Code
Tutorial: Active Record's named_scope Method for Ruby on Rails
This screencast covers Active Record's namedscope_ method. Namedscope_ adds a class method that returns objects meeting specified criteria. Named scopes are commonly used to identify a grouping of objects based on some common criteria such as "...
Tutorial: Create Animation with GTween Library for ActionScript 3, Part Two
In this second part of our introduction to GTween Library, I will show you how to implement many of the GTween classes as we create a cool spinning and folding paper animation. Recall that Grant Skinner developed GTween Library, which makes it e...
Network Maintenance: Use PHP to Port Scan and Check Service Status
The Internet Protocol Suite (TCP/IP) uses two reference components, an address and a port number, to ensure that network communications are sent to and received by the proper servers and applications. For security and performance reasons it is oft...
Tutorial: How to Create a Signup System with CodeIgniter
Most every ecommerce website has a user registration page. This basic form typically captures information about the user before processing orders from an online shop. In this tutorial, I will step through the process of creating a PHP-based regis...
Tutorial: Create Animation with GTween Library for ActionScript 3, Part One
In this two-part video series, I'll introduce you to the powerful GTween Library, demonstrating how to use some of the animation effects this library makes possible. Grant Skinner developed GTween Library, which makes it easy to tween. Tween stan...
Six Exceptional HTML 5 Videos
HTML 5 does more to facilitate the evolution of the Internet from a communication media to an application platform than any other recent web technology. Stated simply, HTML 5 is the newest version of the Hypertext Markup Language. It can be writt...
Audio Interview: Scott Meade on Ruby on Rails
Ruby on Rails powers some of the Internet's most popular websites and applications, and it is an increasingly important framework for ecommerce dev...
Try CodeIgniter for Your Next Ecommerce Build
If you have created websites in PHP, you have probably dealt with some of the same code or coding tasks—such as pagination or image manipulation— repeatedly as the need for exactly the same type of code is repeated from project to project and site...
Tutorial: Put Your Flash Application On Facebook
Facebook has more than 350 million active users worldwide and some 70 percent of those users interact with applications on the platform, according to the social network's own data. As an ecommerce web developer, the opportunity to connect to Face...
PHP 5.2.12 Officially Released
The PHP development team at PHP.net recently released version 5.2.12. The new release was developed to improve the stability of the PHP 5.2.x branch, address some minor bugs, and enhance security. The popular PHP scripting language is used on an ...
Nine Useful PHP Frameworks
Using a PHP framework can speed project development and make it easier to create stable, reliable, and modern web applications. Scripting language frameworks generally extend the basic principles behind a language like PHP, by making it simpler t...
Tutorial: Timeline Animation in Flash CS4
The Motion Editor feature in Adobe Flash Professional CS4 gives Flash developers control of motion tweens, allowing for property-by-property animations. The feature makes adding basic timeline animation fast and easy, but the control is signifi...
Tutorial: Use the Graphic Class in ActionScript 3 to Generate Site Traffic
Generating site traffic is a major concern for ecommerce marketers, and one of the many methods they use to attract site visitors is to offer content other than just products. This additional content might be blog articles, how-to videos, or inte...
Tutorial: Create a Single-image, Fading-hover Effect
CSS and JavaScript can be a powerful web design duo, working together to add both a presentation layer and a behavior layer to your site projects. In this short tutorial, I will describe how to use CSS and a single image to create an image-switch...
Tutorial: Building a Custom Scroll Bar Component for Adobe Flash
Flash Components, though powerful, are often heavy (in terms of file size), restrictive, and unsuitable for some projects. In this screencast, we'll tackle building a custom scroll bar class in ActionScript that is lightweight (4k), extendable a...
Ruby on Rails: "Views" and "Controllers" Explained
Ruby on Rails is one of the most popular programming frameworks, in part because of its model-view-controller architecture. In this screencast, we look at views and controllers. Models can stand alone and provide value without views or controlle...
Seven JavaScript Tutorials We Wish We’d Written
JavaScript adds interactivity to web design and development. The language is one of the most important aspects of modern website creation, and without it, many user interfaces would be bland indeed. Often, we find skilled developers who have take...
Tutorial: Transforming XSLT with PHP
One of the mistakes many new PHP developers make is not separating their code layer from their presentation layer. When creating applications for the web, for instance, new developers will often mix backend database calls and other programming l...
Tutorial: Creating A Flash-based User Form and Attaching a Database, Part Two
Adding Flash development skills to your toolbox can make you a much more marketable developer. So to help improve those skills, Flash and web design expert Jonah Were describes how to create a database and uses PHP to connect that database to a F...
A Look at Audio and Video Elements in HTML 5
HTML 5’s audio and video APIs offer web designers and developers an alternative for delivering rich Internet content. Internet users in the U.S. watched some 27.9 billion online videos in October 2009, according to comScore, the Internet tracking...