• A surreal artist showcase
• A school showcase
• Malay Customs
• An interactive storybook by James Garner

Initially, I thought of making an interactive storybook after being inspired by James Garner's Politically Correct Bedtime stories but I realise that 3 months wouldn't be enough for me. That goes for the school showcase too. And for the surreal artist showcase, although I like the works of Surrealists like Salvador Dali and Rene Margritte. Its hard for me to think about the Educational aspect of it, I mean come on, if I made a quiz on surrealism, what should I ask for? Mix and match the pictures with the artist? Come to think of it, that's a pretty good idea. Ah well. My project proposal has already been sent for the Malay Customs and I'm quite excited for my project anyway :-)

I still do not have the floppy disk that contained my project proposal for my TM220. Fortunately for me, I hadn't thrown away the draft copy of the proposal. I had to retype everything from scratch. I *still* would like back the floppy disk though. I've you've seen it, please return it back to me please - thanks. Anyway, take a look at my project proposal here.

Did you know:

Did you know that you can actually create a Gantt / Milestone chart without actually using Visio or MS Project? Don't waste money people - you can make a pretty professional Gantt chart using MS Excel!

Lets do this step by step:

• Type down the data that you need like this:

Take note that for the duration, the amount of time considered is calculated in days.

• Once you've typed in the data, just highlight and click on the Chart Wizard
• You should be in Standard types, click on the Custom Types and click on the floating bars

• Click finish. Now you have a really nice looking Gantt Chart. But we're not finished yet.

As you can see, we would like to have one of the activity to be at the top.

• Click on the Eating, Dreaming Sleeping part and click on the Scale tab. Click on the option, in reverse order.

Presto! You've just made the Eating as your priority. But we're still not done yet. As you can see from your chart, you have alot of empty space for your first activity. Lets try to get rid of these empty space.

• Click on the sheet and the start date. Click on Edit > Clear > Format.
• Take a look at the number and keep that in mind. This will be the starting number for your chart.
• Click undo clear to get back at your date format.
• Click on the dates on your chart again. Click on the scale tab
• Replace the minimum with the number that you have just noted down and click ok.

Congratulations! You've just made a pretty nice Gantt Chart :-)

Anyway...

I've borrowed a really good book on Multimedia which is already due to the library. Heheh. Its called Multimedia Production, Planning and Delivery by Villamil-Casanova Molina, John Villamil-Casanova, Louis Molina. Take a lookie. I think its pretty good for people who are new at Multimedia. A plus point would be the book isn't boring and its not thick - which makes it a joy to carry about :-)

I've also gotten this book: Human-Computer Interaction by Alan J. Dix (Editor), Janet E. Finlay, Gregory D. Abowd (Contributor), russel Beale, Janet E. Finley (Contributor), Russell Beale. This book was recommended by my lecturers. Fortunately I got this book at a good price at an auction website so I didn't have to pay like $50 dollars for this book :-) I haven't really started reading this book as its pretty thick, but I've scanned through the book, it looks pretty interesting with some Human Perception Exercises - aka Eye Illusions.

Something that I don't agree on ...

Our lecturer, taught us how to do rollovers by using the script,

on exitFrame me
if rollover (5) then
set the visible of sprite 5 to false
else
set the visible of sprite 5 to true
end if
go to the frame
end

But I kind of don't particularly like this script because as you can see the picture doesn't immediately change when you place your mouse over it and there is this horrid pause while waiting for the picture to rollover. View an example here.

But probably the biggest reason why I dont like this script is because of the reasons:

1. It is tedious. You *have* to align the cast members at exactly the same spot.
2. It is troublesome. Lets think about it. Lets say that we have nicely noted down the script number and nicely placed it on out script and then suddenly, you just HAD to move to cast on your score. The you had to change your script all over again.
3. Its aesthetically unpleasant - having to see so many cast members on the score is just distasteful. I don't know about you, but I like to keep my score box nice and short.
4. I hate typing out so much! If I had to place 5 rollovers, I had to type in like 25 lines! And that doesn't include the tediousness of having to align and stuff.

There is a much simpler way to do this. You do not have to worry about placing the other text exactly to the back of the cast member - and best of all, you don't have to worry about getting the cast numbers. Heck, you don't even have to worry about the script. So no worries if you *accidentally* changed the placings of the score.

Okay, lets do this step by step:

• First, open the paint button on the toolbox to create a shape or text that you wish.
• In this example, I have typed out a yellow text.
• Rename this cast as "text1"

• Repeat the steps above to make another text in a different colour. Rename this cast as "text2"
• Next, click on the behaviour inspector This will bring about a behaviour inspector window.
• Click on the top plus sign and click on the "New Behaviour"
• Under bahaviour name, rename it to "rollover". Click ok.
• Under the events, click the plus sign and click "mouse enter"
• Under the action, click the plus sign and click sprite > Change cast member
• Change cast member to "text2"

After this, we need to add another script. Or else, when the person places his cursor the cast, the cast will change but will not change back to the original.

• Under the events, click the plus sign again and click "Mouse Leave"
• Under the action, click on the plus sign and click sprite > change cast member
• Change cast member to "text1"

• Click rewind and play. Enjoy! :-)