Portfolio for André Scheffer

Adobe announced that Google and Yahoo are adding search capabilities that will enable users to look inside the content of files encoded in Adobe’s Flash file format SWF.

The content inside SWF files has heretofore been ignored by the search engine giants, but Adobe has worked with both companies to make sure that their search engine technology can now look inside existing and future SWF content, including text, hyperlinks, audio and video content.

“End users will be getting more accurate search results because there’s a lot of information in SWF files that will now be fully indexed, including more information in Rich Internet Applications (RIAs),” said Justin Everett-Church, senior product manager for Adobe Flash Player, Platform BU.

“And content producers are now able to put Flash files online and know that they’re going to bring more users through organic search. The good thing is that they don’t have to do anything to enable this capability it works on any SWF file,” Everett-Church told Macworld.

Google is already beginning to offer search results including data inside Flash files, and Yahoo will follow suit with an update to its Yahoo Search engine, according to Adobe.

Copyright 2008 IDG News Service. All Rights Reserved.

Set a Guinness World Record for most software downloads in 24 hours by getting Firefox 3 during Download Day.

The official date for the launch of Firefox 3 is June 17, 2008. Join the community and this effort by pledging today.

Beta releases of the next versions of Dreamweaver, Fireworks, and Soundbooth are now available for download on Adobe Labs. Anyone can download and try the software for at least two days after installation while existing customers of Dreamweaver CS3 and Fireworks CS3 can request a serial number to activate the respective beta for the duration of the prerelease period. For those interested in the Soundbooth beta, we are allowing any customer with any CS3 product serial number (including but limited to Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Fireworks, etc.) request and receive a beta serial number and activate the Soundbooth beta.

For more information regarding each release, follow these links:

* Dreamweaver beta
* Fireworks beta
* Soundbooth beta

TxEff is a AS3.0 Flash Component especially developed for web designers that need to include text animations within their Flash movies in a fast and reliable manner.

The TxEff is the highest level of artistic touch that a Flash component can bring to a simple Flash movie with text. You can tweak the effects in infinite ways to get the desired text animation. Just write the desired text/htmlText inside a TextField, drag-and-drop the TxEff over it, and you’re done.

Visit the website.

I have participated in the May 1st Reboot,
an international relaunch of web sites by authors and creatives working within the field of Web Design.

Visit the May 1st Reboot site.

I took my Photoshop CS3 Recertification exam and am happy to report that I have passed. The exam was tough, covering a lot of the new CS3 Extended features. My exam had a few questions about timeline animation and video, as well as one question about 3D. I also had a lot of questions covering output for web & mobile devices. Good luck if you are still planning to take the test - remember, you have until the 30th of April to recertify.

Press Release 3/27/08

Adobe Systems Incorporated (Nasdaq:ADBE) today announced Adobe Photoshop Express public beta, a free Rich Internet Application (RIA) available to anyone who wants to store, sort and show off digital photos with eye-catching effects. During the public beta period, Adobe will solicit Photoshop Express user feedback on product features and functionality, which will continue to evolve over time. As the newest addition to the Photoshop family line, Photoshop Express has taken much of Adobe’s best image editing technology and made it simple and accessible to a new online audience. Photoshop Express allows users to store up to 2 gigabytes of images online for free, make edits to their photos, and share them online in creative ways, including downloading and uploading photos from popular social networking sites like Facebook.

“Photoshop is trusted technology that has changed the visual landscape of our world. Now, Photoshop Express allows anyone who snaps a digital photo to easily achieve the high-impact results for which Adobe is known,” said Doug Mack, vice president of Consumer and Hosted Solutions at Adobe. “Photoshop Express is a convenient, single destination where you can store, edit and share photos whether you’re at home, school or on the road.”

Free and Available Now
Adobe Photoshop Express beta is available now for free via any Web browser at http://www.photoshop.com/express. Photoshop Express was created with Flex, Adobe’s free, open source framework for building RIAs. Flex applications provide a consistent, rich user experience across operating systems and all major browsers, including Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari and others. An Internet connection and an up-to-date Flash Player 9 are all that are required to experience Adobe Photoshop Express. In its early phases, Photoshop Express is available to US residents-only in English. Users may experience slow performance if accessed outside of the US. Future plans include availability in other languages and countries.

At 8pm on the 29 March millions of people around the world will use the simple action of turning off the lights for one hour to deliver a powerful message about the need for action on global warming.

Mark your calendar and join WWF and our partners in the global “Earth Hour” movement by turning your lights off from 8-9 p.m. on March 29.

But there’s much more to Earth Hour than the one-time event. Visit www.earthhour.org to see how you can make Earth Hour a part of your everyday life and find out ways to reduce your carbon dioxide emissions.
You can take a stand against the greatest threat our planet has ever faced. Join the Earth Hour movement now at www.earthhour.org

I have just worked my way through the book “Up to Speed: Photoshop CS3” by Ben Willmore. This book is perfect for anybody already familiar with previous versions of Photoshop, who wants to go directly to the new features of this exciting upgrade.

Unfortunately the book doesn’t cover the Extended version of Photoshop. Despite this it is still well worth getting and even after using CS3 for almost a year I did indeed, as predicted in the introduction, say “I didn’t know CS3 did that!”.

The Scottish Government has just published proposals for the most progressive climate change legislation in the world: the Scottish Climate Change Bill. If the proposals are passed, they could commit Scotland to reducing its greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by 2050 – the target that all developed countries should make if we are to avoid the worst effects of climate change.

Take action here to encourage the Scottish Government to be bold and lead the world.