Well, it's been about a month and a half since we pushed out an update to TileStack. That's a few weeks longer than I like to go, but we spent most of the time working on the absolutely most important feature of TileStack... wait for it...
The Stack Editor
Yeah, we know it's been less than stellar. Ok, it's actually been down right terrible to use in a number of ways. We admit it and we apologize if you have been discouraged by its state of affairs. The truth is that none of us have been happy with the editor since we first launched the beta, but we thought it would be a good idea to start getting feedback on what we were up to so that we could take things in the right direction. Looking back on it, we probably should have called our initial launch an "alpha" or "preview", but there's not much we can do about that now :) What we can do however, is fix it.
That's why today, I'm happy to announce a redesigned, simplified, and nearly problem free Stack Editor:
And this is just the beginning. In future updates to the site, you are going to see the editor improve in a number of new ways. Additionally, we are going to be investing heavily in our HyperCard compatibility goal as well as our help documentation. But for now, here's a great video introduction to the new editor:
New Export / Embedding Options
We've also been quite busy adding new export & embedding options for the stacks you create. New options include export as a Facebook Application and Google Gadget as well as improved exporting to a OS X Dashboard Widget:
Everything That's New, Enhanced or Fixed
For the intently curious, here's the complete list of what's changed... and that's a boiled down list :)
Stack Editor:
Simplified and combined the five separate editor tabs into a single "Design" mode tab
Added a dedicated "Browse" mode tab for interacting with your stack
Design mode is now only for editing. No System Messages (ex: openTile) are generated
Design mode has four top-level actions: "New Button", "New Field", "New Tile" and "Stack Info"
When in "Background" mode, the "New Tile" button changes to "New Background"
Added hover over tool tip help to all action buttons lacking text
Hovering over a Part on your Stack, now shows a tool tip with the Part's id and name
Just click to select a Part to edit and the toolbar will change to the correct editing tools
Similarly, to edit the Tile or Background, just click on a Stack's surface
Alternatively, select a Part to edit via the new part selector popup on the left of the editor
Resizing or moving a Part causes a tool tip to be shown with the Part's size or location
Selecting a Background Button or Background Field for editing, switches to "Background" mode
Added "Bring Closer" and "Send Farther" layer control buttons to the tool bar
Text toolbar is now only shown when a Button or Field is selected for editing
Both the "Message Box" & "Background" buttons were moved to the right and given icons
Replaced all button icons to help clarify each available action
Moved "Delete" button to the far left to avoid unintentional clicks
Improved the color selector with a palette of standard colors and a transparent option
Starter script is inserted when you open the script editor on something without a script
Script editor is now functional in Firefox 2+, Safari 3+, IE 7+ and Opera 9+
Fixed numerous bugs with the script editor and added better indention and key navigation
Added code snippets and basic completion support to the editor (ex: if)
Changed the default font for a new Button or Field to be platform independent
Removed auto-delete of unused images and added the ability to delete images in the editor
Added support for uploading sounds to the Icon or Picture popup. This is temporary, but works
Added support for uploading compressed zip files that contain images or sounds
Added proper arrowKey navigation to the editor so that using left/right transitions tiles
Replaced the "number of" display in the navigation bar with a Tile/Background popup selector
Added visible toggle in the options toolbar for Button's & Field's
Web Site
New generated Stack preview images throughout the site
New embed as Facebook Application feature. Access under "Embed/Export..." on a published Stack
New export to Google Gadget. Access under "Embed/Export..." on a published Stack
Enhanced OS X Dashboard Widget exporting
Enhanced pulling up a page that requires you to log in. It will now go to the page after login
Enhanced "Ask This Question" in Help section so it asks a question with 3 minutes to change it
Enhanced presentation of options for an action so they are now shown in an overlay window
Enhanced the mini-feed so that it shows shorter descriptions for items with long text
Fixed "Search Answers" & "Ask This Question" in Help section so they always work when clicked
Fixed the search box on the site. It no longer requires you be logged in to use search
Speak Language
New 'play' command for sound playback (ex: play boing). Does not support note, pitch or tempo yet
New 'beep' command for making an auditory beep
New 'dial' command for sound playback of phone keypad sounds. Does not support "with modem" ;
Fixed comparisons between Parts and values (ex: tile field 1 = "Hello")
Fixed "contains" and "is in" use with Parts and values (ex: the icon of button 1 contains "Smile")
Stack Player
New support for setting the icon or pict to a URL (ex: http://www.mysite.com/mypic.png )
New pre-loading of image & sound resources. This makes resource intense stacks perform much better
Enhanced the look of Button & Field styles and added proper transparency so borders look correct
Enhanced the popup Button so that the 'text' properties change the font of the drop-down
Fixed the popup Button so that the first line is selected correctly.
Fixed the partNumber property so that it works and Speak can be used to control part layering
Fixed the icon & color properties of Button so their values can be retrieved with a 'get' command
Fixed the 'arrowKey' system message so 'right' & 'left' are sent properly. They were inverted
Fixed the 'keyDown' system message so it's sent to the current Tile first instead of the Stack
Fixed the 'enabled' property of Button so mouse up/down handlers will not execute when disabled
Fixed some bugs in the Stack saving routine that in some cases, were causing changes to be lost
People often equate stacks with widgets. In fact the ShakeASpear stack actually started its life as a Dashboard widget. It only makes sense that you should be able to download any published stack as a Dashboard widget. Now you can. From any stack's page, just click the 'Embed/Export' button and then click 'Dashboard widget.'
NOTE: The Dashboard is available on Mac OS X 10.4+ only. Don't worry Windows users, we'll get to you soon. ;)
It is always amazing how quickly time can fly. July is almost completely gone.
My plans for a small mid-month release morphed into a grand vision for a major
end of month release. Today we witness the achievement of that milestone. We
have an amazing and hard-working team that has continued to do wonderful work.
The first thing you will notice is that the entire site has been visually
refreshed. Our goal in this was to make the site more visually stimulating and
intuitive. We've redesigned the footer of every page to include the latest
news and links to information about the site and the people behind it. Each
page has its own custom sub-header with a large icon to help more clearly
identify the page.
The next thing you should notice is the brand new home page. Previously this
was identical to your profile page, but we've re-organized it a little so that
it is a bit more useful. In addition to your personal and published stacks
lists we've added a customized list of the latest site activity. You can find
this list on the right hand side of your home page.
If you look at the navigation bar that is at the top of every page, you will
notice that the Community tab is missing and in its place is a direct link to
this blog and a new Help section. Although we're working hard to make
TileStack as easy to use and understand as possible, we recognize that people
still need to be able to go some place for help.
Our help section is divided into two parts. The first is the highly requested
and much needed documentation. Although it isn't complete yet, it's complete
enough to start being useful. Also, all of the help topics are indexed for fast
searching.
The second part of the help section is our "Question and Answer" section. If
you can't find what you need in the help topics, then you can search through
all the questions we have been asked about the site, and see what we and other
community members have said in response to those questions. If you still can't
find what you need, then feel free to ask a new question, and we'll get back
with you as soon as we can.
If that's not enough for you, we've also improved our iPhone/iPod Touch
interface, enhanced the embedding support, added the ability to download any
published stack as a Mac OS X Dashboard widget (video coming soon), and made
several improvements to the TileStack player and Speak language.
All in all, we think this is a pretty compelling release. We think you're
going to like it so much that you'll want to tell your friends. Over the next
few days we're going to be giving all of our registered users invite codes to
give to their friends. When you log in, there should be a link next to your
display name at the top of the page indicating how many invites you have left.
Clicking the link will show you the codes, and give you a place to enter your
friends' emails directly.
Sure it's cool that TileStack.com makes it easy to create fun widgets that can be viewed from the site, but wouldn't it be cool if you could take those stacks and embed them in your personal blog?
TileStack makes it very easy. From any published stack's page, just click the 'Embed/Export' button, and copy and paste the code provided.
NOTE: For best viewing, click the full screen button and make sure your volume is turned up.
Below is a video that will walk you through the brand new TileStack iPhone Web Application. Starting today, if you visit http://tilestack.com on an iPhone or iPod Touch, TileStack will detect the fact that you're on one of those devices and automatically send you to the right place. Once there, you can simply login with your normal email and password.
One of the best parts about TileStack on the iPhone is that it allows the use of any stack, right on the device. (It will scale the stack to the proper width and height so that it fits on the screen).
Another important point is that any data you enter into a PERSONAL stack on your iPhone or iPod Touch will automatically be saved the background. So if I load up a note-taking stack, enter some text and then navigate away, when I come back and view the stack again, the text I entered is there. It will also be there when I view the stack in a full browser at home.
Check out the video below for even more info and a full demonstration. If you have any questions feel free to hit me up with a message. (You can send a direct message to any member from their profile page here on the site).
Thanks,
Jake
NOTE: For best viewing, click the full screen button and make sure your volume is turned up.
Huge Stack Editor Improvements and New Export-Embedding
by Josh Gertzen on September 25, 2008 at 6:14 PM
Well, it's been about a month and a half since we pushed out an update to TileStack. That's a few weeks longer than I like to go, but we spent most of the time working on the absolutely most important feature of TileStack... wait for it...
The Stack Editor
Yeah, we know it's been less than stellar. Ok, it's actually been down right terrible to use in a number of ways. We admit it and we apologize if you have been discouraged by its state of affairs. The truth is that none of us have been happy with the editor since we first launched the beta, but we thought it would be a good idea to start getting feedback on what we were up to so that we could take things in the right direction. Looking back on it, we probably should have called our initial launch an "alpha" or "preview", but there's not much we can do about that now :) What we can do however, is fix it.That's why today, I'm happy to announce a redesigned, simplified, and nearly problem free Stack Editor:
And this is just the beginning. In future updates to the site, you are going to see the editor improve in a number of new ways. Additionally, we are going to be investing heavily in our HyperCard compatibility goal as well as our help documentation. But for now, here's a great video introduction to the new editor:
New Export / Embedding Options
We've also been quite busy adding new export & embedding options for the stacks you create. New options include export as a Facebook Application and Google Gadget as well as improved exporting to a OS X Dashboard Widget:Everything That's New, Enhanced or Fixed
For the intently curious, here's the complete list of what's changed... and that's a boiled down list :)
- Simplified and combined the five separate editor tabs into a single "Design" mode tab
- Added a dedicated "Browse" mode tab for interacting with your stack
- Design mode is now only for editing. No System Messages (ex: openTile) are generated
- Design mode has four top-level actions: "New Button", "New Field", "New Tile" and "Stack Info"
- When in "Background" mode, the "New Tile" button changes to "New Background"
- Added hover over tool tip help to all action buttons lacking text
- Hovering over a Part on your Stack, now shows a tool tip with the Part's id and name
- Just click to select a Part to edit and the toolbar will change to the correct editing tools
- Similarly, to edit the Tile or Background, just click on a Stack's surface
- Alternatively, select a Part to edit via the new part selector popup on the left of the editor
- Resizing or moving a Part causes a tool tip to be shown with the Part's size or location
- Selecting a Background Button or Background Field for editing, switches to "Background" mode
- Added "Bring Closer" and "Send Farther" layer control buttons to the tool bar
- Text toolbar is now only shown when a Button or Field is selected for editing
- Both the "Message Box" & "Background" buttons were moved to the right and given icons
- Replaced all button icons to help clarify each available action
- Moved "Delete" button to the far left to avoid unintentional clicks
- Improved the color selector with a palette of standard colors and a transparent option
- Starter script is inserted when you open the script editor on something without a script
- Script editor is now functional in Firefox 2+, Safari 3+, IE 7+ and Opera 9+
- Fixed numerous bugs with the script editor and added better indention and key navigation
- Added code snippets and basic completion support to the editor (ex: if
)
- Changed the default font for a new Button or Field to be platform independent
- Removed auto-delete of unused images and added the ability to delete images in the editor
- Added support for uploading sounds to the Icon or Picture popup. This is temporary, but works
- Added support for uploading compressed zip files that contain images or sounds
- Added proper arrowKey navigation to the editor so that using left/right transitions tiles
- Replaced the "number of" display in the navigation bar with a Tile/Background popup selector
- Added visible toggle in the options toolbar for Button's & Field's
Web Site- New generated Stack preview images throughout the site
- New embed as Facebook Application feature. Access under "Embed/Export..." on a published Stack
- New export to Google Gadget. Access under "Embed/Export..." on a published Stack
- Enhanced OS X Dashboard Widget exporting
- Enhanced pulling up a page that requires you to log in. It will now go to the page after login
- Enhanced "Ask This Question" in Help section so it asks a question with 3 minutes to change it
- Enhanced presentation of options for an action so they are now shown in an overlay window
- Enhanced the mini-feed so that it shows shorter descriptions for items with long text
- Fixed "Search Answers" & "Ask This Question" in Help section so they always work when clicked
- Fixed the search box on the site. It no longer requires you be logged in to use search
Speak Language- New 'play' command for sound playback (ex: play boing). Does not support note, pitch or tempo yet
- New 'beep' command for making an auditory beep
- New 'dial' command for sound playback of phone keypad sounds. Does not support "with modem" ;
- Fixed comparisons between Parts and values (ex: tile field 1 = "Hello")
- Fixed "contains" and "is in" use with Parts and values (ex: the icon of button 1 contains "Smile")
Stack PlayerHas 1 comment
TileStack in Your Dashboard (Video)
by Ted on August 05, 2008 at 12:21 PM
People often equate stacks with widgets. In fact the ShakeASpear stack actually started its life as a Dashboard widget. It only makes sense that you should be able to download any published stack as a Dashboard widget. Now you can. From any stack's page, just click the 'Embed/Export' button and then click 'Dashboard widget.'
NOTE: The Dashboard is available on Mac OS X 10.4+ only. Don't worry Windows users, we'll get to you soon. ;)
Has 0 comments
We're Looking Good
by Ted on July 30, 2008 at 1:07 AM
It is always amazing how quickly time can fly. July is almost completely gone. My plans for a small mid-month release morphed into a grand vision for a major end of month release. Today we witness the achievement of that milestone. We have an amazing and hard-working team that has continued to do wonderful work.
The first thing you will notice is that the entire site has been visually refreshed. Our goal in this was to make the site more visually stimulating and intuitive. We've redesigned the footer of every page to include the latest news and links to information about the site and the people behind it. Each page has its own custom sub-header with a large icon to help more clearly identify the page.
The next thing you should notice is the brand new home page. Previously this was identical to your profile page, but we've re-organized it a little so that it is a bit more useful. In addition to your personal and published stacks lists we've added a customized list of the latest site activity. You can find this list on the right hand side of your home page.
If you look at the navigation bar that is at the top of every page, you will notice that the Community tab is missing and in its place is a direct link to this blog and a new Help section. Although we're working hard to make TileStack as easy to use and understand as possible, we recognize that people still need to be able to go some place for help.
Our help section is divided into two parts. The first is the highly requested and much needed documentation. Although it isn't complete yet, it's complete enough to start being useful. Also, all of the help topics are indexed for fast searching.
The second part of the help section is our "Question and Answer" section. If you can't find what you need in the help topics, then you can search through all the questions we have been asked about the site, and see what we and other community members have said in response to those questions. If you still can't find what you need, then feel free to ask a new question, and we'll get back with you as soon as we can.
If that's not enough for you, we've also improved our iPhone/iPod Touch interface, enhanced the embedding support, added the ability to download any published stack as a Mac OS X Dashboard widget (video coming soon), and made several improvements to the TileStack player and Speak language.
All in all, we think this is a pretty compelling release. We think you're going to like it so much that you'll want to tell your friends. Over the next few days we're going to be giving all of our registered users invite codes to give to their friends. When you log in, there should be a link next to your display name at the top of the page indicating how many invites you have left. Clicking the link will show you the codes, and give you a place to enter your friends' emails directly.
Also, we're on Twitter so go follow @tilestack, @gertzen, @tedchoward, @robrohan, and @jakemarsh (if you're not already). We're also on Facebook and we've been known to hang out from time to time in #tilestack at irc.freenode.net.
Has 0 comments
Embed Your Stacks (Video)
by Ted on July 29, 2008 at 7:41 PM
Sure it's cool that TileStack.com makes it easy to create fun widgets that can be viewed from the site, but wouldn't it be cool if you could take those stacks and embed them in your personal blog?
TileStack makes it very easy. From any published stack's page, just click the 'Embed/Export' button, and copy and paste the code provided.
NOTE: For best viewing, click the full screen button and make sure your volume is turned up.
Has 3 comments
TileStack On The iPhone (Video)
by Jake Marsh on July 29, 2008 at 2:31 PM
Below is a video that will walk you through the brand new TileStack iPhone Web Application. Starting today, if you visit http://tilestack.com on an iPhone or iPod Touch, TileStack will detect the fact that you're on one of those devices and automatically send you to the right place. Once there, you can simply login with your normal email and password.
One of the best parts about TileStack on the iPhone is that it allows the use of any stack, right on the device. (It will scale the stack to the proper width and height so that it fits on the screen).
Another important point is that any data you enter into a PERSONAL stack on your iPhone or iPod Touch will automatically be saved the background. So if I load up a note-taking stack, enter some text and then navigate away, when I come back and view the stack again, the text I entered is there. It will also be there when I view the stack in a full browser at home.
Check out the video below for even more info and a full demonstration. If you have any questions feel free to hit me up with a message. (You can send a direct message to any member from their profile page here on the site).
Thanks,
Jake
NOTE: For best viewing, click the full screen button and make sure your volume is turned up.
Has 0 comments