Sticky Notes

Everyone who has installed before 11/30/2014 needs to get the new setup file at craftboard.net

Monday, November 30, 2009

Oneliner to fix the holes (XXX I hope)

Fingers are crossed. XX
All should work fine now with the cookie cutter. I'm going to work on the adds page now. Got that started this morning. Will probably take me a week or so to get it functional. And that's because I have to create some file content for it also.

Hopefully no more bugs will show up between now and then.

Sunday, November 29, 2009

Cookie Tool has holes

Well, what to do about this one? I discovered if the shapes for the cookie tool have been reflected accross the dashed lines they create some interesting but undesired effects. So if you don't want holes when you cut patterns you cannot use the reflection tool. I guess the flash player cannot get the right coordinates if the mc has been reflected. I will try to post an alert some where in the app about this tomorrow. But first I will see if there is a fix that I don't know about.

I took a bunch of pictures of material and am going to try to make a quilt pattern. Maybe a wedding ring quilt or something that requires circles. Then if it works I'll put it in the shared files.

I did come across an instance 1 time where the patterned move when I was scrolling the whole canvas. But the cut shapes did not move. I'm guessing a reference was broken. I'll look for that one tomorrow too. It only happened 1 time.

I did fix a couple more things like cutting from several blocks of quilt pieces that were already cut and put into a pattern. It seems to be ok, but needs more testing.

Saturday, November 28, 2009

Resizer Tool For Shapes

Finally decided to get the code in for the shape resizer. It's been in the plan but how to find the time to do it all at once!!! If anyone knows how to do that send me an email!

Now I just need to make a few files and double check reloading. The next step is to fix the advertisement spash page to load more items. And to create a better advertising area where a user can select some categories to view. Also I want to make it possible to post items made for sale.

Hope I don't develop any horrible disease from all this typing. I need a program where I can talk to type!

OOPS, 1 liner mess up fixed.

Sorry guys. Sometimes when you code for 12 hours a day accidents happen. Found a very simple line that was commented out by mistake. So many shapes were not loading correctly. Sorry about that. It is fixed.

If anyone has anything else to report just send me an email.

Thursday, November 26, 2009

Rotate Tool Fix

The rotate tool had some problems that are fixed.
It wasn't rotating masked items properly. Also fixed the cookie cutter to not cut anything if it finds a pattern under it. It will only cut from the pattern and ignore other shapes it covers.

Also I put a scroll pane component in the cart info panel. And put the amounts over each item. I suppose I could have put the amounts under the image, but I think it looks kinda nice the way it is. If anyone thinks otherwise, let me know.

There was also a small fix in the progress indicator.

Hope everyone had a nice thanksgiving!

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

New Cookie Cutter

Well, I finally got my idea up of a cookie cutter for cutting images or tiles.
I've had this in my head for some time. But could not find time to put it in writing. It took a couple days of testing. However, I seem to have broken my rotating tool for the items that are cut with it. So I will have to look at that problem tomorrow.

How many crafting people know what a mask is? %10 percent is a high guess.
Well in the computer world a mask is a shape that is put over something else to hide what is outside of the shape. In the craft world I would call this a cookie cutter. Can't think of anything else to call it.

So it's pretty simple. Load patterns to the drawer by clicking on the pattern tab. Then click the open folder button in that tool bar. Open the image by clicking any picutre on your disk. Then drag the image to the canvas.

Now you need a shape for the cookie cutter to cut to. So you can make a shape by opening the shapes panel. After you have your desired shape click the cookie cutter tool. To pick up the shape hold the CTRL key and click the shape. It will follow the mouse.

You press on the image pattern where you want to fill the shape. And there it is! You will see a shape with the image that has been filled from the pattern. To see where you cut, the transparency of the pattern was reduced. It can be set to full transparency by deleting it from the canvas and dragging it back to the canvas. But most people will just want to delete it.

Sunday, November 22, 2009

Mobile phone fun!

Just posted these screen shots of the checkout system. More Screen ShotsCheckout Screen Shots


Just testing mobile blogging

AS3 upgrades on the way!

I got board with as2 coding and started the as3 rewrite. I had to read and reread some of 900 pages on the subject! Only 300 more to go. Only a true geek can enjoy doing this!
I'm hoping it takes only a couple weeks max! This will improve application performance and make coding much easier. So you might not be hearing from me until I get a response from paypal about the new cart system.
I will be back in a month to give my next progress report!

Paypal system awaiting approval

It took over a week to redo the cart system to fit with paypals adaptive payments. I had to put in an order progress bar at the top of the cart to explain more about where in the checkout process a user is.

Just a quick rundown of the process.
REQUEST STAGE
1. A user adds items to the cart. (Request step)
2. The user clicks the request button. And checks back later to see if the request was responded to. Emails are sent to each seller with pictures of their items requested. (no paypal stuff yet)

VERIFY STAGE
1. The seller is notified of the request. And replies that they have the item to sell or they don't have it. The seller can change anything about the item. Verifys the price and can send a note under each item.
2. The buyer checks back and see's the response from the seller. If the seller has changed anything the buyer can decide not to buy, or delete the item. If the buyer wants it they can change their requested amounts, or negotiate a different price and leave notes under the item for the seller to see.
3. When both the buyer and seller amounts and quantity are the same the buyer can place the item in the checkout list.
4. The checkout list contains items from up to 5 sellers at a time. When the list is filled with all the items the buyer wants they click the checkout button.

CONTACT & Paypal STAGE
1. Just fill in your information of who's paying and where it's going.
2. Click place the order.
3. Paypal opens in the browser. There the buyer signs in to paypal. The paypal page will show the total amount to be paid to everyone. Be sure the amount is the same as displayed in the application. (These amounts are taken from the server side. Not sent from a url. Anyone can alter a url, so we recheck to make sure it exists in the requested list and that the price and quantity of the seller matches.)
4. If the amounts are equal the user checks out from paypal. And paypal does it's magic. Each seller is immediately sent a payment. Their consignment amounts are deducted. The remainder is sent to the seller.
5. The buyer returns to the application and clicks the status button. If paypal responded about the transaction the indicator will move to completed.

The seller see's the notice paypal sent and check's in the Craft Board.

PREPARE THE ORDER
To get the the orders do this: Click the house icon. Then click the order tab.
There are 3 icons there for 3 types of orders
1 Open - (Cash Register Icon)
Requests only. Items can be changed, or marked as unavailable.
2 Paid - (Bag Icon)
Shows order that are not shipped yet. The user has paid through paypal.
3 Shipped - (Mail Truck Icon)
Shows orders that have been sent out. The seller can give shipping info or links here.

So the seller clicks on the bag to see the order. They will see a list of user names who are waiting for their order. They click the user name. All the items are listed. The shipping address is listed. There is a place to list the date the item was shipped, and a tracking number. They can also put a link to a shipping site to track orders. The seller completes it by clicking completed. Then the order is moved the the shipped category.

If the seller wants to see the order again they can click on the mail truck. There it will be listed under the user name. Click the first letter in the user name to see all orders within the last 3 months from users that start with that letter.

Now hopefully all goes great. The buyer can see when their item was shipped.

RETURNS
Hopefully this won't happen to much. But every seller must make their own return policy. The agreement is between the buyer and the seller. So the seller can post their own policy by clicking the policy tab. You will see a place to type in some html and or text. You can put clickable links in the policy if your agreement is posted on the web. You can also put images that are posted on the web. The html is limited to the basic tags like:

B:bold
UL: userlist
IMG: image
P: paragraph

If you want to learn more about what you can use search google for Flash Textarea HTML tags

That's sums up how the cart system works. It's very unique by resembling the actual negotiation steps people take when transacting without a computer.

Friday, November 13, 2009

Implementing paypals new secure system!

This is wonderful! I'm now integrating paypals new secure system so buyers can directly view all the amounts they are sending and the companies or individuals they are paying.
Before I had to put the total amount from 1 order into one account. Then disperse it to each seller for their portion of the order. The buyer could only see 1 reciever of their payment.

Now with more features from paypal a buyer can see all the companies they are paying from within their paypal account. The amounts are directly deposited to the proper account. Not only does the buyer feel secure knowing the end recipient, the seller get's their money immediately with less transfer fee's.

Thanks paypal!!!

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Item Browser Fixed

The problem is fixed with the item browser for creating categories. I also put a default setting in for new designers to load categories. I will be working on as3 updates the rest of the day. If anyone has issues with the folder lists for items please send an email. (Or any other issues)

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Found a doozy

I found another problem in the posting panel that caused program to exit with an error. It should be fixed. Be sure to update! The renaming and deleting is still having problems updating the folder list. I spent several hours trying to fix it. I finally decided my code will not fix their code, and I'm sure it's a timing issue. I did think of another fix that may work. So that may be up in a couple days working fine.
I'm working on as3 code with the flash 10 player several hours a day. The upgrade should fix the folders in the posting list to show correctly. And I also found an excellent display so you can view items better. Look for that in December.

Friday, November 6, 2009

Uploading More Seedbeads

Now that I have a Color Grid tool I have to get some seed beads up to practice with. So I've done about 10 and have 300 more to go. LOL. Oh the joy of it all! This gives me a rest from coding. I've double checked the loading process for color grids. It's coming along great! I hope to get a video up as soon as I can make a decent seed bead pattern. Maybe I'll do a tiger head. It's only a few colors and is usually very striking.

Boring! Server Updating

The new server is becoming more stable. There were a couple of hardware issues to figure out. So finally sites are being uploaded.
http://microwebber.com (my very first site) I just can't part with it! It's like an old quilt that took a year to learn and write.

http://craftboard.biz - A site for adding functionality to the craft board in the future.

http://jewelreaper.com - Beautiful jewelry site. This necklace you see on the front page was made by my daughter. I have to go through it to update some things.

I have two more sites to go.

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Plotter Tool Drags Item

Before the plotter tool did not have a way to let you know what item you clicked last. That was changed. Now if you hold the CTRL key down it while in plotter mode it will drop or pick up the item your placing. The item will follow the cursor. If the item is under 50x50 it's placed to the right of the cursor. If you have created any image grids you can plot items under 50x50 onto the grid. So the placement of the plotted item will let you know if it's able to be put on the grid. Items over 50x50 are way too big for image grids.

Also fixed an error with the cropper tool not moving it's indicator buttons.

I've been working on the back end practicing adding seed beads. Fixed some server side stuff and a couple reference problems.

The search and browse panels were changed to reposition side by side, and not hide the canvas when opened.

Sunday, November 1, 2009

New Delete Process & loading errors fixed

I've finally got the delete system for deleting several items at one time in the drawer and search board. Seems to be working right. Send me an email if you find an error with this.

I also found the downloads for items were not starting correctly. Fixed that.
Then a couple days ago found a reference error in loading images grids. That should be fixed also.
Fixed loading from the adds page after the canvas has loaded.

Masking seems to be working great. But still needs a little more testing.

I wanted to start on as3 code today. But came up with another hair brain idea. I think I save it for January and continue on.

Be sure to update when prompted so you get all the fixes.