Wednesday, April 26, 2006

The Installer We Have All Been Waiting For...

So I finally kicked off a Triton build that seems to have successfully included what you all have been screaming for...

an Opt Out of AOL Explorer!!!

I must say, I've been wanting this feature in as well. I'm not saying that I don't like the browser, I'm actually all about it. I'm just saying that I went to AIM.COM for an instant message client, not a browser. Lets face it. You end up having a "Would you like this to be your default browser" war between I.E., Firefox, and AOL Explorer. Yea, I know, there are options that disable that...but we're click happy...we click NO and move on.

So stay tuned for our next Beta, or even better, when we GM (which will be soon I hope). It's a big Up from what we released in December. As for AOL Explorer, give it a shot. You may find yourself falling for its eye-candy features and end up setting it as your default browser :)

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

Example: showAd();

Believe it or not, what we learned in school still stands: Using descriptive naming conventions are helpful. For example...

Using Gus' IM Control Panel, you'll find that the AIM code has been beautifully separated into subfolders with obvious naming conventions.

  • The "bl" folder, for instance, stands for Buddy List. And in there,
  • The "bl.js" file, represents the main script code for the buddy list.
Okay Okay. So you're thinking, "Big Deal. Anyone can name folders and files with an obvious naming scheme. How about with code!?" Well hold your horses. Going back to the example above, you'll find:

  • bl.js has a function called showAd();
So anytime you're in that file and you see this.showAd(), you never have to stop and think..."Hmmm, now what does that function call do again?"

Monday, April 24, 2006

Introduction...

Hi AIM users,

So, this is my first blog. Cut me some slack will ya!? My intent is to talk about all things AIM related from a client stand point.

If you have any infrastructure questions, College Justin would be a good starting point. If he doesn't have the answer, I'm sure he can point you to someone that does.

If you have any questions I can't answer, call out Gus Verdun, the Triton Dev Architect. And check out his blog while you're at it...he has some pretty cool stuff :)

Well, I'm out for now. Time for some 24!!!