Create a skin to win a ticket to MAX, a MacBook Air and a bundle of software

Earlier today, ScaleNine.com launched the “Skin To Win Challenge” sponsored by EffectiveUI and Adobe.

Juan Sanchez‘ website ScaleNine.com has an impressive collection of CSS skins for Flex applications. With this contest, he’s looking for new additions to this collection and the top three entries win some really cool prizes including a MacBook Air (with SSD!), tickets to MAX, CS3 Master Collection and Flex Builder.

The contest website has everything you need to get started, even if you’re completely new to Flex skinning! Andrew Shorten created a couple of tutorial videos to help you on your way to create your winning Flex skin!

I’m really looking forward to see the skins that come out of this contest. You have until October 10th to submit your entry so you better start now!

Via:Serge Jespers

Adobe Edge Newsletter - August 2008

Papervision3D Showcase

via: Papervision3D

MooTools 1.2 Image Protector

It always makes me laugh a little when people try to “protect” things on the Internet. The dwProtector tries to “protect” your images with you just having to:

• Prevents right-click “Save Image As”.
• Prevents dragging an image to the desktop.
• Prevents right-click “Save Background As”.
• Prevents right-click “View Background Image”

Check out the example and try to copy it. Of course, a simple print screen / apple-shift-4 does the trick, let alone a view-source.

via: Ajaxian

Some Stats About Flash Player and Browsers

Egypt Imagine Cup

People are starving.  Diseases ravage communities.  Basic education is out of reach for too many people.  Dangerous shifts in the environment affect millions as countries struggle to develop in sustainable ways.  It seems overwhelming - but we can’t throw up our hands and give up.  The answers are all around us in thousands of ideas that happen every day.  Solutions might be in the next few lines of code, a compelling photo or even a simple game that can teach the world a lesson.

These small sparks set the world’s imagination on fire and lead to change that really matters.  Technology can be the force multiplier that transforms these great ideas into real world solutions.  And that’s the point of the Imagine Cup every year - to use technology to make a difference.
We need everyone - software programmers, hardware developers, artists and dreamers  - to imagine a better world, then make it happen.  The Imagine Cup brings together more than 200,000 students from over 100 countries around the world where they compete to help find the answers.  And no matter who comes up with the best solutions - everybody wins.

prettyCheckboxes, a solution to checkboxes

This script is for people who wants to have a consistent look for
checkboxes across browser or those who simply want them to look better.
By using this script you wont loose any of the regular inputs
usability. If you have any comment/suggestion please post them in the main script post.

BT Acquires Flex Mobile company For $105 Million

BT announced that it has acquired Silicon Valley based Ribbit for $105 million in cash. On July 9 we reported that Ribbit executives were telling friends
the deal was done while simultaneously denying it to the press. One
thing we got wrong was the price, though. We were hearing $55 million,
$5 million more than competitor GrandCentral managed to wrangle out of Google. Ribbit got nearly double that. Ribbit has raised just $13 million
from Allegis Capital, KPG Ventures and Alsop Louie Ventures. That makes
this exit nearly a ten-bagger just two and a half years after launch.

CSS support in email clients

Designing an HTML email that renders consistently across the major
email clients can be very time consuming. Support for even simple CSS
varies considerably between clients, and even different versions of the
same client.

We’ve put together this CSS support in email clients guide to save you
the time and trouble of figuring it out for yourself. With 21 different
sets of results, all the major email systems are covered, both desktop
applications and webmail.

• Download the PDF version (124 KB)
• Download the Excel version (41 KB zip)

Via: Campaign Monitor

CSS support in HTML emails of Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail and Gmail

HTML emails are the subject of many discussions. This article doesn’t discuss about weither or not HTML messages have their place in our mailboxes, but about a problem web developers face when creating HTML emails: the email client support of CSS. This article will concentrate on the support offered by three important web based mail clients: Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail and Gmail.

Via: www.xavierfrenette.com

30 essential pdf documents every designer should download

Well it took me a lot longer than I had originally expected but I was able to track down the original links to more than thirty PDF documents that I have collected over the past couple of years. I have personally archived every one of these files due to the high quality of content. No matter what you call them; ebook, white paper, or resource they all contain information that no designer should go without. (In actuality there are more than 30 files however it was a good round number for the title…)

YAHOO! Design Pattern Library

The WordPress Help Sheet

The Advanced WordPress Help Sheet

AIGA | Aquent Salary Survey

AIGA Why Design? Booklet

Type Classification eBook - Jacob Cass

WEB DEVELOPMENT & PROGRAMMING

Getting Real - 37signals (Read Online for Free)

DotMobi Mobile Web Developer’s Guide

Accessibility Checklist - Aaron Cannon

CSS Selectors Cheat Sheet - Cameron Moll

CSS Support in Email Clients

Dive Into Accessibility

PRESENTATIONS

Design is in the Details - Naz Hamid

Grids are Good - Khoi Vinh & Mark Boulton

Destroy the “Web 2.0 Look” - Elliot Jay Stocks

Print is the New Web - Elliot Jay Stocks

Creating Content for the Web - Naz Hamid

Elegant Web Typography - Jeff Croft

Entrepreneurs on Rails - Dan Benjamin

Bulletproof Web Design - Dan Cederholm

Interface Design Juggling - Dan Cederholm

FREELANCING & INCOME

Web Designer’s Success Guide

Passive Income Guide - Freelance Switch

Time Management for Creative People - Mark McGuinness

A Primer in Social Media - SmashLAB

Contingency Design - 37signals

Introduction to Good Usability - Peter Pixel

How to Be Creative - Hugh MacLeod

PDF COLLECTIONS

Creative Latitude Business Resources

Computer Arts Tutorials

AIGA Design & Business Forms