Will Langley, Web Developer
Bio
Will’s passion is incorporating rich media and engaging content into a seamless user experience. His development skills are benefiting many of Capstrat’s Web clients, including Genworth Financial, Wake County Economic Development, Deloitte, the NC Health and Wellness Trust Fund, the NC Department of Justice and the Duke University Office of Information Technology.Articles
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NC Innocence Commission proves its worth
Yesterday, Greg Taylor became a free man, thanks to the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission. Taylor's is the first exoneration since the Commission's establishment in 2006, and this morning the legal blogosphere is abuzz with validation of the agency as a prototype to be followed.
The NCIIC is the first of it's kind - a state-run and state-funded agency with the sole purpose of reviewing claims of wrongful conviction. The 8-person commission can only review evidence not presented at trial. Based on the strength of this evidence, the commission can grant a formal review by a three-judge panel. As of this writing, two other cases have been reviewed, though neither of those resulted in an exoneration. Despite this record, the project appears to be a success. This success can be attributed, in part, to the positioning of the Commission inside the flow of a judicial process. Having subpoena power, the Commission has the authority to command review. Innocence claims too often suffer at the expense of costly, inefficient appeals and reviews processes.
A national debate has developed in recent years over the appeals process in capital cases, and the degree to which potential exculpatory evidence in such cases should be pursued. The Innocence Project, a non-profit legal clinic established in 1992, has fed the debate through contributing to or highlighting 251 post-conviction exonerations. According to New York state Innocence Project director Barry C. Scheck, "North Carolina's commission is an important model for adjudication of innocence claims. In the American court system, there are normally procedural bars that get in the way of litigating whether someone is innocent or not."
Following North Carolina's lead, the Pennsylvania state Senate created an Innocence Commission in 2006. Virginia has merged three organizations to create the Innocence Commission for Virginia (ICVA). Several other states, including California, Connecticut and Wisconsin, have initiated similar innocence projects in the past decade. North Carolina's remains the first and only of it's kind, however, and now, more than ever, is seen as a national model to be followed. -
Build this Droid app!
I want someone to build an app for me that can find lost keys, hats, remotes and dog collars. For my Droid.
I've got an Arduino. I've got all sorts of projects waiting patiently in the wings of my free time. I'm hoping to break into app development at some point this year (Droid app dev - let's be clear, I'm not learning objective c). I'm all about wiring up my house with RFID emitters and a wall panel, but I want something more...device-y. I want an app to track and fire these RFID signals, and geolocate them in their nooks and crannies, between the sofa cushions, in the pocket of the pants that I wore last Tuesday. Hell, take it to the next level and get some funding: pitch it to Netflix to wire up their rentals so I can find those DVD's in the laundry hamper!
This has been done already, I know. Clunky, old and cheap-plastic-y, just like the Web site. If you'll build this Droid app for me, I'll build a sexy site for you to match*. Aaaaaand I promise my devotion to and shameless promotion of you and your fabulous app.
To address the most obvious naysayer argument straight away: I will NEVER lose my phone.
Gauntlet thrown down. Hit me up:
http://www.facebook.com/bigbritches
*Disclaimer: Not for free. Certainly affordable, certainly sexy, but unless you wanna throw in some royalties (let's talk), I have bills.
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Bu Ku set to take downtown Raleigh's restaurant scene to the next level
Inclement weather or not, downtown Raleigh is set to give birth to another fresh and sophisticated dining experience tonight, February 5th, as Bu Ku opens its doors. In conjunction with First Friday, there will be a two-night grand opening celebration, sure to be fun.
Taking it's inspiration from pushcart street vendors around the globe, Bu Ku's menu will feature a range of ethnic cuisines and flavors, from Polish to Thai to Korean, Lebanese, Indian and others.
My stomach growls at the possibilities. Support local businesses and get Downtown!
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Superbowl Ads! My Top 10 List
Here's my top 10 list of this year's crop of Superbowl ads. I have to say, better this year over last.
- Doritos: Snowglobe
- Teleflora: Talking Flowers
- Cash4Gold.com: Heeere's Money
- CareerBuilder.com: Tips
- Monster: Need a new job?
- CareerBuilder.com: Tips
- NBC: LMAO
- Cars.com: David Abernathy
- Doritos: Power of the Crunch
- Pepsi Max: I'm Good
Honorable Mention:
- Castrol Oil: Edge Monkeys
- Audi: Chase
- Pepsi: Pepsuber
- Denny's: Thugs
- Bridgestone: Hot Item
- NFL: Super Ad, Usama Young
Production Value Mention:
- Coke: Heist
- GE: Scarecrow
- Coke Classic: Avatar
There are some notable absences from this year's crop - namely, beer ads in general. And aside from the fantastically-slick 'Heist' ad, Coke let me down. That rip-off of the famous Joe Green ad was decidedly underwhelming. Cheesy award would have to go to NBC's cringe-inducing series of [WATCH THE NEW SEASON WATCH IT WATCH IT WATCH IT] Heroes plugs.
Take a look at all of the ads below - thanks Hulu - and let's discuss! -
Warning! triple-check SWFObject player version for IE7
Since I've made the switch over to Flash CS3, I've noticed a screwy bug in Internet Explorer. I believe it to be nothing more than a production oversight on my part, so let this serve as a warning to others!
My setup is a common one:
• Flash CS3, published out to version 8 (or 9, depending on the baseline user of the client)
Here's the problem. I've been publishing out to version 8 for long enough now that it's become habit - and I have starter code that I slap on the page. Enter CS3, with Publish Settings set by default to publish out to version 9. Should you forget to ramp this back down to version 8, or ratchet up the version number in your SWFObject embed code...YOU WILL NEVER SEE A PROBLEM. Unless you view your project in Internet Explorer 7. All other browsers will read the SWFObject code and determine that the user has at least version 8 running, and are therefore good to go. IE7 does not seem to be able to make this leap of intuition. Make sure your publish version and your SWFObject player version match up and IE7 gets a grip.
What's that Theory of troubleshooting again? The one that states that the easiest and most likely solution is generally the best place to start? Case in point.
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I Live in a Blue State
I am a North Carolina son, born and bred. And today, I am proud to add to my geographic bio.
I live in a blue state. -
What if the World Could Vote?
What if the whole world could vote in the November election? Here's how a global electoral college might look if the election were today:
Of course you have to take this juicy little morsel with a grain of salt. I'm guessing the readership of theeconomist.com is not entirely representative of the larger global population. Still, even taken at face value - this is staggeringly one-sided.
Also - neato infographic...
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Flash Forward San Francisco: First Impressions
There is so much going on here at Flash Forward San Francisco. I'm running off to the Adobe Keynote to kick off day two, but I thought I'd share a warm fuzzy first impression before I go.
The organizers and sponsors of Flash Forward have worked in concert with city officials to make this year's conference greener than ever.
Bins have been put out to separate not only recyclables, but organics as well. These compost bins are picked up by the city, as part of their public composting program. Brilliant!
You won't find a plastic water bottle anywhere. Organizers have provided attendees with reusable, post-consumer water bottles. Water stations have been placed around the venue for easy refilling.
The public really seems to care about their city as a collective here. It's infectious.
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Drawing in Flash is Suddenly Fun
For nearly as long as I have been a Flash guy, I have longed for a better relationship between myself and the drawing tools available to me in the Flash authoring environment. That's not exactly true. I really just wanted Flash to be more like my beloved Illustrator. Now that Adobe and Macromedia have embarked down their road to application Nirvana, I am suddenly a changed man. I get it now. It's intuitive. Drawing in Flash has come a very long way, and I'm finding myself using Illustrator less and less.
This past weekend a friend asked me to clean up an image he found, so that he could have some vinyl wall art printed up for his kid's bedroom renovation. I agreed to help sight unseen, but experience made me reasonably certain of two things immediately:
1) He found a crappy web graphic online of what he wanted, which would never, ever work
2) I would need to re-draw this art from scratch
I was not disappointed. Here's the original image he provided:
As a reflex, I fired up Illustrator and placed the image, then broke out my bezier and went to work. After setting about 10 anchor points, and staring at all the repeated simple shapes, I was possessed by an overwhelming urge to run to Flash. I knocked out the drawing in no time at all, but found myself oddly melancholy after. At some point, after struggling for so long against the but-it's-not-Illustrator effect of learning to draw in Flash, I think I got good at it. And now I enjoy the heck out of it.
Both Illustrator and Flash are powerful, effective and robust tools of our trade, and both have their place in my heart. I officially withdraw my longstanding request to have their toolsets merged. Flash has grown up on its own, and the unique drawing tools it offers have grown on me. Here's the final product. Kid's got good taste in music for a 12-year-old...
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The Most Unique Coastline in the World
As the N&O reported Sunday, our beautiful barrier islands are in danger.
I have not yet absorbed enough information to be able to formulate a definite, unflappable position on the hotbed debate over offshore drilling. I consider myself an environmentalist, but my head is not in the clouds. I understand that we must take dramatic steps to free ourselves from the bear trap of dependence on foreign oil; I am pragmatic enough to understand and agree that this will not happen overnight, and that, at least in the interim, we must find a way to safely pull some of our eggs out of that basket. Now - having hopefully established my willingness to be a rational person, based in reality - I choose my next words very carefully:
WE MUST NOT OPEN NORTH CAROLINA'S COAST TO OFFSHORE DRILLING.
North Carolina's Outer Banks offer the world over 100 miles of truly unique barrier island coastline, visited by over 5 million people every year. These islands are the crown jewel of our state. Mostly untamed and uninhabited, these barrier islands are in constant flux, molding and remolding themselves while protecting thousands of square miles of sensitive marsh and wetlands against the onslaught of a turbulent south Atlantic Ocean. These islands are home and habitat to dozens of rare and endangered species of animal and plant.
Some of our state elected officials are clamoring to voice their support for and get in line behind those who would fling open the gates to a new, unchecked land rush for exploration of our continental shelf. I am confident that for some of these folks, the impetus for taking these positions runs no deeper than to provide a means to distance themselves from any public blowback from our current energy woes. Essentially, to say to their constituents, "See, it's not my fault." This is shameful. Sens. Richard Burr and Libby Dole, I'm pointing my finger at you.
Take a look at this aerial photo. Now, tell me where exactly among these shifting sands you would like to see pipelines run. Tell me where you would like to see refineries built, for oil that may or may not be there, but which certainly would not be pumped for at least the next 8-10 years. Tell me which of these islands you are willing to sacrifice.
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