Incorporating Graphical Content

Our designers have finalized the graphical content of our application. Here is a screen shot of the welcome screen or landing page of our application. I have used a tutorial online to help me make the eyes of the character in the logo follow the mouse around the screen. We will also use these eyes within our main character also. Clicking the Instructions button will provide the user with the option of viewing an instructional video, on how to use the application.




Once logged on the user is prompted to name their character, this will,

1. record thier name
2. start the day and time counter within the stats box at the bottom of the screen.
3. Allow the user to continue within the application.

As you can see I have also incorporated the character graphics within our application.




This is the final news interface or reader, it works similar to before, only now I have worked out a few usability issues. I have included the news reader button, the logout button, and the reset button all into the same shaped object onstage. We plan on including some small tool-tips or pop-ups which will appear when the user hovers over the buttons.




This screen shot shows a dialogue box to allow the user to delete their character should they wish to do so.

• Also over the last week I have been working on getting our application to save user data and store this data within the users flash player on their computer, using the Shared Object method. This was quite difficult as it involved first collecting all the up to date data on a user when the logout button is clicked and then storing that data. However when the application firsts loads, it then needs to check if user data is already storred, retrieve that data and impliment it withn the application upon loading. But also if no user data to present then the application needs to reverts to all the default values.

• I also created a timer, so that once the user logged out, if they attempted to log back in straight away then they would not be allowed, using the Date method. The timer at present is set to 1 minute for testing, however this delay could also be altered later.

• I also created a second timer to count the days a character was active.
  

• I also created a directory within the root folder to contain all of the audio content for our application. At present each Click and Hover apon a botton triggers the loading of these external mp3 files. However through testing I have noticed that there is a delay or lag in the timing of this audio, as the user navigates the GUI and other files. I will have to embed at least these two samples within the FLA files, Click and Hover, simply because of the frequency of their use within the application. While all other samples can be loaded externally.
  

So, aspects and issues for development this coming week include,

• Logout and Reset button tool-tips
• embed Click and Hover samples throughout the application
• Creation of a way for the user to track the number of RSS sources already read.
• Displaying the current Date and time at the top of the News Reader as per design.
• Spinning News Paper intro within the index or preloader file.
• Development of a video player within the instructions section
  

Philip Clarke