Aurlaw Solutions: Michael Lawrence Portfolio

I recently completed some Flash and Video freelance work for LisaMilesViolin.com, a Pittsburgh-based violinist, composer and writer. I created an MP3 Player in Flash MX which featured an XML-based song list to load MP3 files on demand as well as custom player and volume controls. The video, a 4 and a half minute film short called "Bowl Dance", was converted from DVD to QuickTime and Windows Media formats for playing from the web.

I also added the link to the"South Hills Industrial Park" website for the "Websites" section. I developed this site in 2002 while working at MegaLogic.com. SHIP was owned by our parent company Specialty Group Industries Inc., it was also the location of our offices. This site was developed in Flash and featured both Flash-based and QuickTime virtual tours of available office and warehouse space. The site is now a demo since the live site no longer exists.

I recently added a feature to my portfolio site utilizing Google Maps. Google offers an API for their Mapping service to allow developers to customize solutions for their customers. I decided to map the locations of my current and former employers and provide some brief information for each.
View the new Contact Page

Normally I reserve this space for professional or computer-related info but this entry is a little different. Her name is Zoe. I got her from a friend earlier this week.

Today I installed Tiger, the latest version of the Mac, OS X 10.4. This is my first OS update since I bought my latest Mac back in 2003 which came with Jaguar, OS X 10.2, preinstalled.
Tiger has over 200 new features, so it will take some time to really see the potential of the latest release.

One of the new features is Dashboard, which is framework for mini-applications, or Widgets, which allows you to complete common tasks or access to information. Widgets are based on HTML, CSS, and JavaScript which allows developers to easily create their own — this is something I'll have to look into.

I completed my first month of C2S this past week. The highlight of the past month was spending the day at the Emsworth Lock and Dam for a glipse at the SmartLock project. Our firm was selected along with several other firms by Port Of Pittsburgh to lead in the demonstration last year. The project still has some work that needs to be completed before any implementation can take place. SmartLock uses wireless and satellite technologies to facilitate navigation during periods of low visibility. The Proof of concept for SmartLock was developed by students at Carnegie Mellon University.

I started developing a Windows Mobile application called BudgetTrakker. The idea was to have a simple application to help organize and remind me when bill payments are to be made. I also wanted to keep a log of past payments which would include confirmation numbers when paying bills online. This application is my first foray in mobile application development.

I completed my first week at my new job today. It didn't start out the way I hoped. On Monday, PC issues pretty much wiped out my whole day. It wasn't until mid-Tuesday that I was able to begin getting acclimated to my new surroundings and learning the inner workings of projects I'll be working on.

I'm currently working on two projects: Commuter Alert and a Struts-based sales portal for an international moving company. I suddenly find myself very busy and productive.

An opportunity was presented to me recently that I felt I could not pass up. As a result, I have announced my resignation from my current employer effective March 18, 2005. I've accepted a position as a Consultant, Applicaton Developer - I will be developing both web-based and mobile-based applications. I also have a chance to not only advance my .NET knowledge but also gain experience with J2EE application development.

I'm someone who enjoys a challenge, that's what motivates me in this industry. My current position unfortunately has not afforded me the opportunity to advance my skills and work with newer technologies, therefore I feel the need to move on to what I believe will be beneficial to my career.

Today I received my PDA that I ordered last week. I wanted to purchase one for use in developing applications for handheld devices. I decided on a refurbished Dell Axim 50 with built-in Wi-Fi/Bluetooth. I have had an interest in working with mobile devices since I created a demo site using ASP.NET mobile controls last summer. The login page is just a shell and requires no username or password to continue.

I'm looking forward to working more with both web-based and standalone applications for handhelds in the future.

The Mozilla Foundation on Thursday, February 24th announced an update for the Firefox browser. The following is an excerpt from CNET News.com:

The IDN vulnerability allowed an attacker to create a fake Web site on a non-Microsoft browser in order to pull off a phishing scam. A spoofed link would seem to be a legitimate URL in the address bar of affected browsers. But instead of taking the victim to the trusted site, the link would lead to a phony Web site with a domain rendered as the same address under the IDN process.

The updated browser will display the IDN Punycode in the address bar, preventing URL spoofing. Punycode is the encoding of Unicode strings into the limited character set supported by the Domain Name System and IDN.

Get the update from Mozilla's Firefox Page.

I officially launched my new blog this past valentine's day. I recently had a blog at SpreadFirefox that I used sporadically. I'm a huge supporter of the Firefox browser and a lot of my blog reflected my views and news about the browser. I decided to move away from Firefox-specific topics and focus on topics regarding my professional life and anything else involving the web, hence the move to blogger.com. This blog will compliment my portfolio site nicely and replace my Current Development section which was something I put together very quickly last year. Now, I am a little more organized. I decided to use my new design on this blog that I will be implementing soon on my personal site. I should be having more news to report shortly regarding my future and my site.