FlashVars and Externally Loaded Movies

If you ever need to access FlashVars from a MovieClip that you loaded externally, make sure it has been added to the stage first.  If it hasn't been added you can access any of the variables.  This isn't a problem with the loading/root clip because the document class is granted immediately access since it is the stage.

I usually don't have this problem except I was using a 3rd party framework that didn't wait for the ADDED_TO_STAGE or COMPLETE events before accessing those variables.

VideoEvent.COMPLETE and SoundMixer.stopAll()

I just ran across a strange behavior in flash that might save you a few mnutes of head scratching. I had a video playing using a FLVPlayback component.  I also had a button with a roll over sound on it.  On roll over I used SoundMixer.stopAll() to kill any extra roll over sounds.  Well this also kills the video sound and triggers the video complete event.  My best guess is the SoundMixer class is killing all of the video streams in addition to any audio streams.  Lesson learned.

Taming IMAP on Gmail

When Google added IMAP support they turned every label into a folder, including the spam label. This makes total sense, but I get far more spam than real emails and when I use IMAP I have to download all of those spam messages.  Or do I?  I just stumble upon a Gmail Labs extension called "Advance IMAP settings" which gives you the ability to control which labels are downloaded via the IMAP protocol.  Install the extension and go to Settings > Labels.  Each label/folder has a checkbox next to it called "Show in IMAP".  Uncheck the one called spam and you're done.  No more waiting for your spam to download.

Old iPhone

I've been trying to figure out what to do with my old iPhone now that i got a 3GS.  I've been thinking about jailbreaking it, but I don't want to spend a lot of time doing that.  And then last night a crazy idea came to me, turn it into my alarm clock.  Now my current clock radio isn't bad, its just that I hate waking up to talk radio and the battery backup never works.  Anyways i needed to find a way to prevent the iPhone from turning off the display, thats when I stumbled upon LCD Clock (App Store Link).  Its a 99 cent app that has a preference to prevent the screen from turning off.  Its totally a niche app, but it works perfectly for what I need it for.  Plus now i don't need an iHome alarm clock/iPod charger which cost about $100.

Next up I need to configure EyeTV to stream to my iPhone.