Thomas Joos | mobile application developer

I am happy to announce that I will be speaking at FITC Mobile 2009, which takes place from 12/09 till 14/09 in Toronto, Canada. My session is called ” Tips and tricks for Flash Lite optimization ” and will offer attendees a set of best practices, tips, do’s and don’t in order to optimize Flash Lite content and push beyond the boundaries of a mobile device. I will try to make it a technical and inspirational sessions that helps Flash developers getting started with killer mobile applications, using there existing skills! 

More info on my session can be found here. Feel free to drop me a line of you are also attending, FITC is known for it’s cool and late night parties, so that’s a perfect opportunity to meet up!

Last week I attended FITC Amsterdam09 giving a session on Flash Lite optimization. Although I had some tough competition there were more people in my session than I expected. Thanks everybody for showing up after a wonderful party at the FITC boat! ( yes with open bar and everything ). For those who missed the session I uploaded my slides so feel free to have look! I had good feedback on this ‘first-timer’ and I hope to be doing this more often, starting with a session at the ‘Mobile Madness’ – event hosted by the Adobe Usergroup Netherlands on the 11th of March. Feel free to drop me a comment or send me an e-mail if you are attending as well!

Today, FITC has send out a press release in order to inform all attendees that there is a whole range of mobile FITC Amsterdam content available. As some of you know, I kinda have my share in this one:

Toronto, Canada [January x, 2009] — Adobe Max Award08 winner Boulevart is busy putting the final touches on a mobile content package for FITC Amsterdam, a two-day event focused on the art and craft of Interactive design and technology. This is the second year for FITC Amsterdam, which takes place February 22 – 24, 2009 at the Felix Meritis European Centre for Arts and Sciences. The Boulevart team includes Mobile Consultant and Flash® Lite™ expert Thomas Joos, a graduate of the Technical University of West-Flanders.

“Thomas is on the cutting-edge of rich media for mobile and typifies the kind of sharp, young creative minds that make our events a success,” says Shawn Pucknell, Founder and Executive Producer of FITC Amsterdam.

Beginning today, FITC Amsterdam attendees can download mobile screensavers, wallpapers, and a 2009 event guide at http://www.fitc.ca/amsterdam/mobile. All content was developed by Boulevart using Adobe® Flash® Lite™, a powerful runtime engine for mobile and consumer electronics devices.

[...]

You can download the entire press release here. Go and check out fitc.ca/amsterdam/mobile and if you are attending make sure you don’t miss FITC’s mobile boat this year!

We’re only 45 days away from this cool event, and according to Shawn its going to be a GREAT ONE! Tickets are moving fast, the parties are starting to come together and the schedule is up and running! They are almost close to being old out so if you have friends, co-workers or other cool people you know who’d like to come over you might let them know to hurry up!

I’ll be doing a session on Flash Lite optimization and I seem to be facing some tough competition with Serge Jesper’s Flash Catalyst session. Nevertheless I’m really looking forward to it. If you are attending and wan’t to have talk or drink just leave me a comment or send me an e-mail and we’ll catch up in Amsterdam!

Today it’s been a whole year since I posted my very first ”Hello World”. One year of blogging that comes to 57 posts (or an average of about 1.1 posts a week) and 249 comments/trackbacks. In the beginning I had a monthly average of 2000 visitors increasing every month to 8000 last october! Those who followed my blog will have noticed not only my stats were evolving, some exciting stuff happened for me as well. I finished my multimedia bachelor and graduated. I got myself involved in the Flash Lite scene doing cool community projects for FITC Amsterdam08, FITC Toronto08, 2M08 and SOTR. I started working for Boulevart where I have the opportunity to do other flash lite projects like Werchter Mobile. Together with Barefoot we ported this guide to the iphone, which was quite historical because it was the first iphone application that came out based on flash technology. ( And no it was not a flash player on the iphone, we ported flash technology to run native on the iphone! You have no idea how many times I used this phrase :) ) There are some other cool mobile projects coming on, but I have to keep my mouth shut for now. Stay tuned for the coming weeks because some of them will be released soon but I can already give you a little hint: one of the projects I was working on the last few weeks has something to do with an upcoming event in Milan… hmm now what event could that be? :)

I think it is also a good time to ask for some feedback on those who come here every once and a while. Feel free to talk about what you like about this blog, where there’s room for improvement, whatever your thoughts are, feedback is always very much appreciated.

Stay tuned for another upcoming year of blogging!

After the sold out success of FITC Amsterdam 2008 they’re back! FITC will treat Amsterdam with another cool conference in february 09. The first speakers are already confirmed on the website and I am proud to announce I will be one of them. My session is called ” optimizing your Flash Lite content ” and is focussing on tips and tricks in order push beyond the boundaries of a mobile device, in stead of giving up on it.

Everybody agrees mobile will be the medium of the future. A modern cell phone no longer acts as only a phone. It is a multimedia device allowing you to do so much more. We are checking emails, listening to music, taking pictures. We watch and record videos, manage our personal calendar… We see more and more Rich Mobile Applications being developed using Flash Lite and this inspires other developers to get started as well. Unfortunately a lot of them still give up quickly after facing the same problem: how the hell do we get our content running smoothly on such a limited device?

In this session Thomas Joos will present a series of best practices in order to optimize your Flash Lite content. From how to streamline memory management and cpu performance to optimizing a mobile interface, Thomas will provide explanation and code examples that will assist you in getting started with Flash Lite and learn how to push beyond the boundaries of a mobile device in stead of giving up on it.

It’s amazing how fast things develop, last year I attended FITC Amsterdam08 as a multimedia student together with some class mates. It was a blast and we had a lot of fun, got to know people, got inspired and learned a lot. This year I am doing a session myself and I would like to use this occasion to thank everyone who invested in my learning process for the past year. My multimedia teachers Koen De Wegheleire & Tom Vandezande, who introduced me to Boulevart and assured them I had the right profile to do my internship there. Of course Boulevart itself, giving me the opportunity to specialize in Flash Lite development. My colleagues Wim Vanhenden & Raf Vervink who were always willing to help or assist me with all the actionscript 2 issues I had. And at last, maybe a bit cliché but definately worth mentioning, my parents and girlfriend who supported me through my studies and the late night working, which resulted in a busy schedule and a minimal amount of free time.

I finished an event guide for Scotch On The Rocks today. They contacted me a while ago via Peter Elst asking me if I could provide them a mobile guide. I could do and try out whatever I liked to and I started exploring Flash Lite 3 and the possibilities it offers. I experimented on a global navigation concept, based on stunning motion graphics, composed by my friend Ben Dekeyzer who is also elected for the semifinal round in Adobe’s Design Achievement Awards. Ben did an amazing job turning his motion graphics into amazing optimized mobile formats. Just watch the video below and see how the SOTR Mobile Guide looks like. I’m sorry for the quality but still I think it does showcase the concept very well.

It was a bit of a last minute call so I have not had the time to create installers. I zipped the projects and you can download them here. I have a Flash Lite 2 and 3 version. The fl3 version is the one showed in the video. Feel free to check them out and let me know what you think! Hope you guys like it! Any kind of feedback is always appreciated, just drop a comment :)

DOWNLOAD
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flash lite 2 version: download here
flash lite 3 version: download here

I’m not attending SOTR myself but my colleague Nicolas Lierman is. Have a great time at SOTR and I hope you can use the app!

Last week I attended FITC Toronto. As you probably know I developed the official conference guide and Boulevart was so kind to send me over. Thanks guys it is very much appreciated! I saw some very cool and inspiring sessions. Erik Natzke, Robert Hodgin, Tali Krakowsky, G94, Andre Michelle, Bill Perry, Nicolas Canasse… They all educated, inspired or challenged me ;)

I also attended Nicolas’s session about data visualisation in flex and air. Too bad it had to be rescheduled because of some wireless internet problems. there were not as many visitors as there should have been but at least now he knows who the die hard fans are :)

I would like to thank Bill for talking about the conference guide during his session. It seemed like everybody was interested and excited about the concept and it was cool to see people making use of it. It was nice that the app was mentioned in Mike Downey’s opening keynote. Another sign that mobile enterprise concepts are very upcoming and that people are getting excited about it!

If you have used the application and want to give me some more feedback please feel free to send me an email! If you did not use it also feel free to tell me why so I can keep it in mind for the next time. (if you did not attend fitc or do not have a flash lite enabled phone then you don’t need to tell me of course :p ) If you have some other comments you think I may find usefull just knock yourself out and send me an email or give me a comment. My conference guide is user-centered so every type of feedback I can get from you guys could really help me improve it. It could benefit both parties, I think.

I am also proud to announce that Adobe is going to showcase my application in their mobile gallery. I don’t know when exactly they are going to update it but I’ll keep you guys posted.

Thomas

attending fitc toronto? Would you like all the info you need right in your pocket? No more looking for lost info brochures or flyers. I’ve developed the official FITC Toronto Mobile Guide which offers you everything you need to know. It offers a quick and clear overview of the entire schedule: who is performing, what the session is about and where it is hosted. You can check out every morning or afternoon, every room, every place + time of every session…
you can check out everything! There is also a map of the building included so you can easily find out where you need to be. The application also has an fitc party guide included: it gives you the opportunity to check out where the famous fitc parties are hosted. No more excuses not to come by and have a drink or chat! And for the twitter fans amongst us, A basic twitter client is implemented inside the app so you can use the fitc mobile guide for live twittering during the event.

The application is build with adobe flash lite so make sure your phone supports it. Here are some links to help you find your flash lite player:
-symbian os: here
-windows mobile: here

And last but definately not least the links!
for windows mobile: here is the link to download the mobile guide:

—— UPDATE ——-
for symbian 3rd edition: a sis file is available thanks to challenger. you can download it HERE

I appreciate any kind of feedback so feel free to let me know what you think. I’m also attending FITC so let me know if you are coming so we can have a talk and or drink :)

This week I started my internship at BoulevArt. It will last for 3 months and I will be working with Wim Vanhenden and his Flash Team. Interesting people, interesting projects, interesting 3 months if you ask me! :) I am also getting some time to work out some personal interests/projects. As you maybe have heard or read a while ago, I’ve developed the official FITC Mobile Guide and I think I might say it was a succes. Everybody was really positive and excited about the application. I even got a thankyou-present from the adobe mobile team. They have send me a nokia n95! Thank you guys that was really a cool surprise! :)
The people at FITC also were happy with the application and the feedback so they asked me to develop one for the upcoming Toronto Edition as well. That’s the first mobile project I’m working on. I’m planning on working out more mobile projects here but the FITC Toronto application is the first (and most concrete) project on my list. I’m also attending this conference together with Nicolas Lierman (from Boulevart-Google Analytics) and I’m absolutely looking forward to this!

See you in Toronto for a hell of a conference and if you are coming.. let me know by leaving a comment!