Although I can’t talk about what we’re doing publicly just yet, it’s safe for me to announce now that I’m making a move from Cold Fusion to Ruby on Rails for my future development projects.

I’m currently looking for Ruby on Rails developers (contact me greg AT sparkcard DOT com) that can take on several discrete projects. They’ll be working closely with me to convert databases, translate code from CF to Ruby, and to plan the future of the apps.

For my fellow CFers out there, I’ll simply say that I still love CF, but Rails Rocks. My CF code was written very similar to the way Rails works now so it made a lot of sense. We’re planning to open source at least one major part of our system and that’s going to require something that’s freely available unfortunately.

To add to my decision, I’ve spent the last year and half working at getting away from doing development and to focusing on turning my ideas into reality. Though I’ve always had the ability to code what I needed, that skill also served as a crutch in weird ways. I’m moving to Rails in many ways to guarantee that I can’t write the code - strange I know.

Most of my involvement will be architectural and on the front end as well - a skillset I feel invigorated by the recent buzz surrounding AJAX. It’s nice to see a community of people working to develop better systems in the browser.

More soon.

We’re in the process of formalizing the SparkCasting software/hardware setup. The software coding gets underway in earnest on Monday. The hardware is something I’ve been working on for a very long time (it keeps me up at night).

In the past, we’ve used a simple combination of bits that included an iRiver MP3 recorder and some low-end microphones. Personally, I’m not an audio engineer so it never hurt my ears too bad to listen to previous shows we’ve done (being clever about how and when you record is the secret to turning a hostile environment into a friendly one).

Of course, we’ve had our share of complaints, bad experiences, and unusable audio. To that end, we’ve upped the ante quite a bit now and we’re sailing with a whole new batch of hardware that we can quickly destroy in a spill.

The top dog in this expensive new rig is the Edirol R-1. This is one of the best recorders I have seen for what we want to do that doesn’t cost a small fortune (don’t get me wrong these puppies are expensive enough). I’ve just acquired our first 2 for shows we’re planning for next month. We’ll still be using our old standby, the iRiver, when we’re short on equipment, but it feels good to start getting the things we know we need.

For anyone that’s been waiting/looking for one of these, B&H now has them in stock. Grab it here. They’re the cheapest I found anywhere to top it off.

For perspective, we’ve gone from a portable rig that cost $200 to $800. And that’s just for 4 people! We’ll definitely be round-robining guest for a little while, haha.

Just a quick ping to everyone out there in the blogosphere - yes, I’m still alive. It’s really been an exciting couple of months here and it digs me greatly to not be able to talk about how much is going on right now, but change is on the way.

I can catch you up with my travel plans, for one thing. I’ve been on the West Coast so much this year that I can’t get my body clock to return to what resembles normal. Surely, I’ve never been much on sleep, but it’s actually starting to get annoying :) Naturally, the year is just past half way done, but I am venturing West at least once a month for the rest of the year it seems.

Here’s that tentative agenda:

• Aug 10 (Seattle)
• Aug 11 - 14 (Los Angeles) - SparkCasting Shows
• Sept 6 - 9 (Portland) - Podcast Hotel Emcee
• Nov 11 - 12 (Ontario) - Podcast Expo Speaker
• Nov 13 - 16 (Los Angeles) - SparkCasting Shows

More soon.

I’m in a unique situation right now. We’re finally getting an application built to handle large parts of the backend functionality for the SparkCasting system.

I’ve already delivered a functional specification to several .Net developers, but in light of Flash 8’s upload/download abilities, I’d love to consider building it in Flash (my preferred platform).

Anyone up for this type of work?

Well the much anticipated launch (by podcasters anyways) of iTunes 4.9 has come and passed. I thought I would share my experience as a first time user, but someone who’s dealt with podcast downloads before.

First, finding those podcasts. There’s a new link added amongst your libraries that handles Podcasts. Click on it and you’re taken to a library view of the podcasts that you have already subscribed to.

Naturally. that’s empty when you start off. However, down in the bottom there’s two quick little links: ‘Podcast Directory” and “Report a Concern”. I haven’t found a podcast to complain about yet, but if anyone wants to volunteer ;)

Launching the Podcast Directory link takes you to an iTunes Music Store-esque destination. iMS uses these interesting sliders, in case you haven’t seen them, that allows you to slide through some album-art like chips. The main sections go something like this (the viewable ones at this moment are listed below):

• New & Notable
  • The Gears Behind Ears
  • KCRW’s The Treatment
  • ABCNews.com - ABCNews Shuffle
  • 2005 NECC ADE Podcast
• Public Radio
  • KCRW’s Left, Right & Center
  • On The Media from NPR
  • WGBH Morning Stories
  • KCRW’s The Road Less Travelled
• A flurry of promotional clips for ESPN, Jamie & Danny, etc. with a ad centered to “Publish A Podcast”.
• Indie Podcasts
  • Inside Mac Radio
  • Cinecast
  • Dawn and Drew Show
  • 5 Minites with Wichita

In any event, I started this post about a week ago but never got to finish it. I’ve kept 4.9 installed but it lacks the features I was accustomed to with my old stand-in Nimiq. It’s probably related to my initial doctrination with the original batch of Podcatchers, so I am sure that millions of newcomers will get it.

To balance that, I’ve heard that servers are overloading with the new attention brought to podcasting by the iTunes update.

For all those that are that are reading, I wanted to drop a quick note to say I haven’t forgotten you. Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been on the road and working on a number of new developments.

In the next few weeks, you’ll see a lot of new activity. It’s very exciting, but I can’t talk about it just yet.

– Greg