Update: This dead drop is now over. Congratulations to the lucky winner!
The dead drop has now started so if you want the prize package go and check out the live map to see where I am right now. Check the last updated text on the map to see when the last update was. I may be going through a 3G dead zone. This experiment will also serve as a good test of AT&T’s nationwide network coverage.
One you find me there is a code printed on my tailgate which you need to enter into this web form in order to claim the prize. Don’t have Flash on your mobile device? You can also see my current position by going to this static page. Want to make your own tracker? You can also get a raw XML representation of my position on this page.
My truck is a dark blue 2003 Ford Ranger. You’ll be able to tell it’s me by the stickers in the back window.
Good luck!
Lee
love it.
This is awesome!! Hope you make it out to the Chicago area. How are you getting your geoCode from your mobile device into Flash? I saw on Twitter you were asking about running a sql query to retrieve the most recent entry, so I assuming you are storing your current location into a sql databate, and then having your swf pull the most recent entry from mySql, and reflecting that on through the google maps flash api. I guess my question is how are you getting your current gps location into mySql??
Thanks Lee! Happy holidays to you and your family.
@Nick Eby: Lee tweeted about that a few days ago (http://twitter.com/leebrimelow/status/6805059135).
Lee, good luck for your road trip, as always this is a great idea and a great opportunity for the community ! Next time you’re in France / Europe, i won’t let you leave without getting the Dead Drop winner coin out of your pockets
Man I´m so sad now that I dont live in the USA. This would be so much fun. But I enjoy the nice view of America on your google app. You are a lucky man to see a such nice view driving to your parents. I´m sitting here in cold germany. Hopefully I can do this one time too.
Merry christmas and a happy new year.
Rafael
hey can you let us know as people find you, I will try to leave as soon as I can! Thank you! And you have up to 5 people to find you right?
Girlfriend and I went on a nice little adventure and almost got snagged by CHP twice in between Bakersfield and the hills heading to Tehachapi trying to catch up to you on your way toward Barstow. Once you were in the hills, though, you were too far gone. Arrgghhh!!! You may have foiled me this time, Mr. Flash Leadfoot, but save one for the swing back through, I’ll catch you then!
- M
I just got back to my office after racing out to I-5 to try to catch Lee from the coast. Unfortunately for me, he took a left at Bakersfield and headed East, and out of my driving range. Good luck to all y’all in the Midwest.
Really cool idea. If I was in the USA I’d give it a shot! (I’m living in sydney). Gotta love road trips!
You should also set up your app to tag no-coverage areas so you can send off a coverage report to AT&T when your journey is complete… or at least tag what % of time was 3G vs 2G/EDGE vs.. none
got bored as hell at work today and wanted to experiment with your gps xml. Used map3D instead as well as polyline (tracks route from swf creation), infoWindow, and flyTo. Got my mind of work for 30 mins. Just for fun, quick demo.
http://www.nicholasleby.com/myFiles/CatchMe/
Hello Lee,
It’s too bad I don’t have a car, otherwise I’d be speeding down the highway to catch you right now. I’m really excited about the CS5 release, but I guess I’ll just have to find another way to get my hands on it.
Anyway, I think that the location app that you made for this dead drop is really cool and I’m hoping that you might put together a tutorial on how you made it? That would be awesome!
Thanks and Happy Holidays,
-John Henry
Maybe google maps is fudging the distance, but I took a look at your xml, ran the numbers, and it looks like you might be about 15 over there around Kingman, AZ. Watch out for those speed traps.
Happy travels.
Excellent fun project. Don’t feel to bad radykal I’m in Fargo ND. My odds of catching the Brimelow Express aren’t to stellar either. Mr. Brimelow if you lose your mind and decide to drive anywhere near ND in the middle of winter I’ll meet you on the road.
*I also have access to a tow truck.
Wow, awesome, this is the coolest thing ever!!! It was really weird when I opened the live map, he was going the wrong way! I zoomed in more, and saw he got off to get gas and now he’s stopped at a restaurant haha!! Soooooooo cool.
How are you generating the xml data to track your position? Can you post a tutorial on this perhaps?
You just (06:41 *my* local time here nearby Hamburg, Germany) drove through Memphis, TN. I’ve stayed there for 4 weeks during a student-exchange in 1990. Great feeling to see your virtual you drive through Memphis and imagine waht you are in at just this moment seeing in real. Cool Project. I wonder where these little technological leaps (powerful computers with e.g. gps, fitting into shirt-pockets; everywhere online; etc.) are leading toward … it’s kind of exciting.
Regards from wintery, wee-hourish and cold and pre-xmas Norderstedt
Paddy
Man it is urrgent…plz can you inform me how i can add the code for the carousel part 3..so i can load external .SWF file every time i click on an icon a different SWF will load….it is dead urgent man… ive been looking that up trying to ge tit out from ur totrail for the past two weeks and i think im blind if you please help me…i need for my next university project….
thank you so much
your awesome!!!!!
@mike this is an easy task to load external swf on clicking any carousel item.. google it “how to load external swf in AS3″ and in the carousel code where click handler is written implement it..
made some changes to my Lee tracker! http://www.nicholasleby.com/myFiles/CatchMe/
Lee, at what interval are you sending your location to your database?
Where in VA are you going?
@shan…
thank you so much for ur reply, my freind i looked that thing up on google too many times and i couldnt get like the way u guys posted it here..anyway..im so sorry if im bothering u ..i know this is too simple for u…and im trying to learn from you…but the thing is i dont know why it is not loading from the xml file to the stage…and on the other hand i want the swf to load on the click of every item…not when the whole movie load … so here the explanation of i made:
I created a movie clip with instance name swfmov and andd inside it i put another movie clip with instance name inswfmov…then i created a tag in the xml doc (icons.xml) a tag called swfld = “mov1.swf”. what i did is the following in the action script:
var tooltip:MovieClip = this.attachMovie(“tooltip”,”tooltip”,10000);
tooltip._alpha = 0;
// i attached the movie clip right after the tooltip movie
var swfmov:MovieClip = this.attachMovie (“swfmov”, “swfmov”,1000)
swfmov._alpha = 0;
and in the function called xml load
var xml:XML = new XML();
xml.ignoreWhite = true;
xml.onLoad = function()
{
var nodes = this.firstChild.childNodes;
numOfItems = nodes.length;
for(var i=0;i
var t = home.attachMovie(“item”,”item”+i,i+1);
t.angle = i * ((Math.PI*2)/numOfItems);
t.onEnterFrame = mover;
t.toolText = nodes[i].attributes.tooltip;
t.content = nodes[i].attributes.content;
i typed here the following:
——————————————
t.swfmov.inswfwmov.loadMovie(nodes[i].attributes.swfld);
——————————————-
t.icon.inner.loadMovie(nodes[i].attributes.image);
t.r.inner.loadMovie(nodes[i].attributes.image);
t.swfmov.inswfmov.loadMovie(nodes[i].attributes.swfld);
t.icon.onRollOver = over;
t.icon.onRollOut = out;
t.icon.onRelease = released;
}
}
under the function called released after the if statement in the else i typed the following
var
tw6:Tween = new Tween (inswfmov,”_alpha”,Strong.easeOut,0,100,1,true);
For thy lord
your God had made it possible for u
to see the month of December!
So shall all impossibility in your will be possible!
Wishing u all merry x-mas!!
FAIL … finding you with an iPhone is an impossible task!
Here I am in VA on Xmas Eve looking for Lee … last update was yesterday wth?
Thanks Lee! I can’t believe I actually found you! It would have been impossible without the use of my parents laptop once I arrived in VA from Charleston,SC. It was wonderful meeting you. Your parents and home are lovely. My apologies if I acted like a little school girl. I was pretty excited to meet you.
You’re very welcome Craig and it was great to meet you too. I’m just really happy that at least one person won!
err! i had a friend waiting for you to come up by the Jersey area since i couldn’t make it from mass!! i thought you were heading to NY, didn’t know you were goin’ to finish up in VA! Here’s to the next drop!
I’am in Peking.If i’am in USA,I think I can run to the position like Forrest Gump. I try to see the code printed on your tailgate with the Real-time map google,But…………
While i was thinking how i can win a Flash CS5 pre-relase prize from Turkey, i figured that i could use the live traffic cameras. I spotted the van online but, couldn’t be
able to see the Code.
i knew that i couldnt win the prize in that way but it was worth trying.
you can see the video captures i obtained on the link below.
http://video.yahoo.com/watch/6673556/17333263
And again, you neglected you’re European fans…..
Dead drops are fun, but you’ve got to make it more international, take Serge for example, he -as a fellow evangelist; working for Adobe Europe/Belgium- could bring this fabulous dead drop-concept to Europe.
I as an devinger -or rather; how I like to be called- a designing developer and developing designer, have been working months on various iPhone Apps, these are, unfortunately all lost in a recent crash of a hard drive I did not have a backup of. I, being the perfectionist I am, have set myself a goal of completing ten (10) App, before releasing in the (App) Store. So you can imagine my dismay when discovering I didn’t have a backup of it.
Being a self-taught programmer and designer, Objective-C is still hard on me; the essentials, basic structure and semantics are (as you undoubtedly know) quite different from ActionScript. But actionscipt is a language I know from the back of my hand. This fact I think you can understand, I and a lot of others where looking forward to the beta.
I hope this plea is enough for you to realize that, even though there isn’t a beta, start considering opening-up the pre-release (to) some more.
My dearest regards and best of wishes, Dave Wouters, Netherlands.
So I almost caught you when you were sleeping at the McDonalds Parking lot the morning of the 23rd. I had coerced the manager to go out and get the code for me. She was going to go get it 20 minutes after I talked to here since she was going to be done work. You left 10 minutes after I talked to her. I couldn’t physically be there myself since I am in Canada. If you want to give a runner up prize for ingenuity I would be glad to accept.
Anyways glad you made it home safe. For those of you who are complaining because you are not in the USA… you could have been thinking outside of the box as well. I tracked Lee all night, almost got a few gas station attendants to go out onto I-40 to get the code for me. I tracked all of the Traffic Cams along I-40, and if on the 23rd Lee had slept for 10 more minutes I would have been successful. Be creative and don’t always confine yourselves to what you think the limits are. Just a thought.
-Dave