From perlysmil@webiphany.com Mon Nov 19 11:13:51 2001
From: PerlySMIL <perlysmil@webiphany.com>

Hello there,

I've made some changes to Smil.pm (PerlySMIL) that I 
wanted to let people know about.  PerlySMIL is now on 
version 0.86, and that version is uploaded to CPAN.

1.  Better documentation
2.  Scripts now available online
3.  RealText module and Smil.pm support
4.  SMIL 2.0 initial support

First, I've hopefully improved the documentation for the
methods exposed by this module.  If you visit 
http://www.webiphany.com/perlysmil you will now notice 
a "METHODS" section under the perldoc documentation.
This is a comprehensive list of all the methods which
are "public" for this module.  I wasn't sure if these
were obvious to people, but this should give you a handy 
guide when writing scripts, supplementing the examples 
in the documentation above it.

Second, I've added links on the website to all the scripts 
which come with the distribution.  So, if you used CPAN.pm
to install the module and don't know exactly where those
example scripts are, you can also find them on the website 
under the link marked "Sample scripts".

Third, there is a new module accompanying Smil.pm. It is
called RN::RealText.pm and is the beginning of support for 
RealText authoring in Perl.  There are only two methods, 
the constructor to create the object ("new") and the method
"addCode", which adds RealText code to object.  This isn't 
so special in itself except that Smil.pm can now accept 
objects with the same interface and inline them directly 
within your SMIL code.  For an example of this please 
check out the "smil2.pl" script in the example scripts.  
I will be adding more methods to the RealText module, and 
also perhaps adding more modules which can be used in the 
same way, like RealPix, for starters.

Finally, there is a the beginnings of support for SMIL 2.0 
extensions.  SMIL 2.0 is here with the arrival of RealOne 
from RealNetworks.  I would highly suggest downloading
and playing with this amazing piece of software.  You can 
find RealOne at http://www.realnetworks.com/.  To support
SMIL 2.0 I've begun thinking about how Smil.pm will change.
I've added a method for creating transitions, and I have
stubbed out a method (another way of saying I was too lazy
to finish it) which will permit an author to add animations.  
So, this is a quick preview of the way that PerlySMIL will 
handle SMIL 2.0.  The primary goal is of course to maintain 
backwards compatibility with Smil.pm scripts written for 
SMIL 1.0 players.  A few examples of these methods are in 
the smil2.pl script in the installation directory.  

Thanks for listening.  If you have suggestions or comments, 
I am always interested to hear them.  Also, I would like 
to take this opportunity to ask people to drop me a little
note if they are using PerlySMIL for anything interesting 
that they care to talk about.  I would personally love to
hear about it, and I would also like to host interesting
applications in a new section on the website, if people 
have stories to tell.

Bye,
Chris, chief dentician of PerlySMIL 
http://www.webiphany.com/perlysmil/