For almost 1 year I have been working as the senior flash developer for RW. We were working on this top secret project called “Moontoast“. Well, after a hectic first part of this year we launched Moontoast at SXSW.

Before I tell you my part in the project, let me first tell you what Moontoast is; why you would want to use it, and how to get started.

Moontoast democratizes information by

• Connecting those who know with those who want to know. Moontoast is making available everything anyone can think of, ever. Yeah, it’s big.
• Moontoast is the next step for the Internet, from information retrieval to knowledge transfer.

How to use Moontoast

• Search Moontoast profiles for an expert of any kind.
• Establish a live connection with that expert, link straight to calendars, send SMS or email too.
• Schedule a Moontoast session and determine price.

Who uses Moontoast

• Someone who wants to make there own beer.
• Someone who would like to know how to use there computer so you don’t have to bug a family member to help you.
• Someone who wants to take vocal lessons from Kip Winger.
• Anyone looking for any kind of knowledge. Again, it’s that big.

Who built Moontoast… funny you should ask? Well the kick ass development team from Remarkable Wit out of Nashville, TN.

Now the part I have been trying to get too… What role did I play in building Moontoast?

Enter the Moontoast live video chat application. This application is pretty much my baby, and I was blessed to be able to build this as my part of the RW development team. This application was built using the Flex Framework and an open source FMS (Flash Media Server) called Red5. This was my first application that would use FMS and Remote Shared Objects. Shared Objects are basically variables and functions that allow you to pass information and update each users application when something changes in one of the user’s applications. Basically updating user preferences, alerts, and so on, in real time. An example of this would be a text chat message in the Moontoast video chat app. One user types a chat message and when the user sends the message, both chat conversations are updated via the Shared Object.

The heart and soul of this application, of course, is the real time live video streaming. This Flash app looks at your computer’s hardware on launch to see what possible ports could have a web cam and microphone attached in order to send the video and audio data to the server. The result is a Video Stream that each user can see on their computer, so that you can have a live face to face conversation with the other user.

I am really proud of this application and I thank the whole RW team for giving me the opportunity to develop this application, and I look forward to seeing and building more innovative applications with you guys.

I personally would love feedback from users on features they would like to see improved in the application, or features they would like to see added. You can do so by leaving a comment on this blog post.

So… if you have some time today and knowledge that you feel is valuable to the world; or if you are looking for some knowledge on a particular subject, give Moontast a try.