Posts Tagged ‘Flex’

Adobe’s AIR, bridging online and offline world

February 25th, 2008 Information Technology No Comments
Adobe took an important step in merging desktop and Internet applications upon announcing the availability of AIR 1.0, a run-time module that provides a way of running "rich Internet applications" (RIAs) on the desktop. Since the release of the beta version of AIR, several organizations already adopted the technology; among them, NASDAQ Stock Market Inc, AOL, EBay and many others. I agree with most developers, that AIR will reduce download time due to the fact that the desktop is constantly being updated while connected to the Internet. A free download will allow users of Macs, PCs and, later this year, Linux machines to run any Air applications. Talking about interpretability, the word will get a whole new meaning on the web now. It’s about taking existing web applications and adding extra functionality whether you want to work offline or whether you want to access data on your disk. Adobe had and is still facing a challenging task – to spread wider in the predominantly Java/.NET enterprise world.  But they already made some serious achievement in this direction. The birth of AIR is pretty much the death of Java on the desktop, well at least some of e thinking that way…
Read more →

Flex 103: ActionScript basics

July 31st, 2007 Software 1 Comment
ActionScript is a scripting language (Developed by Macromedia,now owned by Adobe ) based on ECMAScript (Also referred as JavaScript or Jscript), used primarily for the development of websites and software using the Adobe Flash Player platform. The latest ActionScript 3.0 introduced last June (2006) with Adobe Flex 2.0 and Flash player 9.0. This ActionScript is completely different than any of its predecessor since it uses an entirely different virtual machine. ActionScript 3.0 provides significant enhancement in performance, as well as more robust programming model that lends itself to complex Rich Internet Application development. You can say that’s the reason Flex is so kick ass RIA builder. How ActionScript work? The way ActionScript work is very simple like any other scripting you have known. Generally ActionScript is executed by the ActionScript Virtual Machine (AVM), which is part of Flash Player. ActionScript code is typically compiled into bytecode format by a compiler, such Flex Builder, or that is available in the Flex SDK and the Flex Data Services. The bytecode is embedded in SWF files, which are executed by the Flash Player, the run-time environment. Pretty simple and straight forward isn’t it? Why ActionScript 3.0? As you already know since Flex 2,…
Read more →

Flex 102: MXML basics

July 2nd, 2007 Software 1 Comment
This is the second session in the flex tutorial series. In “Flex 101: Knowing Flex” we just get to know Flex a bit closely. In this session we will focus on MXML basics, which is the key to any Flex application development. As you already know, MXML is a kind of XML markup language, which only used in Flex especially for layout user interface components. MXML vs. HTML Though for a new bi it may be hard to grasp, but honestly MXML isn’t so different than HTML. Just like HTML, MXML provides tags that define user interfaces. But MXML provides a much richer tag set, such as-data grids, data binding, trees, tab navigators, accordions, menus, animation effects etc. Not only that you will be even able to extend MXML with custom components (MXML + ActionScript) that you reference as MXML tags. The biggest difference between HTML and MXML is the outcome, the MXML defined applications are compiled into SWF (Flash file) files and rendered by Flash Player which you got to admit much more rich and dynamic than HTML. MXML coding You are a developer or not, you should know by now, every markup language follow their own coding standard,…
Read more →

Flex 101: knowing Flex

June 25th, 2007 Software 2 Comments
There are plenty of Flex tutorials out there, still why another one? Simple in my opinion most of the Flex tutorial I came across with goes too deep/complex without creating a base of understanding. Flex isn’t HTML  that you can just learn it through so called -Dumb guide to Flex. To be able to use full potential of Flex you should be known to one or more of these- PHP, ASP,JSP, CSS, XML etc. No need to be master of those but at least familiar with them makes Flex application building a lot easier. Adobe documentation/tutorial that comes with Flex 2.0 builder is quite self explanatory, but might be hard to grasp for a newbie. Let us start the lesson by knowing the Flex a bit thoroughly than just overview. What is Flex? Flex is neither a programming language nor a scripting language. Flex is an IDE (Integrated development environment) and as well as a SDK (Software Development Kit) for the development and deployment of cross platform, RIA (Rich Internet applications) generally based on Flash. Initially it was developed by Macromedia, which is now own by Adobe Systems inc. Since April, 2007 Flex SDK is open source, but IDE still…
Read more →

Adobe Flex goes toward Open Source

April 27th, 2007 Software, Web 1 Comment
I have been always a profound believer of open sourcing software for expanding the boundaries of progressive development. The examples of open source success is all around us, Java, MySQL, Linux, Firefox, Thunderbird, WordPress, Drupal is just a name a few. Looks like Adobe got the idea of open source advantage. Adobe just today unveiled a new version of its Flex SDK development tool set, code-named Moxie, along with plans to provide its code to the open-source community. Flex is a tool to build rich Internet applications — Web applications that include the rich features of desktop applications but the ease of maintenance of a Web application. The free Adobe Flex SDK includes the technologies developers need to build effective Flex applications, including the MXMLâ„¢ compiler and the ActionScriptâ„¢ 3.0 libraries that make up the popular Flex framework. Here are some demonstrations of Flex’s creation- (Click to enlarge the thumbnails) The next version of the standards-based language and programming model, initially scheduled to ship by the end of the year, will be available under the Mozilla Public License (MPL) now used by the Mozilla Foundation and by Sun Microsystems Inc. for its Open Solaris operating system. MPL requires that change…
Read more →