If you still rely on this research project, please grab the bits now – as part of routine cleanup it will be disappearing off of Labs in April 2013.

As you can see, Apache is continuing to improve the Flex SDK.

Flash Builder 4.7 is also compatible with the latest beta of AIR 3.6 and Flash Player 11.6 – just follow the instructions on how to install the latest AIR SDK with ASC2.

Flash Builder 4.7 is a complimentary upgrade from Fb 4.5 and Fb 4.6.  If you’re a Creative Cloud user, download and install Fb 4.7 from the Creative Cloud site.  If you have a retail copy of Fb 4.5 or 4.6, you’ll need a new serial key to install 4.7 – get this via the official request form.  If you’re a volume licensing customer, contact your Adobe licensing representative.

Update Jan 17, 2013 : A few people have reported not receiving a Fb 4.7 upgrade after submitting a request via the official request form.  If you’re in the same situation, here are a couple things to check.  First, if you never received a confirmation email after submitting a request, it’s likely that your spam filter is blocking email from Adobe support.  If you received a confirmation but not a license key, note that we’re sending keys to the email address that was registered with the original Fb 4.5 license (not the email address submitted via the form.)

Still having trouble? Tell us in the comments (with a valid email address, please!) and we’ll help troubleshoot.

I am pleased to announce that in a recent Apache board meeting, they approved a resolution to “graduate” Apache Flex and make it a full-fledged top-level project at Apache!

The Apache Flex community is working on new releases as we speak with new locales and bug fixes, and exploring ways of cross-compiling ActionScript to JavaScript.

The Apache Flex URLs will be changing as part of the graduation process, but for now you can find us via this handy-dandy redirect: http://www.adobe.com/go/apacheflex  

We are excited to announce the availability of Flash Builder 4.7 beta. Flash Builder 4.7 adds support for Flash Player 11.4 and AIR 3.4, as well as support for the new Apache Flex 4.8 SDK.

With full support to the new Flash Player 11.4 ActionScript Concurrency (ActionScript workers) feature, which helps developers create more responsive games and apps by offloading tasks and computations to background workers. Game content is more responsive as these workers run concurrently to leverage more machine resources while helping to avoid UI freezes and other events that slow down game play. Click here to learn more about Flash Player 11.4 and AIR 3.4 new features.

Flash Builder 4.7 beta improves AIR for iOS app development workflows with support for USB debugging, ad-hoc app deployment, and support for the iOS simulator. Click here to learn more about these new capabilities.

Screenshot of iOS feature in Flash Builder 4.7 beta

Continuing on our previously stated commitment to Flex and the development of Flex, we have contributed Flex SDK to the Apache Foundation.  Flash Builder 4.7 supports Apache Flex 4.8 in addition to Adobe Flex 4.6 and Adobe Flex 3.6.  For information on how to get Apache Flex SDKs for use in Flash Builder, see http://www.adobe.com/go/apacheflex_download.

Please report any issue you may experience together with reproducible steps here. We look forward to your feedback on Flash Builder 4.7 beta and suggestions on how we can further empower you to build great apps and games.

In case you were wondering, the Flex trademark has been assigned to Apache as mentioned here: http://markmail.org/message/vkwfmjkdjzpxrkke.  As the email mentions, this is another step on the road to transitioning Flex to Apache as promised here http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/whitepapers/roadmap.html

Adobe has more donations planned as described in the roadmap, but you can get started with Apache Flex now by downloading the release from http://incubator.apache.org/flex/download.html and most importantly, by providing feedback, and contributing patches and code.

Adobe Flex 4.6 is still available from Adobe and supported by the Adobe support team. Apache Flex 4.8 is supported by the community via a mailing list (flex-users@incubator.apache.org). To subscribe, send an email to flex-users-subscribe@incubator.apache.org.

If you’re wondering where to ask questions or file bugs, here are some rules of thumb:

- If you must continue to use Adobe Flex and want help from Adobe, ask your questions on the Adobe forum and file bugs in http://bugs.adobe.com/jira/browse/SDK. All existing support contracts for Flex will be honored, but remember that Adobe is only planning to address critical bugs. We anticipate more bug fixing and faster response time with Apache Flex.
- If you plan to use Apache Flex, ask your questions on flex-users@incubator.apache.org and file bugs at https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/FLEX.

Download a Flex SDK

Here are the details:
1) Flex had a site on opensource.adobe.com. That site was using a version of wiki software that was prone to attack.
2) Adobe plans to host all of its open source projects at Open@Adobe
3) Flex SDKs aren’t completely “open”. They have Adobe licensed files in the downloads.

We had some contractors migrate the opensource.adobe.com site to Open@Adobe so we could shut down opensource.adobe.com. I tested out the download links but didn’t notice they still used a page on opensource.adobe.com. Then, a few weeks ago, we shutdown opensource.adobe.com and suddenly, you couldn’t download a Flex SDK.

When we went to migrate that page to Open@Adobe we found that the page was “interactive”. It had a checkbox that you had to click on in order to enable the download button. It turns out that the wiki on Open@Adobe does not allow that kind of interactivity for security reasons. We explored various ways of trying to replicate that click-thru license on Open@Adobe but were unsuccessful, and our legal advisors required us to keep that click-thru interface to make sure you understand the rules around what you are downloading.

It also turned out that trying to host the click-thru page on some other Adobe server was fraught with process and other difficulties. There would have to be security audits, chains of approvals, etc, and meanwhile folks would still not be able to download SDKs. So, I’ve hacked together this SWF for you to use for now.

So that’s why we are where we are. The Flex pages at Open@Adobe will point to this same SWF. Some folks have posted direct links to the Adobe downloads server as a workaround, but that bypasses the licensing requirement. It is best if you can use the SWF.

Again, sorry for the inconvenience. It is an interesting intersection of security and open-ness. This blog and opensource.adobe.com are hosted by Adobe which strictly limits who can create interactive content. Open@Adobe is hosted at SourceForge which is a lot less restrictive and who can create content so they have tighter rules on what that content can do.

Between these two white papers you should have a much clearer understanding of our current plans and intentions for Flex and Flash.

Be sure to come to a meeting of our Flex User Group Tour 2012 when it comes to a city near you.  You can check some of the earlier posts outlining the European and North American tour dates.

Alan Greenblatt
Senior Technical Evangelist, Adobe

You can find the Flex whitepaper here: http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/whitepapers/roadmap.html

Note that we will also be updating previous posts to point to the Flex white paper.

We hope to see you all on the Flex User Group 2012 Tour, coming soon to a city near you!

Alan Greenblatt
Senior Technical Evangelist, Adobe