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Archives
November 30, 2006
FlexSearch.org - Custom Flex Search Engine
It appears that Ted Patrick was right when he said that searching for Flex information was painful. In the past few weeks, a number of people have put a lot of time and effort into making this better. Ted posted his own solution a few weeks ago, complete with an open API that allowed people to create some cool Flex search mashups. Others have taken a different approach: using Google to create a custom Flex search engine. FlexSearch.org was started by Clint Modien just today. The list of sites that its searching is available, and they're looking for people to help manage and enhance the site, as well as contribute to the blog. Their mission statement says that FlexSearch is "a custom Flex search engine by the community for the community", and it appears as though they're off to a great start. Give them a hand if you can.technorati tags:adobe, flex, search
Opera Mini now available
From Digg, I noticed that Opera updated their mobile phone browser. I just downloaded and installed Opera Mini onto my Nokia E62, and I already like it better than the built in browser. It has support for RSS feeds, and seems much faster in rendering pages than the built in browser. I prefer the fact that it renders pages faster than how they were originally designed. The E62's built in browser renders pages at something like 640x480 resolution, and allows you to scroll to view the entire page. Opera Mini on the other hand shrinks down menus and just shows you the content of the page. Check it out if you've got a phone that can run Java applications.technorati tags:operamini, opera, mobile, e62, webbrowser
November 28, 2006
Building Applications for Apollo - Its not rocket science
Mike Chambers gives a great overview of Adobe Apollo in this online Acrobat Connect session. The 45 minute presentation gives an overview of the upcoming runtime from Adobe, including information on APIs that Apollo will provide to developers and several sample applications, including a very cool Flex / Google Maps application that was written by Christian Cantrell (demo at 8:02).
Developing applications for Apollo isn't rocket science. Web developers who are building solutions today with HTML and JavaScript can build applications easily, as will Adobe Flex and ActionScript developers. Apollo will be completely cross platform, and support HTML, Flash / Flex and PDF content natively. The difference between Apollo and regular web applications is that it provides additional APIs to do things that you can't do today, like access to the local file system, working offline etc...
In the session, Mike gives a very cool demo of an advanced music player, that not only plays music and MP3s from your local computer, but integrates with Flickr to display photos for artists from Flickr and with a Lyric wiki, to display lyrics directly in the music player. (Check out the demo at 25:41 to see this in action).
You can find out more about Adobe Apollo from the Developer FAQ on Adobe Labs.
technorati tags:adobe, apollo, ajax, flex
November 27, 2006
Need Help with Flex? Did you know there's developer support available?
If you're developing commercial applications for Flex, you may be interested in developer support for Flex. The Adobe Enterprise Developer Program provides unlimited support by email for Flex for 1 year, for $1495 US. You can purchase the program online via the Adobe online store. This covers all the Flex products, including charting components, Flex Data Services, Flex Builder and even the SDK.
If you've had trouble getting started with Flex or LiveCycle, then you should consider purchasing Adobe Enterprise Developer Support. This support option goes beyond what's available in product support, and will help you in building out your solution. Flex product support will help you with product problems, but won't help you in integrating with existing systems, databases and other developer problems. These are the types of problems that Developer Support attempts to resolve.
technorati tags:adobe, flex, enterprise, developer
November 22, 2006
Adobe Open Sources ActionScript Media Gallery Code
The ActionScript code that is used by Photoshop Lightroom and Photoshop Elements to create beautiful slideshows is now completely open source. You can download the ActionScript source code from the Adobe Media Gallery website. There are also sample galleries, a getting started guide, documentation, mailing lists, forums and instructions on how to contribute to the project.
This work continues Adobe extensive involvement in open source technologies. I can't remember a company changing so quickly so fast. A few months ago we had very little in the way of open source software, today we're working hard on things like Tamarin, part of the Mozilla project, the Adobe Media Gallery, ActionScript 3 libraries for popular web services like Flickr, Mappr, YouTube and more (we're working right now on open sourcing the eBay libraries that were the basis of the eBay Apollo application shown at MAX), the Flex / Ajax bridge, the Adobe source libraries and more.
technorati tags:adobe, opensource, tamarin, photoshop, lightroom, actionscript, mediagallery
November 15, 2006
Adobe Policy Server as a hosted service
Yesterday Adobe launched the Adobe Document Center, which allows you to limit access to PDF, Word and Excel files. The application was written in Adobe Flex, and provides the ability to control who has access to your documents (including whether or not they can copy or print the document), and track who has done what to your documents. The Document Center is available as a free trial under the end of the year (same timeline as the free trial for Acrobat Connect). (Press release available here).
The online service mimics the functionality available in Adobe LiveCycle Policy Server, which was also updated today to include the ability to protect Word, Excel and Dassault Systemes CATIA v5 files. You can read the press release online.
technorati tags:adobe, livecycle, flex, onlineservices, policyserver
November 14, 2006
Looking for a job working with Flex?
Adobe is currently looking to hire someone to work in the Enterprise Developer Business Unit, out of the Ottawa, ON, Canada office. Here's the job description:
"The successful candidate for Senior Computer Scientist for the Enterprise Developer Business Unit will have more than five(5) years of experience in software development in the high technology industry. This individual will be responsible for creating a high-impact integration experience between our LiveCycle and Flex/Flash products. This individual should be a self-starter with the proven ability to bootstrap ideas and direction through the development of prototypes in an agile manner. A particular emphasis on user experience design and implementation using object-oriented principles is a requirement. The ideal candidate must have the ability to influence beyond specific project boundaries and across business units in the company to achieve project goals. While experience with Flex is not absolutely mandatory, it is considered highly beneficial."
Knowledge & Skills:
- Over five (5) years experience in the technology industry, including experience in a Software Development role.
- Experience working with the following (but not limited to): Java, electronic forms, business process management, XML related specifications (XML Schema, XML DSignature, Xforms, XHTML etc).
- Masters or Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science or Engineering is very desirable.
- Excellent verbal and written communication skills.
- Ability to work independently.
- Ability to work with cross-functional teams.
- Strong coding and design skills.
- Experience with Flex/ActionScript is highly desirable.
technorati tags:adobe, flex, helpwanted, jobs
November 13, 2006
Flash Based Webtop - YourMinis.com
The team at Goowy Media is at it again. The same team that bought you Goowy Desktop, has launched a new service they call yourminis. According to their website, its a personalized dashboard of widgets. Give it a try and let them know what you think.
Michael Arrington appears to be the one that gave these guys the publicity they were looking for. Read about YourMinis on TechCrunch.
I like the fact that you can integrate videos and podcasts right into the page, and the use of tabs to seperate pages is a great feature as well.
It reminds me a little like JamJar, which Adobe launched a few months ago.
technorati tags:flash, goowy, yourminis, techcrunch, webtop
November 09, 2006
FlashLite Game Contest
ActionScript.it, an Italian focused ActionScript website, is running their 2nd mobile game contest. The deadline for submissions is January 29, 2007. Games must be developed in FlashLite or J2ME. The complete set of rules are available online.
Prizes include FlashStudio 8, an iRiver and some O'Reilly books. Last year's winners are online, and look great.
For those of you looking to enter the contest, the FlashLite developer center may have some good tips for development, as well as the Mobile and Devices developer center.
November 08, 2006
Sudoku in Flash
If you're a big fan of Sudoku, like I am, then you may find this Sudoku site cool. They use Flash for the game display, with a cool pop up for selecting the numbers, and a custom right menu to change from using pencils or pens. Nicely done.Introduction to Adobe Flex Builder for PHP Developers
If you were listening to my talk last week at the Zend PHP Conference in San Jose, and were interested in Adobe Flex, here's how you can get started with Flex Builder and PHP.
1. Download Adobe Flex Builder. The trial is available for Windows, or for Mac.
2. Watch this episode of Flex TV, created by Ted Patrick. This is a great introduction to Flex Builder.
3. Download the PHP RIA SDK by Adobe. This SDK contains libraries and samples that help you develop Flex applications that connect to PHP backends. The SDK is actually an open source project that you can contribute to. The project is hosted at Google Code.
4. Join the PHP RIA SDK by Adobe mailing list at Google Groups. Participate in the group - ask questions, send feedback on the product etc...
5. Read articles on the Flex Developer Center, and in particular the PHP page of the Flex Developer Center.
6. Check out Flex.org, a great community site with many resources for Flex developers.
technorati tags:php, flex, flextv, phpriasdk, flexbuilder
November 07, 2006
Using Flex 2 and SabreAMF Together
If you attended my talk at the Zend Conference, then you know that one of my preferred methods of connecting Flex to PHP directly is through WebORB for PHP by the Midnight Coders. However, there are other solutions out there. Renaun Erickson has an article up on the Flex Developer Center that shows how to integrate Flex 2 with SabreAMF.
Renaun's example is in the PHP RIA SDK by Adobe project, hosted at Google Code. I need to update the .zip file to include the sample, but if you're connecting via SVN to that repository, his sample has been added. Subscribe to the PHP RIA SDK by Adobe mailing list if you have any questions about the samples included in that SDK.
If you would like to contribute articles and content to the Flex Developer Center, then please feel free to contact me by email, or by posting a comment in my blog.
What does today's Mozilla announcement mean for developers?
Frank Hecker, executive director for the Mozilla Foundation, has a great write up on what today's announcement means for JavaScript developers. A few things to note:
"Finally, the Mozilla project will gain yet another major corporate contributor in Adobe, one that's made the largest single code contribution to the project since Netscape originally released the Mozilla source code in 1998."
"For Adobe, Mozilla, and others who might join in future, the Tamarin
project represents for client-side web technology what the so-called
LAMP
stack does for server-side web technology: a move to
not only centralize development around key specifications (ECMAScript
for Tamarin, HTTP, SQL, etc., for the LAMP stack) but also to jointly
develop and promote high-quality open source implementations of those
specifications.
If you develop web applications using JavaScript, you should read the entire posting on Frank's blog.
Brandan Eich also has a posting on it, and will be chatting on IRC later today to discuss the announcement.
technorati tags:adobe, actionscript, tamarin, mozilla
Open Source Developers and Adobe
In case you missed it, Adobe and the Mozilla Foundation have teamed up. Adobe will be contributing source code for the ActionScript virtual machine, via a project to be hosted at Mozilla. Mozilla's CTO, Brendan Eich, says that this is the largest contribution to the Mozilla Foundation since its inception. You can check out the code now via CVS from mozilla/source/js/tarmarin on lxr.mozilla.org.
From a developer point of view, this means that you can build applications for Flash Player 9 that will use the same code structure as applications for Mozilla 2. No longer will you need to learn two seperate languages.
Many people are saying that this is the largest contribution of open source software from Adobe as well. In fact, Adobe has many open source projects that are run by Adobe. Here's a partial list of them:
Adobe Source Libraries at http://opensource.adobe.com (currently down, but you can get it from Google's Cache.
ActionScript 3 Libraries - We will be adding the eBay library, which is the basis of the Apollo application shown at the MAX conference, to this set of libraries as well.
Adobe Spry Framework - The Spry framework for Ajax allowes web developers to add Ajax functionality to their web pages.
Adobe Flex / Ajax Bridge - Used to connect your Flex application to JavaScript, and vice versa. Allows you to build sites similar to Google Finance.
Adobe PDF has been an open specification for a long time. While the code to Adobe Reader is not open source, the open format has allowed many developers to build PDF creation and reader tools.
technorati tags:opensource, flex, spry, fabridge, pdf, adobe
November 06, 2006
Hello from new digs in Ottawa
The entire Adobe Ottawa office today moved into a fantastic new building at 343 Preston St. The new building is absolutely fantastic, a big kudos out to everyone who was involved in the move. A voice message from Bruce Chizen this morning welcomed us to the new office, telling us that planning for the move started two years ago. Again, congrats to everyone who worked hard to make sure that work was disrupted as little as possible. My desk was all set this morning, with working Internet and phone service. So far, only minor problems for a few employees.
The past few weeks have been very busy. The MAX conference in Vegas was great. I posted a few entries a while back, but haven't posted an update in a while. My introduction to LiveCycle Designer sessions were very well attended. In fact, the entire LiveCycle track was well attended, with many sessions filling up entirely with ex-Macromedia people trying to figure out what LiveCycle is all about and wondering how to get started with it. Watch this Breeze session for an intro to LiveCycle, and then download the LiveCycle Toolbox to get started with it. LiveCycle is really starting to gain momentum: two of the MAX award winners were based on LiveCycle technologies.
Last week I attended the Zend Conference in San Jose, CA. I met with a number of great people, and presented an introduction to Rich Internet Applications to PHP developers. The slides from my talk are available here (warning: 3MB PDF), and I believe that the session was recorded. I'll post a link when I find it. For those of you who attended the session and want to get started with PHP and Flex, the PHP RIA SDK by Adobe is the best way to get started with the two technologies.
technorati tags:adobe, php, adobemax06, livecycle