Many of my Adobe AIR demonstrations show the concept of “script briding” between JavaScript and Flash libraries (i.e. SWC files). Using this feature, JavaScript developers can leverage existing work done by Flash developers in areas that were previously not feasible in the browser. It’s important to recognize however, that the Flash Player itself ships with extensive built in functionality that may be useful as well. I wanted to explore this concept a little further, so I put together a little example that leverages PlotKit and Flash Media Server. (more…)
As I was hanging out in Madrid, getting acclimated for the AIR Europe Tour, I started thinking about what I was going to present - specifically around script bridging. In the United States, I just talked about how Flash and HTML are separate, but can be integrated. I though it would be good to actually show how separate they are in the browser, and contrast that with how integrated they are in Adobe AIR. Several hours spent exploring ideas, and a new demonstration was born. (more…)
Two very quiet, yet very important announcements came last week for developers using Adobe AIR. The first is a new “Introspector” for AIR developers using Ajax - think Firebug, but for AIR. The second is an update to Aptana Studio (1.1 required) which provides support for AIR Beta 3. Here’s a quick look at both these updates which should prove very beneficial to those with an HTML workflow. (more…)
HTML 5 introduces a new canvas element which comes along with a graphics context based on Quartz 2D. This means that JavaScript developers can draw paths, fill and clip (mask) shapes, transform bitmaps, and even provide basic animation in addition to other operations. The similarities to the ActionScript Drawing API (especially in ActionScript 3) are striking, so I couldn’t resist playing around. (more…)
Every new update to Adobe AIR means one thing for me - a lot of additional work. When I first started putting together samples for the AIR Pocket Guide, it never occurred to me that I’d have to revisit them time and again. What started as a couple dozen examples has also now grown to be over forty (40) AIR samples, to include a number of full applications. That being said, I’m happy to announce that the samples update for AIR Beta 3 is complete, and are available for download. (more…)
As a general rule, I try only to post content involving source code on my blog. I have been known to leave long comments however, and that’s exactly what happened yesterday when I read Richard Leggett’s blog post on the future of Ajax. I have nothing but the utmost respect for Richard, but I thought this particular post could use some rounding out. After some consideration, what follows is that comment turned blog post. (more…)
There was an interesting post on Ajaxian last week about a testing utility for XMLHttpRequest. Kris Zyp had written RESTTest for his own uses and talked about it during his session at The Ajax Experience. There were requests to make his utility openly available, so he did just that. The comments on the post point to other such utilities; all of which I have problems with that Adobe AIR can solve. (more…)
I often find myself inspired by the questions that I encounter on the public AIR forums. Today I saw a question about using AIR to select a random image file from a user-selected location on disk. What piqued my interest was that the selected directory was to be populated by capturing images from a web camera. (more…)
Adobe AIR continues to march forward, and at MAX 2007 AIR Beta 2 was released. To accompany this release came new versions of tooling to include Flash CS3, Flex Builder 3 Beta 2, Dreamweaver CS3 (including a new version of Spry), and Aptana’sAIR plug-in. Part of the requirement for the Aptana team was a Beta 2 set of JavaScript-based AIR samples. My Beta 1 samples shipped with the previous version, and I’ve updated those samples for Beta 2. (more…)
One of the questions I encountered regularly during the AIR Bus Tour was about encryption using AIR. There’s an obvious sensitivity towards having an application remember certain details (like passwords) about the user, and then storing that data in the clear in a text file. During AIR Beta 1, I suggested that folks use one of the various ActionScript encryption libraries. I’m happy to report that AIR Beta 2 includes an “encrypted local store” for developers to use. (more…)