RIA Radio, Live at Adobe MAX – Day 1 Keynote

October 25, 2009

RIA Radio Logo

I was honored to be a guest on RIA Radio during the recent Adobe MAX show. I joined the hosts, Garth BraithwaiteLeif Wells and  Zach Stepek, along with fellow guest Kevin Schmidt. We discussed the announcements from the Day 1 keynote (Flash for the iPhone, Flash 10.1 on mobile, TVs, and netbooks.)  Throughout the entire show, they sat down with a lot of cool folks, so take a listen.

RIA Radio

Listen to this podcast ( mp3). You can also subscribe to the RIA Radio Podcast in iTunes.

Kevin Schmidt to discuss the big MAX announcements and give our take on what they mean. Topics covered include: Flash for the iPhone, Flash 10.1 on mobile, TVs, and netbooks.
Experts: Leif Wells and  Zach Stepek
Listen to this week’s podcast ( mp3). You can also subscribe to the RIA Radio Podcast in iTunes.
Read more from Garth Braithwaite.

O’Reilly’s InsideRIA Summer of Flash Podcast

July 23, 2009

Adobe has been busy and this summer we have seen some changes to their Flash Platform and some new tools for working with it. In the new Summer of Flash Podcast the panel (Garth Braithwaite, Stacey Mulcahy,  Zach Stepek, and Leif Wells) will be discussing their experiences with these new tools, and how they will impact RIA developers’ workflow.

In this episode they discussed Flash Catalyst and their experiences working with it. They highlight how it has changed as it came to the public beta and what they are expecting and hoping from the final release.

Summer of Flash Podcast


Reflection from the glow of FlashCamp SF

June 1, 2009

I meant to write this up after I returned from Adobe’s San Francisco offices, but with Saturday being my 16th wedding anniversary, I figured I should not spend it in front of a keyboard.

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I flew up to San Francisco that morning. I was surprised to find James Polanco from Development Arc, standing just past the security exit at SFO. He was waiting for his business partner who was arriving on another flight. We rode BART into the city chatting about the upcoming event. They had some meetings to attend to, and I headed for the hotel. (We were later photographed together at the event).

After spending after of the afternoon at the Contemporary Jewish Museum, I headed down to 601 Townsend. A small crowd was gathering in the lobby, while various Adobers, were busy setting everything up.

I chatted with several good friends, as a queue began to form. The line quickly began snaking around the lobby. After a few minutes, the check-in table was open; raffle tickets, badges, t-shirts, and other goodies were quickly handed out. I thanked Rachel Luxemberg for the suggestion of the museum. If you don’t know Rachel, you should.

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I grab a nice beer from the great selection out together by Mike Chambers. Kudos for posting the choices. I know they were competing with FlashOnTap in the beer category, but it nice to be able to do some homework on the brews before hand, to make the best choices.

As we enjoyed a drink or two and a some nosh, I was able to reconnect with several old friends. I had to miss last year’s MAX due to the death of my father, so this brought back warm memories of events past.

We found our seats, folks from all parts of the community were in attendance: from Google to Facebook to students. Kevin Lynch CTO of Adobe, and David Wadhwani, GM and VP of the Flash Platform business unit provide an overview of the Flash Platform. The video and slides are now online. The rest of the presentations should be available within a day or two.

For a lot of folks, seeing the progress on Flash Catalyst was the highlight of the evening. When the CDs were begin handed out, it seemed that FC was being installed first on most machines.

Various team members showed various new elements with the Framework, the newly rename Flash Builder and Catalyst. Some of the key points were the Data List Component in Flash Catalyst, the new Skinning capabilities in the Flex Framework, and the Client Side Data Management.

Throughout the evening, the various teams were available for some one-on-one Q&A. I had a great chat with Adam Cath of the Flash Catalyst team about the Data List Component and using the tools for mobile UIs.

Everyone seemed to have a wonderful time. Thanks Adobe and Mike Chambers for hosting such a wonderful event. (And winning a copy of CS4 Master Collection didn’t hurt either!)


Adobe CEO talks about Flash and new technologies on FT.com

April 24, 2009

via Andrew Shorten

There is a three part video interview with Shantanu Narayen, Adobe’s CEO, up on FT.com today as part of their “View from the Top” series, in which they talk to CEOs about news and trends within their respective industry.

In Part 2 of the interview, the conversation is focused on the adoption of Flash on mobile phones and the competition between Flash and Microsoft Silverlight, as well as Adobe’s strategy for getting new technology adopted as a standard and cloud computing. There is some interesting discussion about Adobe’s relationship with Apple and Google.


Tour de Flex Updated

March 31, 2009

 

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A new version of the Tour de Flex application has been released. It can be downloaded here. In addition, there is also a web based version also available.

The web version supports deep linking so the browser back/forward buttons work as expected.  You can even bookmark specific samples!

AIR version details:

  • Splash screen has been replaced by a quick start screen that we can update frequently with news of new samples, resources, etc.
  • Comments are now hosted in the Adobe forums.  You can post questions, subscribe to responses, etc.
  • Now requires AIR 1.5 
  • The download size is now 35% smaller thanks to RSLs.
  • Categories are all tree-based instead of a mix of dropdown and tree (confused a few people)
  • Minor improvements to Eclipse plugin

Adobe AIR Development Plug-In for Aptana Studio Now Available

March 12, 2009

Today, the Adobe Air Team  announced that with Aptana that the next major update to the Adobe AIR Development Plug-In for Aptana Studio is now available for download

The full list of features in the plug-in include:

  • Support for Adobe AIR 1.5. (new)
  • Integrated JavaScript Debugger. Watch screencast. (new)
  • Bundled JavaScript frameworks with full code assist (new)
  • Tools for generating application badges (new)
  • Integrated content assist for the Adobe AIR SDK
  • Pre-installed Adobe AIR runtime and SDK
  • Project wizard generates all necessary files for out-of-the box launching of Adobe AIR applications
  • Export wizard bundles and deploys Adobe AIR applications
  • Easily import Ajax libraries into Adobe AIR projects
  • Create and manage certificates for signing Adobe AIR applications
  • Support for localization, menu builders, and source viewing
  • Adobe AIR samples that can be previewed or imported as project
  • Help and online documentation

If you are looking for a good Javascript editor, I would highly recommend it,


Both Adobe Flash Player and AIR Updated!

March 1, 2009

Earlier this week, Adobe released an update to both the Adobe Flash Player and Adobe AIR. The Flash Player update contains fixes for critical vulnerabilities identified in Security Bulletin APSB09-01. The current version is now 10.0.22.87. The debug versions of the player are available, so go get them from http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/

 

Update: AIR 1.5.1

The latest update to Adobe AIR features improved reliability, compatibility and security.   Notable updates include:

 

  • Updated API with the addition of InvokeEvent.reason and Capabilities.cpuArchitecture.
  • Over 60 resolved bugs

The new updates are available for Windows, Mac and Linux on the Adobe AIR download center.

 

The SDK has also been updated. There are instructions on updating your copy of  Flex Builder 3 to use the new SDK, however I did not see anything on updating the other installs of the AIR SDK used by Flash CS4, Fireworks CS4.


Tour of California – Adobe

February 13, 2009

The 2009 Amgen Tour of California is slated to kick off on Saturday. This 9 day, Tour de France-style cycling road race that challenges the world’s top professional cycling teams to compete along a demanding, recently expanded, 750-mile course from Sacramento to Escondido. 

Race fans can follow the tour, and the progress of their favorite riders and teams, with the race trackers built on using Flex, AIR, Flash Player, Flash video and LiveCycle technologies.

You can read the press release (and see some video) here.

You can follow the race here.

I’m planning to watch the race on the last day as they climb up Palomar Mountain.

Update: I did travel up Palomar Mountain, and got to watch them fly up the hill. I’ve posted my photos on my Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=90964&id=581228763)


Adobe Flash Platform ActionScript reference

February 5, 2009

ria_guide This ActionScript reference for rich Internet application development provides an alphabetical reference for all native ActionScript APIs for the Adobe Flash platform runtimes: Adobe Flash Player and Adobe AIR—as well as the Adobe Flex framework APIs. Use this guide both as an API reference and a tool to learn about the ActionScript APIs available within the runtimes. Download the pdf.


Google Maps API for Flash + AIR

November 19, 2008

When I gave my talk about mapping solutions in Flash/Flex/AIR, one point I made was due to the TOS with Google Maps, you would be unable to use it in an AIR application. Well as of Tuesday, that is no longer true. The Google Maps team just released version 1.8, and this version can be used in AIR apps!

For more information (and screenshots!), read through their snazzy new tutorial on developing AIR apps in Flex Builder.