The decision reverses an earlier pledge in which it said it would help get Flash working on the gadgets.

Closed tools

In mid-April, Adobe released software  Creative Suite 5 that contained option to export Flash applications into native iPhone applications. Shortly before the release, Apple updated the terms and conditions of the license software developers must sign to create iPhone and iPad applications. The revised terms placed strict restrictions on what developers can use to create these applications and effectively banned them from using 3rd party tools such as Creative Suite 5.

At the time Adobe wrote that it still intended to deliver the feature. Now it has said it will halt development of future export tools for Creative Suite.

“We will still be shipping the ability to target the iPhone and iPad in Flash CS5,” wrote Mike Chambers, Adobe’s principal product manager for developer relations, on his blog. “However, we are not currently planning any additional investments in that feature.” Mr Chambers also commented on Apple’s revision of its terms and conditions. He wrote: “…as developers for the iPhone have learned, if you want to develop for the iPhone you have to be prepared for Apple to reject or restrict your development at any time.”

Apple responded in a statement to technology news site CNet in which it described Flash as “closed and proprietary”. Apple preferred to support more open standards which replicate everything Flash can do, added the statement.

Mr Chambers wrote that now Adobe will concentrate on Google’s Android smartphone software and ensure that its Flash technology works well with that. “Fortunately,” he wrote, “the iPhone isn’t the only game in town.”

Flash CS5: Native iPhone Application Development

The new support for iPhone applications in the Flash Platform tooling will not allow iPhone users to browse web content built with Flash technology on iPhone, but it may allow developers to repackage existing web content as applications for iPhone if they choose to do so.Flash Player uses a just-in-time compiler and virtual machine within a browser plug-in to play back content on websites. Those technologies are not allowed on the iPhone at this time, so a Flash Player for iPhone is not being made available today. Flash Professional CS5 will enable developers to build applications for iPhone that are installed as native applications. Users will be able to access the apps after downloading them from Apple’s App Store and installing them on iPhone or iPod touch. Developers can deliver applications built with Flash Platform tooling just like any other iPhone application. This will require the developer to be a member of the iPhone Developer Program and follow the program guidelines. iPhone applications built with Flash Platform tools are compiled into standard, native iPhone executables, just like any other iPhone applicatio. Applications can be built targeting iPhone OS 3.0 and later.

Update: Apple has bowled out Adobe’s effort to get iPhone application development on Flash platform with introduction of new clause in its iPhone SDK 4.0 license agreement which makes developing iPhone application using tools other than from Apple as illegal. Check more details about whats new in iPhone SDK 4.0 and its implications at http://www.macoscoders.com/2010/04/09/new-features-in-iphone-os-4-0/

After shipping AIR 1.0, many of developers challenged Adobe to open the runtime up even more by, for example, allowing communication with native processes and providing enhanced networking support. With AIR 2, Adobe’s goal from the outset was to remove limitations in the runtime that prevented developers from building their applications.

Some of the capabilities that are coming in AIR 2 include:

• Native process API
  Beginning with AIR 2, developers will have access to a native process API that will enable applications to invoke and communicate with native applications on the local machine. In order to preserve the cross platform nature of the .air file format, applications that take advantage of the native process API must be deployed as native installers such as .exe and .dmg. The AIR runtime SDK will include support for generating basic native installers.
• Support for detecting mass storage devices
  Now your AIR application can detect when a mass storage device is connected or disconnected. An AIR 2 application can listen for when a user plugs in a Flip video camera or USB Flash drive so that it can, for example, automatically synchronize files to the local system or prompt the user to upload photos to Facebook or videos to YouTube.
• Improved support for accessibility
  Runtime dialogs such as the installer dialogs will be readable by supported screen readers such as JAWS. In addition, it will be possible to build accessible Flash-based applications in AIR leveraging the existing accessibility API’s and features available in the Flash Player and Flex SDK.
• Open document API
  Support for opening a document will be possible from an AIR application. With this API, AIR asks the operating system what the default application is associated with the file. For example, specifying a file path to a PDF file will launch Adobe Reader or a .doc file will open Microsoft Word.
• Improved performance
  Applications that run using AIR 2 will consume less memory and use less CPU than AIR 1.5 without recompiling the application. We will share more information about this when we launch the beta.
• Local microphone access API
  Currently, audio must first pass through a server before it can be saved locally. Using the upcoming AIR 2 local microphone API, it will be possible to record audio locally, which can be important if your application is running in a disconnected mode.
• Multi-touch & gesture support
  AIR 2 will include support for multi-touch (Windows 7) and gestures (Windows 7 and Mac OS X 10.6).
• Faster, more powerful WebKit
  An updated version of WebKit that includes a faster JavaScript engine and new HTML5/CSS3 capabilities will be included inside of AIR 2.
• Improved socket support
  It will now be possible to create local servers and lightweight P2P applications with enhancements to AIR’s socket support.

In the coming weeks leading up to the beta, we will begin sharing more information including videos, articles and blog posts about some of these new capabilities. We are extremely eager to get the public beta into your hands so that we can begin incorporating your feedback.

Adobe expects to ship a beta version of Adobe AIR 2 on Adobe Labs by the end of the year. In the first half of 2010, Adobe expects to ship the final version of AIR 2.

http://www.adobe.com/devnet/devices/articles/htchero.html

Flash And Flex Developer Magazine

FFDMag.com has come up with the new ‘Flash And Flex Developer’ Magazine.

• How to become a Flash/Flex Developer?…
• Data Analytics and Tracking User-Behavior in Flex Applications…
• Animating with ActionScript…
• Create your first ActionScript game in minutes…
• Flash DecalSheet System…
• Flickr in Flash – Creating a portfolio…
• How to use Yahoo! Maps in Flex…
• Flex Application Architecture…
• Google Analytics for Flash…
• Miniblog Part 2…
• Drag and Drop in AIR using Flash CS3…
• FLEXing Your Business Application…
• New 3D Methods of Display Objects in Flash Player 10…
• Blender to Flash workflow…
• How to view PowerPoint on YouTube…

Rainbow Live Flash CMS

Rainbow Live combines the ease of Visual XML editing with the power of a Live Content Management System (CMS), making it easy to design data in whatever structure you want, and then edit it online without having to re-upload new XML files. It’s been designed specifically to provide Flash website developers with an easy way to edit and build XML based sites. Rainbow Live has been developed to answer the needs of Flash developers who use XML as a data source. Checkout a demo and more details at:-
http://www.codeandvisual.com/rainbow

Rainbow Live removes the need to rely on a backend developer to build and maintain a database. Rainbow Live saves time and money as the process of setting up XML structures is familiar to many Flash developers and is made even more intuitive with Rainbow Live’s node-based approach.

Rainbow Live provides you with a User log-in to allow data to be managed by the client long after your involvement is through. Rainbow Live provides the perfect lightweight solution when you don’t need all the bells and whistles (and overhead) of a complete CMS system.

While Rainbow Live is not technically a complete CMS, it provides all of the basic functionality needed to design, populate and edit data for small to medium based Flash projects (And any where else that XML is used as a data source).

Some of the key benefits of Rainbow Live:

• Runs in browser
• Move, delete, duplicate and rename nodes
• Add and remove multiple attributes using a simple dialog box
• Avoid writing poorly formed XML
• Edit XML files live online
• Upload Images and files
• Automatically create thumbnails
• Admin and User log-ins
• Lock and hide elements from user
• Define child templates to define your own node type
• No backend scripting necessary
• Customizable scripts
• Doesn’t dictate structure of your data/website – you can easily design the CMS to your own needs

With each new Flash Player comes new possibilities and as usual, it’s left to the Flash community to figure out what those are. Here is a short version highlighting only the new features available and what they probably offer.

3D effects New

Create more intuitive, engaging interfaces using built-in support for 3D effects. Get started quickly without being a 3D master by designing in 2D and easily transforming and animating in 3D. Fast, extremely lightweight, and simple-to-use APIs, along with 3D tools in Adobe® Flash® CS4 Professional software, make motion that was previously accessible only to expert users via ActionScript® language or custom third-party libraries available to everyone.

Custom filters and effects New

Create high-performance, real-time effects for cinematic experiences that quickly engage users. With new Adobe Pixel Bender™, the same technology behind many filters and effects in Adobe After Effects® software, these dynamic and interactive effects can be used both in production with After Effects CS4 and live with Flash Player 10. The Pixel Bender just-in- time (JIT) compiler can also be used to process other types of data, such as sound or mathematical functions, asynchronously in a separate thread.

Advanced text support New

Take advantage of a new, flexible text engine that brings print-quality publishing to the web, building on more than 25 years of Adobe expertise in typography. Gain more control over text layout using the Text Layout Framework, an extensible library built on the new text engine in Adobe Flash Player 10, which delivers advanced, easy-to-integrate typographic and text layout features for rich, sophisticated and innovative typography on the web. Create multilingual web applications using device fonts that can now be anti-aliased, rotated, and styled, or build your own unique text components.

Dynamic sound generation New

Use enhanced sound APIs to dynamically generate audio and create new types of audio applications such as music mixers and sequencers, real-time audio for games, and even audio visualizers. Work with loaded MP3 audio at a lower level by extracting audio data and supplying it to the sound buffer. Process, filter, and mix audio in real time through the Pixel Bender JIT compiler to extend creative freedom beyond the visual experience.

Drawing API Enhanced

Perform runtime drawing more easily with restyleable properties, 3D APIs, and a new way of drawing sophisticated shapes without having to code them line by line. Developers can tweak parts of curves, change styling, replace parts, and use custom filters and effects, delivering improved throughput, creative control, and greater productivity. Enhancements to the Drawing API add the z dimension, real perspective, textured meshes in 3D space, a retained graphics model, read/write rendering, and triangle drawing with UV coordinates, while adding memory and improving performance.

Hardware acceleration Enhanced

Use the hardware processing power of the graphics card to paint SWF files into the browser and accelerate compositing calculations of bitmaps, filters, blend modes, and video overlays faster than would be performed in software.

Vector data type New

Use the new typed array class for better performance, efficiency, and error checking of data. Lee Brimelow recently put out a Flash Player 10 tutorial where he shows how to use the new Vector type.

Dynamic Streaming New

Show exceptional video with streams that automatically adjust to changing network conditions. Leverage new quality-of-service metrics to provide a better streaming experience.

Speex audio codec New

Take advantage of the new, high-fidelity and open source Speex voice codec, which offers a low-latency alternative for voice encoding. Flash Player also supports ADPCM, HE-AAC, MP3, and Nellymoser audio.

File upload and download APIs Enhanced

Bring users into the experience by letting them load and save files from your web application. New file reference runtime access allows local processing of data without roundtripping to the server.

Color correction New

Deliver web applications with accurate color, so your favorite web destinations look the way they were intended. Color correction works with the monitor’s ICC color profile and allows you to convert SWF files to standard RGB.

New classes:

Vector Class – Offers arrays with Type checking. Should (in theory) be faster than ordinary arrays and easier to debug since they’ll only accept the correct data type. Lee Brimelow recently put out a Flash Player 10 tutorial where he shows how to use the new Vector type.

GraphicsBitmapFill and GraphicsEndFill Class – New classes for handling filling of bitmaps, great for creating shaders (textured triangles) on 3D models. Supports a matrix for advanced distortion as well as a smoothing option. In an interview with Adobe’s Tom Barclay he mentions these features as either CPU or GPU accelerated.

GraphicsGradientFill, GraphicsSolidFill, GraphicsStroke and GraphicsPath Class – Same as above, but for gradients and line drawing.

GraphicsTrianglePath Class – Object for storing one single 3D triangle, complete with geometry, normals, culling and mapping data.

Shader Class – Allow you the create custom shaders for 3D graphics. In 3D, a Shader applies rendering effects such as shadow, motion blur, specular highlights and other visual enhancements to 3D geometry at the time of rendering them to screen. This process makes fairly simple 3D models look visually richer than they really are. Rob Bateman has created a good example of what shaders are and what they offer for 3D in Flash. I initially thought this class had to do with 3D shaders, but according to Zeh Fernando, this class is related to Pixel shaders – thus shader is here just another word for Pixel Bender generated effects. Too bad – then again – Pixel Bender was built to “bend”. Maybe somebody can figure out how to make 3D shaders using it?

The Shader class has several supporting classes such as ShaderInput, ShaderJob, ShaderParameter, ShaderParameterType, ShaderEvent, ShaderFilter and ShaderPrecision. From looking at the ShaderParameterType class, It looks like the shaders will support up to four levels of rendering quality (anti aliasing?). Very promising indeed!

SamplesCallbackEvent Class – Allows you to get and set the position in the audio data as well as inject audio samples into the audio stream on your machine. I reality this, combined with the extract-method in the Sound Class makes it possible to generate any kind of sound as well as mix, add filters and more.

Matrix3D Class – to render objects from 3D space to a 2D representation, you use a matrix function. This new matrix class is native to the Flash Player, offering a massive speed enhancement. The old matrix functions were not native so any 3D engine will get a nice speed boost just from adding support for this feature alone. The class offers a large set of methods for working with the matrix such as interpolation, decomposition and transforms. Related to this class is also the new classes Orientation3D, Perspective Projection, Transform, Utils3D and Vector3D.

New methods in existing classes:

BitmapData Class – now supports getting and setting Vectors (getVector/setVector)

BlendMode class – provides constant values for visual blend mode effects. This class has a new static constant called SHADER. Shaders are often associated with rendering of 3D content. Interesting!

DisplayObject Class – This class handles all the display of objects in Flash (as the name implies). What’s new is that EVERY single object now supports the third dimension. Where you formerly could set the X and Y position, you can now also set the Z position like this:

myMovieClip.z = 100;

Every object can rotate around the X, Y and Z axis (rotateX, rotateY, rotateZ) as opposed to formerly only being able to rotate in 2D. See Lee’s 3D tutorial for an extensive example of this. You can also scale along the Z axis (scaleZ) as well as set the blendShader. Setting the blendShader sounds like it could be a way for using Pixel Bender to calculate the texture. Senocular has posted a tutorial that indicates this. This tutorial also mentions Graphics.lineShaderStyle(), a method not in the current Flash Player 10 beta, so it’s clear that somebody in the community has a more recent version as well as some official documentation…

Graphics Class – Handles all the drawing of graphic primitives in the Flash Player. There’s several new methods here. Some handle 3D drawing and some enhance the existing functionality. According to Adobe some of these commands can now be calculated by the users graphics card processors (GPU) for a massive speed boost.

Stage Class – has a new property for getting and setting the ColorCorrection according to the viewing monitor’s ICC color profile. In theory, this should improve color fidelity – given that the ICC profile is correct.

Event Class – In AS3, we rely on events for most everything we do. New core events are related to text enditing (Clear, Copy, Cut, Select all, Paste), audio (samples_callback) as well as movie playback (Exit_frame and frame_constructed) . These latter two are especially interesting as exit_frame brings a feature many Director developers have been missing. They both give you more granular control over when your code is executed. Should prove very useful for component development and could potentially rid us of the ever annoying “When in doubt – wait one frame“.

Microphone Class – This class gets new methods for getting and setting the audio codec. Flash Player 10 offers the new speex codec in addition to the existing and proprietary Nellymoser codec. Speex is a free, open source codec that is patent free so this is yet another great move towards openness from Adobe. This class now has a supporting class with constants for the two possible codecs (SoundCodec Class).

Sound class – This class has two new functions and that’s all we need… The Sound.extract command will pull out audio data as a ByteArray so you can manipulate it as you please. Using samplesCallbackData, you can then write those data back to the audio stream. Keith Peters has a great sample with code on his blog.

FileReference Class – now have two new commands for loading and saving files straight from the users desktop. No more uploading to a server for manipulating files.

NetConnection and NetStream Class – These classes have several new features for anabling Peer 2 Peer (P2P) features via Flash Media Server. Some good discussion on the P2P feature at this blog with Justin Everett Church chiming in at the end to clear the air of confusion.

NetStreamInfo Class – Has been enhanced with several useful features that are probably related to the new dynamic streaming capabilities. Using the information provided by this class, other video streaming server vendors should be able to support similar features. There’s two related classes that has changes as well: NetStreamPlayOptions and NetStreamPlayTransitions. These will allow for swapping streams while playing transitions, a feature I had planned to add for the AS3 version of video.maru.

Capabilities Class – gets a “hasColorCorrection” method. Probably a good idea to test agains this one before trying to set the color correction on the Stage object.

Adobe Flash Builder 4

Adobe has officially announced  re-branding of Flex Builder  to Flash Builder.  Naturally, this change has caused quite a stir among the Flex developer community. The announcement has been received with mixed emotions. I had a feeling that would be the case, considering people involved in Flex development are generally application developers and the word ‘Flash’  does well with designers. In the early days there was a pretty solid line between people working Flex and people doing Flash.  Now Adobe might want to remove this separation to some extent (atleast in the name to begin with) and get both the Flash and Flex community together to further the usage of Flash Player as an application development platform.

Adobe Flash Platform

Adobe is renaming the next version of Flex Builder to Flash Builder 4, it will still be the same Eclipse-based IDE with lots of exciting new features. Adobe is  not renaming the open source Flex Framework or the free Flex SDK.  Adobe will also continue to promote the use of the Flex Framework and Flex development in general.

Also this move to the Flash Builder brand marks the separation between the Flex Framework and the IDE built on Eclipse that can be used for the development of ActionScript as well as Flex projects.

An another interesting development with regard to getting Flash and Flex developer community closer is arrival of Thermo, which basically lets the designers do some part of application development without bothering much about coding.

Adobe is also conducting a pre-release demo of Flash Builder 4 at different locations of the globe. In Bangalore it is slated to be on June 3rd. So if you want to find out more about the upcoming beta releases of  Flash Builder, this would be a great place to start.

1. Auto Car – A client application based on Adobe Flex running on web
2. Auto Admin – A Adobe AIR based administrator application running on desktop

Auto Car and Auto Admin applications together form a work flow enabling administrator to add/remove/edit/view cars in the inventory. The client application allow end user to view and order pre-owned cars listed by the admin application.

The two applications were presented at the Adobe RIAthon 2009 event conducted by Adobe at the Grand Asoka Hotel in Bangalore. Due to some unfortunate turn of events at the contest, these two applications were not able to compete at the event in its full glory. But luck had something else instore for me. At the near end of the event, Adobe was able to recognise the mess up done which had removed the application from the contest. I should really be greatful to Adobe to recognise the efforts that went into making the application and rewarding me with a cool iPod Nano and a laptop bag.

Adobe Riathon 2009 iPod Nano

Luck was showered on me on that day one after the other. It was a moment of sadness then turned to shock , then to surprise and finally it ended with a great note that I got the recognition for my work. Thanks Adobe..!

Some screenshots of Auto Car:-

I have developed a  component extending the functionality  of Grid. In my component, it divides the screen into 4 parts and there is a centeral button which the user can drag to resize any of the four sides. You can see the demo at:-
http://www.macoscoders.com/demo/navgizmo/

But I always think my component can be best done using DividedBox instead of Grid. whats your take on this? (People at Adobe suggested me that Grid would soon see an end or its not recommended to use Grid)

If you need the source do mail me.