Adrian Parr’s Blog

Here is a list of things I want to look in to during 2008. If there is anything you think I should check out but have missed off this list then let me know.

1. Papervision3D
2. Tweener
3. TweenLite
4. Go (Go ActionScript Animation Platform)
5. KitchenSync
6. Xray (The AdminTool)
7. AS3 Bulk Loader Library
8. SWX: SWF Data Format
9. Adobe Flex 2 & 3
10. Adobe AIR
11. Eclipse and FDT 3.0
12. Cairngorm
13. PureMVC
14. ActionScript 3.0
15. SWFAddress

Not necessarily in that order. Wish me luck!

If you are anything like me, then when you need to find your Flash Shared Object (SOL) files, you can never find them on your computer. Well, just as a reminder, they can be found here on a PC …

C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Application Data\Macromedia\
Flash Player\#SharedObjects\<random string>\<domain>\
<path from webserver>\<filename>.sol

and on a Mac they can be found here …

Macintosh HD:Users:<username>:Library:Preferences:Macromedia:
Flash Player:#SharedObjects:<random string>:<domain>:
<path from webserver>\<filename>.sol

I also recently noticed that the path to data saved from Adobe AIR apps is stored here on a PC …

C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Application Data\
<AIR App Reverse Domain Name>\Local Store\#SharedObjects\
<flashname>.swf\<filename>.sol

and on a Mac they can be found here …

Macintosh HD:Users:<username>:Library:Preferences:
<AIR App Reverse Domain Name>:Local Store:#SharedObjects:
<flashname>.swf\<filename>.sol

Hope this is of some help, and will save you a bit of time trying to find them.

There are also a few useful tools out there that will allow you to check (and modify) the contents of SOL files. Try ASV SOL Viewer and Editor, SolVE: Local Shared Object Viewer/Editor or SOLReader.

Here is some example code for using and enterFrame loop in ActionScript 3.0

In the Output window you should see the following …

event.type: enterFrame
event.bubbles: false
event.cancelable: false
event.eventPhase: 2
-

Last week O’Reilly launched the InsideRIA website, a portal/blog for Rich Internet Application developers around the world. It looks like it is going to be a great resource and it currently has articles written by respected people such as Colin Moock, Rich Tretola,  Tony Hillerson, David Tucker, Tony MacDonell,  Andrew Trice,  Andre Charland, Jonathan Snook and Raymond Camden.

The also have an InsideRIA Atom feed (which I have added to my Google homepage).

I’ve just been having a play around with QR Codes. The code you see above is a code for the URL of this website (www.adrianparr.com). They are basically two-dimentional barcodes. Try making your own here. Kaywa have a free QR Code Reader that works on many mobile phones. I’ve just tried it on my Nokia N73 and worked like a dream.

UPDATE 15/07/2009: I have just purchased and installed the QuickMark iPhone application and it worked really well. You can buy it from the iTunes Store for £1.19.

This Thursday (31st January) there is a London Flash Platform User Group meeting. The speakers lined up are Paddy Keane talking about PureMVC and Rob Bateman talking about 3D in Flash (Away3D, Papervision3D and Sandy). It should be very interesting.

As always, a big ‘thank you’ to Tink for organising the event.

Time: 19:00 - 23:00 (doors open at 18:30)
Venue: CosmoBar, 50-54 Clerkenwell Road, EC1M 5PS (click for map)

The Adobe on AIR Bus Tour is coming to Europe (minus the bus) this summer. At the time of writing the details (locations and dates) are still being finalised. Keep up-to-date by checking the Bus Tour Weblog and the on AIR Weblog. You can also follow the tour via video, Twitter and Flickr.

Hooray! I managed to get a ticket to the Colin Moock ActionScript 3.0 training day being ran by Adobe. I’ll be attending the London event on Monday 3rd March 2008. The event is being held at Vinopolis, the famous wine tasting venue (map here). I hope we get some free wine to help us get our heads around the nitty-gritty of AS3. See you there, if you are going as well.

On Thursday 24th January I went along to the Flex London User Group meeting at Shoreditch Town Hall. This month’s meeting coincided with an official Adobe event, and therefore there was a huge turnout. Normally we get around 30 people turning up, this month there was approx. 250 people (requiring a change of venue). The speakers were Serge Jespers and James Ward.

Here is a summary of what they covered …

Serge Jespers

• Flash Player update to “Moviestar”
• H.264 codec
• Adobe services such as Scene7, Share, Pacifica (VOIP), Cocomo (collaberation app)
• Thermo (PSD > MXML)
• Flash Player 9 installation stats
  • 3.4 billion installs worldwide
  • 94.3% of European users have FP9
• Flex job trends (www.indeed.com)
• Examples of Flex Apps (Buzzword, SlideRocket, Picnik)
• Flex.org showcase
• Desktop RIA’s using Adobe AIR
• AIR example Digimix
• Flex Builder 3 Overview
  • Skinning a button using Photoshop and slicing
    • Name the slices (Button_upSkin, Button_overSkin, Button_downSkin)
    • Save out as PNGs
    • Import Artwork in to Flex
    • Flex will then create a CSS file
• Flex Component Kit for Flash CS3
  • Select MovieClip
  • Commands >> Convert symbol to Flex Component
  • Creates a component (SWC)
  • Add it to Flex build path
  • It then becomes part of your framework. It even has code hinting.
• Create MXML Module.
  • Can be used as an external asset like LoadMovie
• bin-debug <– only for testing
• bin-release <– put this online
• Reduce Flex app filesize by using Runtime Shared Library
  • Framework will then try and load from cached version on client’s computer.

James Ward

• Flex 3 Charting Components - ILOG Elixir
• Flex 3 SDK is Open Source (stlab.adobe.com)
• Open Source BlazeDS
  • Remoting and HTTP-based messaging technology
  • Opened up the AMF format (Action Message Format - AMF3)
  • Demo of BlazeBench
    • Comparison between AMF, Dojo, SOAP, JSON (JavaScript Object Notation)
    • AMF is quicker
    • Parsing of data is very, very quick
    • AMF has compression built in to the protocol (no need to use GZip)
  • BlazeDS comes from Adobe LiveCycle
    • LiveCcycle Data Services ES uses RTMP to stream data to the client (this is not available in BlazeDS).
    • Check out Flex MXML Producer and Consumer
• Flex-AJAX Bridge

Back in November 2007 I went down to Brighton for the Flash On The Beach conference. It was a fantastic event (as it was in 2006) and John Davey did a great job of organising the event and getting a wish list of speakers from around the world. Here is a list of the speakers that I managed to catch across the three auditoriums.

Monday 5th November

• Keynote - Richard Galvan - Overview of Flash CS3 Professional
• Grant Skinner - 50 Reasons AS3 Kicks Ass
• Mike Chambers - Understanding Adobe AIR
• Keith Peters - Make Flash Games. Retire Early.
• John Grden - Papervision3D CS3 Component - get er’ done!
• Joshua Davies
• Brendan Dawes - If it aint broke - break it!

Tuesday 6th November

• Ted Patrick - Flex and ActionScript 3 Worst Practices
• Craig Swann - Perceptive Interactions + Alternative Interfaces
• Aral Balkan - Let’s talk about SWX, baby!
• GMUNK (Bradley Grosh) - GMUKNICKDOWN 07
• Alex Jenkins - Pulling the emotional trigger.

Wednesday 7th November

• Andy Polaine - Playful Revolutions
• Joey Lott - Stylizing Flex Applications
• Andre Michelle - Klangfabrick
• Branden Hall - The Nooks and Crannies of ActionScript 3
• Jared Tarbell - Algorithms to Fill Space
• Closing ceremonies & raffle

All of these presenters are doing some amazing work and I came away from Brighton really inspired and eager to learn more. Here’s looking forward to Flash On The Beach 2008!

This is a test blog post using Deepest Sender (Firefox extension).

Here is a link to the Adobe Developer Connection website. It always worth checking here regularly to see what new information there is. There is a lot of content on there. Personally, I quite like the new(-ish) design.

This is my first test post to my new WordPress blog. Hooray!!