Adrian Parr's Blog

Last night was January’s London Flash Platform User Group meeting at the CosmoBar in Clerkenwell. The speakers were Paddy Keane talking about his experience of using PureMVC and Rob Bateman talking about the history of 3D on the web. The event was so popular that Tink had to send an email out to everybody warning that over 120 people had signed up to go, and that places would have to be on a first-come-first-served basis (normally we only get around 40 – 50 people). Anyway, here is a quick bullet point summary of what they covered.

PureMVC (19:00 – 20:00) – Paddy Keane

• Why use a framework?
  • gives agility to the project and code
  • helps with risk management
  • good when features are changing
• Based on Model, View, Controller but with additional Façade
  • gives code clarity
  • shows your coding intent
  • need to have good Development Process
  • start with a list of features
  • mock-up features and then test
• The best way to get started with PureMVC is to read the Best Practices document and then read it again

The 3rd Way: Handling 3D on the Web ( 20:15 – 21:15 ) – Rob Bateman

• History of 3D on the web
  • VRML, 1994
  • Web3D Consortium
  • X3D standard, 2002
  • Java3D, 1998
  • Macromedia Shockwave 3D using Director, 2001
  • Sandy 3D Engine in Flash, 2005 (Flash 8 & AS2)
  • Papervision3D (Flash 9 & AS3)
    • Import Collada files
    • Showed examples
  • Away3D Extensions
    • OpenSource Community
      • ASCollada – Collada ActionScript Library
      • WOW-Engine
      • evo.engine for effects
    • Examples
      • TiltViewer by AirtightInteractive
      • Fifa Street 3
    • Use Google SketchUp to create 3D models
      • Save KMZ file (Google Earth 4), rename to ZIP, unzip, inside the ‘models’ folder is a Collada file (DAE)
    • Flash 10 may support hardware acceleration
    • Next version of, Firefox 3.0 (codename ‘Minefield‘) is due to have OpenGL ES built-in
      • This will be good for the mobile market
    • Showed us ADHDTV by evoflash

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)