Flash Catalyst (especially Paninni) Rules - This Is An Apology

Hi… Two weeks ago I posted a question asking how to create a horizontal scrollbar that reveals content from both the right and left sides of a page. I became frustrated because I couldn't bring Catalyst in line with the design I had created in Illustrator for my web page. I had tried using a data list, a component with nested buttons and more components but wasn't able to resolve the challenge on my own. So, I started reviewing the video tutorials and visiting the Adobe Catalyst forum for an answer. When my question didn't receive a response within the first couple of days I posted an additional comment expressing my disappointment. Well, Mykola D. responded to my question telling me how I could use Flash Builder and ActionScript to accomplish my goal. This frustrated me even further because as a designer (not a developer), the last thing I wanted to do was to learn code and begin as a novice with yet another program. So instead I posted another comment basically lambasting Catalyst, and the basic premise of the new program as a "bridge" between designer and developer. Well… I was wrong. In fact, my ultimate experience with Flash Catalyst (Paninni) has been so rewarding that I wanted to post this additional comment to let any one know that read my previous post that I jumped the gun forming an opinion. REALLY jumped the gun. And you know what I forgot? I forgot one of my own fundamental rules when creating. Never try and take a set of preconceived ideas and impose them on a set of tools with which you are unfamiliar. The best ideas emerge from the the artists familiarity with the materials, tools and techniques he/she is using. Trying to create in any other way would be analogous to someone trying to compose a piano concerto without knowing how to play the piano… Or performing brain surgery without ever having attended medical school. I am sure we have all run across THAT type of person before… You know, the big shot creative director who fancies him/herself an "idea" person but has no idea how to actually reduce those ideas to practice, instead relying on the expertise of real artists to create. And you know what? After focusing my attention and actually learning Catalyst it turns out that I didn't have to compromise my Illustrator design one bit. I got the scroll bar to work and even implemented an Illustrator mask grouped with the custom component and… Well, it just worked fantastic. My web page is up and I am very pleased. If you would like to take a look at a professional designers first attempt at a web page I am including the link below. Thanks to whoever had the initial idea for creating Catalyst and I hope the development of this product continues. I am already working on some other ideas on how I can use Catalyst.
Karl
http://www.karldeckeronline.com/

I totally feel ya (though I don't know the thread you are writing about)...
My only complaint is that there is little support for it, however it is obviously quite powerful and full of deesign steroids
In particular it works so well with illustrator, if only I could figure out import=>swf to work on the server

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Why Kill of Flash Catalyst, especially when it works well?

Flash Catalyst
I skin components via an Illustrator files (also psds) received by designers. The joy of skinning and making sure the components are rasterized for performance, and having a stage to edit components and reskin them is wonderful! I adore Flash Catalyst.
Apache Flex
Now with the Flex going to Apache, the white paper states that Flash Catalyst will actually be "Removed" from future Flex releases - This baffles me!
I quote the White Paper:
Flash Catalyst CS5.5 is the last release of Flash Catalyst. At this time, it will not be updated to work with Flex SDK 4.6 (even though it does?!) or any Apache Flex releases nor will it be included in future versions of the Adobe Creative Suite software offerings.
Flash Catalyst workflows will be removed in updated 4.x versions of Flash Builder. - That is a Crime!
I would like to ask, if it is possible to stick with Flash Builder 4.6 (which works with Flash Catalyst 5.5), and continue to develop with these two tools, and no matter what Flash Player (even future ones) users have - would still render?
The idea of killing off something that works so well (if you know how/when to use it), and so enjoyable to work in, angers me!!

You can find the answer. Just modify some config file.
http://chrisgriffith.wordpress.com/2011/12/05/flash-catalyst-cs5-5-and-flash-builder-4-6/
In Applications/Adobe Flash Catalyst CS5.5/plugins/com.adobe.flexbuilder.flex_1.5.0.308731/config.xml add in a reference to 4.6. You’ll need to copy 4.6 into the sdk directory. When you publish it will publish with the 4.6 SDK. Still haven’t figured out how to add new components to the components panel or change the theme (mobile) (or add new Interactions…) You can export this project and import it into FB. Going the opposite way is a bit more trouble. You’ll get an error about the supported SDK’s. You may need to update the hidden project files to “4.5″ instead of “4.6″ which may allow you to import it again… There’s more you can update… search for plugin.xml in the plugins directory.

"This project is not Flash Catalyst compatible" property value error (Panini)

I created a project last night in Flash Catalyst Panini and spent several hours on it, saved it, closed it, and this morning when I tried to open it again, it gave me this error:
This project is not Flash Catalyst compatible. To fix compatibility problems, open the project in Flash Builder.
src/Main.mxml (141): Unexpected property value: . Expected: array.
Any idea how I can fix this or do a workaround of sorts? I'm pretty sure from reading other forums that "This project is not Flash Catalyst compatible" is related to a known bug, but I'd really like to not have to recreate my project from scratch... I'm a designer and am quite familiar with Photoshop and Illustrator but kinda new to Flash Catalyst and Flash Builder, although I know a very small bit of html and basic programming principles so that helps to a degree.
Here is the file: files.me.com/sdjourni/zv2mr8
Thanks for your help.

Hi,
    Looks like there were some issues with code related to filters.
   But, I'm unable to reproduce the issue at my end on the latest build. Could you please let us know on which build of Flash Catalyst did you hit this issue?
Anywyays, I removed two lines of unwanted code and the project is working fine now. I attached the new fixed project to this post. Please download and use that.
   We will investigate the actual issue once we get the Fc build number from you.
Regards
Srinivas Annam

How about this idea with flash catalyst? Can it happen in next version or before the release?

Hi friends,
Let me come straight to my interest!
I create a datalist control asset using photoshop. Bring this into Flash catalyst by importing the artworks. Then selecting respesctive artwork and making it as an horizontal list control with custom way for sliding between thumbnails with some description text.
Till now it is 100% possible with flash catalyst beta 1.
Can flash catalyst team further tweak this ui design tool to go ahead and select the data template and add custom interaction where, we can go ahead and give the path in such a way it makes a 180 degree carousel in seconds without any coding. I just need to go into the template and draw/move the positions for 5 thumbnails which sits within the width area of the datatemplate, then all the thumbnails follow the path.
This might be two much, but next wish is to, create states within the data template for loading the thumbnails into list control with custom animations, loading the thumbnail when some search is changed , i mean on layout updated on the datalist.
So in short , my wish is second level tweaking of layout needs to be done within data driven controls.
Please come with comments!
Regards,
Muthaiah Thiagarajan,
EMC Corporation, Bangalore.
www.fmass.com

Hi Adam,
You are almost right !
I am just rephrasing my question for you to understand!
But I don't mean only carousel, I love to see the list control comes in some innovative paths. As you know in flash CS4 adobe has come with motion editor concept for tweening, where you can go ahead and fix some path for the motion of any object on the stage like in aftereffects.
Now how about i take a template from illustrator where i define the data template of a data list control and scroll bar as vector assets. Now in flash catalyst, i come and fix them as data template and scroll bar. Now i double click and go into the datatemplate and then have a editor like in flash, where i can set a path for the motion of the repeated items, then in runtime it follows that path. This is my first idea.
Second one was i have a search box on top of it , then i type some name to search from the above mentioned datalist control, now it refines and updates the exisiting list with relavant repeated items. When this layout updates , each item should animate and sit back on the data list.
It's a small example for my idea! Hope you got my point!
As you said , I am also mentioning the same repeated items(a.k.a. Data Template, a.k.a. Item Renderer)! One more level of animation to avoid coding and easy to create stunning path following list controls. Even it can be used to define other controls too ! I don't mean images, it can be anything!
Can it be possible ?
Thanks!
Regards,
Muthaiah,
Principal Web Technologist,
EMC Corporation, Bangalore.

Open a Flash Catalyst file with new Panini?

Hello,
I put myself under the bracket of a designer, although have the skills to use flash professional, using as3 but have fount using flash catalyst to be a breathe of fresh air as I can stay well away from code and achieve quick basic outcomes. My only issue I have is when getting Panini and now I am itching to use the new features, especially a simple design I have done for a webpage and I need the new resizable feature to completely make it complete.
I realise there is yet the possibility of opening an old file into the new Panini, although in the future there will be... but I kinda need it now and I get the obvious error below:
This preview version of Flash Catalyst Panini cannot upgrade Flash Catalyst CS5 projects. This feature will be enabled in a future build.
To open this project, open the FXP in Flash Builder Burrito, resolve Flash Catalyst compatibility issues, and then Export as a new Flash Builder Project (.FXP)
Now I have Burrito and have stared longaly at the code but don't know where to start, is there anyone who could help me out? I am a student so have no access to a developer as such and the design is only for a friend but would apprecaite the help, not much the way in tutorials on cutting edge tech!
Thanks,
Matt

Hello,
I put myself under the bracket of a designer, although have the skills to use flash professional, using as3 but have fount using flash catalyst to be a breathe of fresh air as I can stay well away from code and achieve quick basic outcomes. My only issue I have is when getting Panini and now I am itching to use the new features, especially a simple design I have done for a webpage and I need the new resizable feature to completely make it complete.
I realise there is yet the possibility of opening an old file into the new Panini, although in the future there will be... but I kinda need it now and I get the obvious error below:
This preview version of Flash Catalyst Panini cannot upgrade Flash Catalyst CS5 projects. This feature will be enabled in a future build.
To open this project, open the FXP in Flash Builder Burrito, resolve Flash Catalyst compatibility issues, and then Export as a new Flash Builder Project (.FXP)
Now I have Burrito and have stared longaly at the code but don't know where to start, is there anyone who could help me out? I am a student so have no access to a developer as such and the design is only for a friend but would apprecaite the help, not much the way in tutorials on cutting edge tech!
Thanks,
Matt

Flash Catalyst Launch Error Problem

Hello,
I recently installed the web production of Adobe CS5. I have been trying to launch Flash Catalyst and been getting this error message:
Internal Error:
"A file system error is preventing Adobe Flash Catalyst from launching"
Then I have to hit "ok" and the program doesn't load, does anyone know how to fix this?
Thank you.

Same error but here's more info
FC launches fine when logged in as a standard local user account on the machine.
FC fails to launch when logged in on a network user account (LDAP, Open Directory account on XServe).
This makes me think that FC is trying to write a file in a location that is forbidden for it to use.
I've deleted all network user Preferences files and it still fails to launch.
I've deleted all netowrk user Application Support Files and it still fails to launch.
Problem exists for my configurations
10.6.8
iMac, MacBook Pros
All Adobe updates for CS5 up to date
No other Adobe apps in the Master Suite collection have similar problems.
Somebody out there has a fix for this...please help.

Additional wireframe components from Guillermo Torres Adobe Max Flash Catalyst Session?

I am wondering where I can find Guillermo Torres' additional wireframe components from his Adobe sesh: " Sketching Interactivity Using Flash Catalyst?? Is this availbale online somewhere?
Thanks!

Hey All,
Guillermo just let me know his wireframe components library is up on the XD Inspire blog, it's in the comments section of his video: https://xd.adobe.com/#/featured/video/430
If you want the direct link, here it is:
https://xd.adobe.com/downloads/torres_web_library_0.5.fxpl.zip
Enjoy
Tara

Flash Catalyst and the problem of designers who can't to program.

Let us assume that Flash Catalyst is still limited to certain resources. For example, a loop sequence of images, a video and photo gallery, a contacto form and others.
I always have to work with Flash Builder - and then have to programs code? Will future versions of Flash Catalyst help us in this aspect? I hope so. I wanted to hear from you. Recalling that Flash Catalyst is a valuable aid to designers who do not know programming.
Graceful.
@eldermarx

Exactly, my dear juviesi.
To create a little more complex sites we have to learn to program in Flash Builder - even if only a few lines. The Flash Catalyst' idea is great, no doubt, but I hope that Adobe will facilitate futher the life of graphic designers in future version of this software.
Thanks.
@eldermarx

Can I create this... in Flash Catalyst?

Hi, I would like some expert opions to know if it is possible to create the following..
http://www.flinders.edu.au/flolive/docs/letters.swf
in Flash Catalyst.
You click on the letter and drag them to the bottom to create any type of wording that you like.

Within Flash Catalyst, I don't think so. This would be best done using either Flash Professional or Flash Builder.
Chris

Switching from Flash to Flash Catalyst/Flex

For the last few years I have been developing applications for project reporting. To explain this in simplest terms, my clients give me hundreds of reports and supporting documents, graphics, videos, etc. which I then condense and reorganize into a presentation/application in Flash. The project is then published as an .exe to be burned to CD ROM or DVD along with any supporting files and is then distributed to project stake holders, investors, etc.
I'm considering the possibility of a switch from Flash to Flash Catalyst/Flex and want to outline what my needs are, here in the forum, in hopes that others now using Catalyst/Flex can help me decide if this is an appropriate move.
Features needed:
1. Basic animation, transitions, etc.
2. Full Navigation (up to 3 levels) for up to 300 slides.
3. Keyboard navigation (PageUp/PageDown) to navigate sequentially through the entire presentation.
4. Linking into other applications and documents - Word, Excel, Power Point, etc.
5. Full Screen Mode
6. Slide Show Mode
7. Search Features
8. Slide sharing (via email)
9. Video and audio w/controls
10. Pan and Zoom w/controls (panning and zooming of graphics and .swf files)
11. Scrolling (scrolling of text, graphics and .swf files)
12. Interactive forms
Can anyone please comment specifically on these features and wether or not they are possible using Catalyst and/or Catalyst/Flex in combination.
Thank you all for any insight or suggestions.
John

With the exception of making fre-form animations (like a cartoon for example), everything you can do in Flash can be done in Flex considerably faster.
The downside is that Flex applications (especially ones designed in Catalyst) are generally larger, and consume more memory. Personally, I never publish anything made in Catalyst without optimizing it in Flash Builder first.
If the drop in operating performance isn't a deal breaker (most of the time you can't even notice it), then I would certainly consider moving to Flex going forward on new projects.

Interactive ROI Calculator using Flash Catalyst?

Hello, a client of ours has asked us to create an interactive ROI calculator similar to the one in the following link:
http://bit.ly/98vjCF
Our design and production department does work in Flash, mainly to create simple web banners, however they're not hardcore Flash developers by any means. We'll be upgrading from CS4 to CS5 with Catalyst soon. Is it possible to create an interactive ROI calculator using this software or would using a seasoned Flash developer be a better choice?
Thanks for any info.
henry

Hi Henry,
You can use Flash Catalyst to design the UI of your calculator, both for protyping and optionally for final production too. However, to do the actual calculations you'll have to write a bit of code using another tool. For example, you can import the Catalyst project into Flash Builder and wire up the calculation logic to the UI you've created. This gives you the option of having a nontechnical designer work on the UI, while a less design-oriented developer writes code without having to worry much about the visuals.
The underlying code used in a Catalyst project is Flex 4. This should be a snap for a seasoned Flash developer to work with. Or, a Java or JavaScript developer should also be able to get up to speed on Flex pretty easily (especially if the UI was already built in Catalyst and the dev is just wiring up the "business logic").
Hope that helps,
- Peter

After Flash Catalyst discontinued - What Workflow Designer / Developper to use? and how skin compone

Hi,
Now that Flash Catalyst is discontinued before being totally usable,
I used Flash Catalyst for skinning components and prototyping design of App.
So i wonder how experienced people do that without Flash Catalyst?
And more im asking to Adobe the same questions. What do you propose to do now what Flash catalyst helped to do until now?
how do you skin components?
how do you work with designers to get their App Pages designs?
in a word, what is the WorkFlow?
Thanks

I couldn't agree more with you that developers need a solid WYSIWYG tool, and Catalyst was Adobe's closest rival to Blend. It had much more potential than the amount of attention it received. Adobe was very foolish pulling the plug on it, not to mention all their other recent decisions related to the Flash Platform.
My point was that with all of the importing and exporting capabilities of Illustrator, Photoshop, Flash Professional, and especially Fireworks, you already have all of the capabilities of Flash Catalyst, at least in regards to making creative assets available to the Flex framework. That was the sole purpose of Catalyst- to bridge the gap between Adobe's design applications and Flex. If you weren't concerned with Flex, Flash Catalyst would be of no use, even if it were still in development. Exporting a Catalyst project to Flash Professional or HTML was never on it's roadmap, although I'm sure I'm not the first person who thought of those possibilities.
Catalyst, simply put, was the FXG editor which Flash Builder's design mode was not. For example, you could not draw a rectangle using Builder's design mode. With Catalyst CS5.5, it allowed you to directly assign FXG assets to MXML skins for ten of the nineteen Spark components which use the MXML skin architecture. This was a huge limitition, and espeically obvious with the new roundtripping feature, because using any of the non-supported components could easily break the connection between Builder & Catalyst. Honestly, myself and many of the Adobe engineers I talked to on the Flash Builder team, still do not understand why Catalyst wasn't merged into Flash Builder in the first place.
Perhaps it's not as useful out of context, but I compiled a presentation a few months ago for my Adobe user group, titled "Creative & Production Harmony": https://acrobat.com/#d=jNyu*qRjpF68tbl*8lCiTw&x=s
Basically what it outlined, was when to use Catalyst, and when you are better off exporting straight from the other design apps. My conclusion, was that you're generally better off designing your assets in the app you're comfortable with. That IS your WYSIWYG editor, to the precision of 1px. It was also a future proof answer since Catalyst was discontinued and many of the other Flex related workflows have evaporated. The main loss behind discontinuing Catalyst, were its states, timeline, and visual editing of FXG less commonly preserved when exporting from the other apps.
A workflow example for a project I recently used Catalyst with, http://disneycruiseadventure.com/ was to open the PSD provided inside of Photoshop, launch Catalyst, draw a shape (or copy/paste in a vector smart object from Illustrator), and use it's properties panel to match the Photoshop layer styles. This basically the climax of the day, because the rest of it was all spent manually editing code in Builder (and often fixing a lot of the crap code Catalyst spit out). For advanced use of graphics, we relied heavily on the Flex Component Kit, which basically lets you work with any MovieClip inside of Flex or even insert Flex components into a Flash Professional container. The integration between Flex & Flash Pro is most commonly overlooked, which is sad because it still offers the very most design freedom for Flex and has been around long before Catalyst.
In my personal project, my workflow heavily involves Fireworks. It's exporting capabilities are unparralled by any of the other Adobe design apps. You can design with the 1px precision you are after, and almost always preserve that precision after exporting to Flex 3, FXG, and even CSS. Speaking of CSS, now you can export to CSS3 and jQuery mobile themes using Fireworks. If I had a choice between Fireworks and Catalyst, I would take Fireworks without any question. If you're looking for another workflow, consider the idea of taking HTML/CSS exported by Fireworks and opening it inside of Adobe Edge for adding animation and interactivity. Then do your final editing with Dreamweaver, or skip the Edge step if you don't need it.

Flash vs Flash Catalyst

Could someone tell me the difference between these two application? Could I use either to create SWF flipbooks?

You can think of Flash Catalyst as a front-end for Flash Builder; it lets you lay out a project in Photoshop or Illustrator, import it into Flash Builder, and by assigning button and contents to states, make a Flex project. Flex is alternative, component-based way of creating SWF files, based on XML and ActionScript. You use Flash Builder (called Flex Builder before CS4) to manipulate the XML file that controls your project. Like Dreamweaver, it has a design view and a code view.
Flash is the traditional authoring tool for SWF files. It is timeline based, and traditionally you build your project in a design window. However, you can also use ActionScript with Flash, and it has faciliites for editing ActionScript files. Thus you can lay out your project graphically, but still have ActionScript code interact with the design elements.
They are sort of two different ways of doing the same thing, and it sort of depends on your perspective. If you like designing your whole project in Illustrator or Photoshop first, and then adding animation, Flash Catalyst and Flash Builder is probably the easiest way to go. If you like building your project in Flash, and pulling in elements made previously in Photoshop or Illustrator, Flash might be best, especially if you are used to working with animation timelines.
You could make flip books either way. With Flash Catalyst/Flash Builder, you would make your book with each page on a separate layer, with separate layers for "next" and "previous" buttons. Then you would import your PSD into Flash Catalyst, and assign each page layer to a different state. Then you would save this as an FXP file, and import it to Flash Builder to create your SWF file.
With Flash, you could bring import the same PSD, and assign each page layer to a different frame on the timeline, and use the buttons to move between frames.
But I would recommend that you do neither of these. I would recommend composing your flip book in InDesign, which has an SWF flipbook export option. Especially if your flipbook is designed like a book, with text and pictures (rather than just being a stack of images, for example), InDesign is set up for designing that sort of thing, much more so than the other products. Certainly you can do fancier animation sort of things with Flash or Flash Builder, but if you just need to flip between pages, InDesign is the way to go.
(And there's actually another option: you can design your book in InDesign and export it as an XFL file, which you can then import into Flash if you need to add fancier animations. )
Hope this helps,
Lynn Grant
Cross Design Group, LLC

Using Lightroom Flash Galleries in Flash Catalyst

Hi there. I love the ability of Lightroom to create brilliant Flash Galleries especially since there are so many plug-ins out there for the Lightroom Web Module.
My questions is, Is there a way to take the exported Flash Gallery from Lightroom, and use it in Flash Catalyst? In Flash Catalyst I have tried to import the .swf file created by Lightroom but when I try to view the Catalyst project, the gallery doesn't work. I have also tried after the fact to move the remaining files exported by Lightroom into the same folder Catalyst places the .swf file, but still to no avail.
Am I doing something wrong here? I'm not a programmer and have limited knowledge of code, but I'm also a quick learner and would very much like some help finding a solution to this.
If you have any advice, it would be much appreciated!
Thanks,
Stef

I'm not familiar with Lightroom in particular, but there is a tutorial on using a similar swf gallery here.
Things to check:
The lightroom files are all in the same location relative to the swf when you move them to your project
If your html page and your Catalyst swf are in different directories, make sure you set the base url
If you're still having trouble, you may want to install the debug player from here:
http://www.adobe.com/support/flashplayer/downloads.html
It can generally show you any problems that pop up. They may not be very human-readable, but if you post them here I bet someone can help you decrypt them.

Flash Catalyst CS5 is running Slow?

Flash Catalyst is very slow in my computer, another thing is that I can not see the icon next to page.
Specifications:
hp envy: 12 gb of Ram,processor: Intel core i7 1.8, windows 7 ultimate.
PLEASE HELP ME!

There are a few things going on with the default version of Catalyst CS5 that might make it respond more slowly (especially on a big project - lots of nested components with many states):
1. The binary that runs catalyst is still 32 bit so on Windows (Even a 64 bit system with 12GB of RAM) it can only use 2GB max
2. Since the process that's being run uses a Java Virtual Machine to run (JVM) it can only use 1.2 GB of that theoretical max of 2GB
3. By default it comes configured to only use 512MB of heap in the JVM, but this can be modified as shown in the link below:
http://elromdesign.com/blog/2010/03/30/improve-flash-catalyst-performance/
Theoretically you could run it on a 64bit JVM that takes advantage of more than 2GB of RAM per process, but I am unclear how that works with a compiled .exe -> JVM (Tomcat had a similar issue a while back before they started including a pre-compiled 64bit Bootstrap loader for windows)
We were having issues with an extremely large Catalyst CS5 project and by doing the modifications linked above it gave us a bunch more breathing room.
Another reocmmendation: Upgrade to Catalyst CS5.5 - opening the same project in Catalyst CS5.5 (without the .ini modifications) was extremley performant so it looks like they have done some other performance enchancements between Catalyst CS 5.0 and Catalyst CS 5.5.
Hope this helps.
-rOck
p.s. It looks like Adobe is getting on the bandwagon of 64 bit as some of their projects (Photoshop and Premiere?) have already been converted to take advantage of 64 bit. Being a developer myself I understand the implications of a "simple" change like converting an application from 32bit to 64bit.

Flash Catalyst (especially Paninni) Rules - This Is An Apology

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