Flex, Air, Flash, Flash builder, ASC2.0

After the decision of moving Flex to apache, and with the release of Flash builder 4.7 I am getting a bit confused about what is what anymore.
Flex development is moving to apache, yet the compilers, packaging tools and more seem to live inside the Flex SDK.
Air SDK has previously gone on top of the Flex SDK and seems to be an addon on the Flex SDK.
However in flash builder 4.7, AIR SDK is set as the compiler even for web projects, although the result is a .swf file with no dependency on AIR.
On top of things now you can get AIR SDK with ASC2.0 that still can build web applications (non-air)
I am sorry if this is a stupid question, but Isn't this getting a bit complicated and terminologies getting mixed up?
Am I right to assume that things are moving towards the following:
AIR SDK - Compiler and core framework/Api for AS3 code that targets either web(swf), air or air mobile (this would be bundled with Flash builder), have command line tools, to build & package applications.
FLEX SDK - Frameworks for RIA apps (mxml files etc), but ultimately not necessery unless your doing those kinds of apps.

In the Flex/Flash world, everything eventually gets compiled to SWF despite how the source is written. SWF consists of media assets as well as bytecode that can be executed. This is very similar to the Windows world where EXE/DLL files may be a compiled product of C++, VB, Delphi, etc code.
ASC 2.0 is a new compiler that produces more optimal bytecode. While Flash is fast, the current ActionScript compiler does not produce good enough bytecodes that gets the best out of Flash player.
Adobe AIR provides additional capabilities outside of Flash Player to make the applications more desktop friendly. Flash Player is constrainted by browser security, therefore capabilities such as are local file read/write are limited. While the security makes sense, when it comes to desktop applications where security model is different, it makes sense to have extentions that enrich the user experience. Throughout the years, besides API additions, AIR grows to include capabilities such as packaging SWFs for mobile devices.
Flex is just a framework that's designed to make building business applications easier. However, business applications can be built without Flex framework.
p.s. I am not an Adobe employee, but I have been trying to clear this confusion for many people. It seems that Adobe's PR is not keen on communicating with developers, while they are awesome in terms of catering creative professionals.

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Show Notifications in Air - Flash Builder 4.6

Hi, I'm new into Flash Builder mobile apps development.
I just downloaded the latest release of Flash Builder, the 4.6.
I read in this Adobe's article, that with this version I can add "Notifications" to my apps.
I tried to, but all my experiments failed.
Here's a quick personal video illustrating all my steps, and coding errors, please, whatch it:
(It's very, very short, just the time to write some lines of code)
I think my error is simple to solve... but I'm a NewBie and I don't know very much this programming IDE.
Thanks everybody for any help.
Have a nice day
Brandon
WOW!
I'm seeing now that my video's quality is very low... here's the code I wrote:
// Here I want to declare my personal Notification Variable, as said in Adobe's Tutorial
private var myNotification:NotificationManager;
// I saw that NOTIFICATION MANGER does not exist in my code library... but I tried pasting Adobe's one...
// as you can see from this video... the compiler gives me coding error..
// CONCLUSION... WHAT CAN I DO ???
// THANKS TO ALL !!!
// Bye :-)
protected function button1_clickHandler(event:MouseEvent):void
// Here I'll paste Adobe's code to create a new Notification for my first Flash Builder Mobile App...
// CODE...
Thanks again

Here's Adobe's article I missed to link:
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/air/native-extensions-for-air/extensions/notification.html
And the video I made:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0S26Qle-tc&feature=channel_video_title
PS = WHATCH MY VIDEO IN FULL HD - 1080p, or YOU'LL NEVER READ THE CODE

Flash/Air/Flash Builder development for ios?

Hi guys,
Does anyone know whether an application developed at iphone size, will automatically scale full screen to ipad if downloaded from the app store and if 'fullscreen' is set to true in the application descriptor file?
Most of our graphics are vector based and therefore scale fine from the iphone resolution to the ipad. We have tried publishing out our flash app developed using flash builder to .ipa format (at iphone resolution), installing it on an ipad 1 and iphone 3gs and it scales up fine on the ipad.
Does apple have any issue accepting apps at iphone size forced full screen to fit the ipad? Am I right in saying that any app submitted to the iphone app store will be recognised as an iphone app and present the x2 symbol if installed on the ipad, and any app submitted to the ipad store or as universal will automatically scale to fit full screen?
Essentially what I am trying to do is keep my iphone size app at iphone size, sumbit it as universal and just scale it full screen on the ipad... without having to redo assets or submit two versions.
I hope you can help,
Thanks,
D.

fullscreen just refers to whether the status bar is showing. If you have left the stage scale mode in its default setting, then your iPhone stage will scale up to fill the width of the iPad, but there would be a thin slice above and below the stage area that would be blank. You can perhaps just put a border graphic there, just off stage, and that would then be revealed on iPad.
For iPhone 5 you have the opposite problem, there would be bars down the left and right. So, have a border graphic off of all four sides of the iPhone stage, and you’ll be ok for all devices.
Another approach is to set the scale mode to no_border. Then the stage will scale to fill the width of the iPhone 5 or the height of the iPad, and you’ll lose a bit of the stage content in the other directions.

I want to learn Flex in Flash Build 4.7!!!

Can someone point me in the direction of a tutorial, or book on learning in Flash Builder 4.7? If one even exsists? All I can find is resources to learn in "Design Mode" which was discontinued in 4.7. I REALLY don't want to have to figure out how to translate the lessons...

Are you refering to an MXML file, or just a straight up XML file? In either case it should be the same. Comments are done with HTML style comment tags, like this:

I have verified and know that this is the case with MXML. In XML I haven't verified it, but unless Flash Builder 4.7 is handling XML in a radically different way than how most applications handle XML, it should work.
Also, here's a shortcut key that you would probably find useful. To comment something out, simply select what you want commented out, and then press CTRL-SHIFT-C and it will automatically comment out the selected section. And if you select a commented out section and press CTRL-SHIFT-C, then it will uncomment out the selected section.
Hope this helps.

Adobe Flex and Flash Builder

Hi,
i program a keyboard with flash builder , i need to make it as On-Screen Keyboard of operating system ,, i can't found function that allaw me to write on another window (as Run Command or text document) if there is a function do that for active Window
Thanx

That's so cool.
Thanks Randy.

Flex or Flash - Building an interactive game.

What is the best IDE for building an interactive game using
film clips and voice activation? I will need to randomly sequence
film clips.
thanks

If you want to make a Flash-based application then yes, you
will need one of these tools. I believe there are a number of third
party tools that can also work to build flash-based projects as
well. But there are a multitude of different ways to build
browser-based applications. One of which is the language you are
moving from. Otherwise, you can use PHP, JavaScript, Ruby, Ruby on
Rails, etc

Flex and Flash Builder Beta Feedback Survey

Hey guys,
Please take 15 minutes to give feedback on the beta releases here. Your input is greatly appreciated. Please also pass this along to other individuals who might be using the betas.
Kind regards,
Vera

Hi Glenn,
I updated the link yesterday afternoon, but for some folks it seems to still be going to the old survey. I'll put a redirect on the old survey, but please try going to the survey here.
Vera

Flex Builder 4 == Flash Builder 4

I've seen a ton of blogs discussing Adobe's decision to rename Flex Builder to "Flash Builder" for version 4.0, and wanted to see what you all think.
Personally I agree with many of the blog comments that it is a bad move.
Flex apps are not Flash apps (thankfully), they just happen to run in the same runtime (Flash Player). AIR apps are not Flash apps as well.
I still think Flex will succeed, but are you all looking forward to working in Flash Builder 4?
I for one hope Flex continues to succeed despite this move.

Just recently re-infuriated by this terrible decision on Adobe's part so I located this thread.
On Adobe labs they use this as the reasoning:
If you are new to the Flash Builder beta, the first thing that you’ve already noticed is that we are renaming Flex Builder to Flash Builder. This name change will create a clear distinction between the free open-source Flex framework and the commercial IDE.
So instead of developers (most of which have already learned the distinction by now after TWO versions) having to know the difference between an SDK and an IDE (what kind of idiot developers can't understand this???), now Flash designers (many more of those) and programmers also need to understand the difference between Flash Builder and Flash Professional. They aren't the same product in the least and are barely related, but Flash "newbies" won't know that from the names. Meanwhile Flex newbies will still be confused by the Flex SDK/Flash Builder mismatch.
You would think that Flex devs (many of which come from the Java world which has exactly the same concept of SDK/IDE) who are familiar with software engineering (unlike your typical Flash developer), would be able to overcome this "confusion" more easily than the much larger number of Flash devs.
So now this change is needed, to add even more confusion for everybody involved:
When Flash Builder 4 is released for purchase, the current plan is to name the full-featured edition Flash Builder 4 Premium edition. This change is being made to reduce any risk of confusion between Adobe Flash Professional and Adobe Flash Builder.
If it's already realized that you're just replacing the confusion of Flex newbies with the confusion of both Flex AND Flash newbies... why do it?
Was this some over-paid executive's knee jerk solution to an almost insignificant problem? Given that it seems almost nobody thinks this change is a good idea, perhaps they should have asked (here or elsewhere) their customers what they thought of such a change before simply announcing it and passing it off as a big marketing improvement?
But more importantly: Is it too late to reconsider this idiocy? (I can't wait till Google searches start mixing up Flash Pro and Flash Builder information making it just that much harder to find relevant links!)
If you really want to eliminate the confusion of "Flex Builder" vs "Flex SDK" for the mentally challenged, why not simply rename Flex Builder to a more creative and unique name similar to what Java has in Eclipse/JDK? Heck even calling it FX Builder would have been better than Flash Builder! The marketing dept here needs a serious wake up call IMO.

Importing Flex 2 projects in Flash Builder 4.5

I have a decent amount of Flash/ActionScript experience, but I'm brand new to both Flex and Flash Builder... so apologies for asking a potentially stupid question.
I just received a Flex project from a client, and I assumed I'd be able to work on it with my recent install of Flash Builder 4.5
But when I go to File > Import Flash Builder Project and navigate to the Project folder, I just get a warning that says:
“The folder does not contain a valid Flash Builder Project.”
I think this project might have originally been developed in Flex 2. Am I doing something wrong, or is it normal to not be able to import older Flex projects into Flash Builder? If Flash Builder can't import old Flex projects, what's the recommended workaround?

dont import it, do it from scratch in fb4

Interactive floor plans with Flex / Flash builder

Hi,
I'm totally new to Flex and Flash builder and pretty strong in Java back end technologies.
We're having a requirement of visually present the data center floor plan with the server racks in it. Following features has to be supported.
1) Zoom in and out of the data center rack areas
2) Clickable racks, which shows the details of the servers which it's carry (This has to be retrieved from the database)
3) Click and reserve space in the data center floor (to install new racks)
How am I going to achive this ?
Any suggestions / tutorials highly appreciated.
Thanks in advance,
Dushan

My first suggestion is to do a mockup using Flash Catalyst. Its pretty intuitive. Nail down the details. Look at some of the code that it generates, and then go from there.

Flash Builder 4.0 Standalone VS Plugin for Flex and Java Development

Hello,
I have recently installed Flash Builder 4.0 for a personal project. The server side of the project was going to be developed in ASP.NET but at the last minute I decided to change it to Java. However now I am wondering if it would be better to uninstall and install Eclipse with the Flash Builder 4.0 plugin.
I am not really asking which one is better, I guess both are pretty much the same (though I wonder what features are not included in the Eclipse plugin), however I want to know which one would let me create an easier workflow model for the development now that I am going to use Java as well.
I am open to other suggestions as well.
Thanks,
Jorge

Hey guys, I'm brand new to this as well and you probably don't need an answer now but I found this anyway:
Flex Builder and Flash Builder both function as Plug-ins to Eclipse, though each also comes in a "stand-alone" flavor - which is still eclipse, but with a lot of the Eclipse functionality torn out for a smaller footprint.
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1761919/flex-php-flash-builder-4-vs-eclipse
All the best!

Does Flex/Flash Builder allow me to do this?

Hi, I have a scrolling gallery element that I built in Flash and then imported to catalyst as part of my website. (I'm an artist who is self-taught in the realm of web-building and maintain my own site.) When I add new images, I end up opening my .fxp file in catalyst and then take that flash element back in Flash and add images, and then export the whole thing as a .swf and then update that file for my site.
Can using flex/flash builder some how stream line my process where I am instead updating data. i.e. adding new images to a database, which then gets pulled in?
Also I have text fields that require frequent updating, it would be much easier to simply update a document that gets pulled into the final output.
Mainly I'm confused on the purpose of flex and flash builder, and am just wondering if it is something I should know in a limited way to make things easier.
Or is there a much easier way to do this all within catalyst without the round-trip to flash? Should this be a "datalist?"
if you want to see what I'm working with you can visit my site:
www.timothymcmahon.com
the gallery component is reached by clicking on either of the two circles on the lower left after entering the main page.
Thanks, Tim

Don't use FlashBuilder for making a gallery. Much better to google "Actionscript xml image gallery" there are a ton of solutions out there.

New to programming. Should I use Flash Builder 4.6 to create CRUD interface to MySQL?

Having just acquired Creative Cloud subscription, I see that I have access to Flash Builder 4.6 Premium. I haven't figured out yet if I will eventually have access to Flash Builder 4.6 for PHP when / if it is released.
I am relatively new to programming. I want to create a desktop application, perhaps a web application, to manage a MySQL database. I am not, at this time, concerned with mobile applications. I'm primarily interested in just managing the MySQL data -- CRUD (create, read, update, delete) operations.
Hopefully I've provided enough context. My question concerns whether learning Flash Builder 4.6 and Flex programming is an appropriate choice. Alternatively, I could just focus on learning basic PHP programming or perhaps learning to use one of the PHP frameworks (CakePHP, CodeIgniter, or Zend). It seems like learning these frameworks will take time as well, so I don't know where I should begin.
I would really value your perspective. Are the Flash Builder related technologies here to stay? Is Flash Builder primarily suitable for mobile applications (rather than desktop or web)? Would it be more or less difficult to learn Flash Builder and Flex than PHP and one of the PHP frameworks with a view to building a MySQL CRUD application?
Thank you, so very much -- for your time and expertise.
Kevin

Kevin,
I am a big fan of Flash Builder. You can build great desktop web applications as well desktop applications that run on AIR (installs locally to the desktop).
I found it easier to pick up Flex (now Flash Builder) primarily due to the resources (Learn Flex in a week video tutorials http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/videotraining.html ) as well as a big developer community that posts a lot of how to's and walk throughs. In my personal opinion, I think the power of Flash Builder/Flex framework is the ability to create what traditionally was seen as desktop apps within your web browser. If you're looking to create a basic crud interface, skipping Flash Builder and just doing it in PHP may be the way to go. If you're looking to add visualizations (ie graphs, charts) or highly interactive user interface to it then Flash Builder would be a good way to go (though keep in mind that you will still need PHP (or some other server side application layer like coldfusion) to interface with your mysql database but Flash Builder's dataservices creates some sample php classes for you to handle CRUD using Zend). There's lots of amazing things you can do with Flash Builder. I'd recommend checking out some of the samples from Tour de Flex to get a sense of what can be done with Flash Builder.
A couple of notes though - You can build and package native mobile apps with Flash Builder but if you're looking to create web apps for devices like iphone and ipads, Flash Builder isn't the solution since it compiles web based apps to Flash and we all know how idevices don't play nicely with Flash.

Flash pro CS55 vs. Flash Builder 45

Dear Adobe Community,
I have been a Flash Pro (AS3) programmer for some time, but since the advent of Adobe Air for Android and iOS this year, I've been seen increasing momentum in the use of Flex and Flash Builder 4.5. For both Adobe moderators/experts as well as community members, what in your opinion and experience, are the advantages of staying with Flash Pro to develop mobile apps vs. using Flash Builder 4.5?
thank you for your advice,
Alex

What Jon says about using Flash Pro for minor AS classes and also avoiding timeline scripting isn't correct. I mean, it is correct if you are of a mindset that is more on the lines of Eclipse code editing, but there are other ways of working with Flash. It is possible to have very complex AS projects, and also it's possible to do impressively complex things with only timeline code. You can even do that in organized ways!
My general approach is that if I have to work with colleagues, or it's a job requirement to work with classes (like, there's going to be a code review by the client), or I am reusing a previous project's classes, then I'll do it as external packages. If I have to do something really quickly, or if it's a proof of concept, I'll do timeline code. Sometimes I will completely work out a technique using timeline code, and then incorporate the code into a class file to use with the main project.
I made the "select your own seat" application for Carnegie Hall site, almost entirely with timeline code (there is one place where I needed to share some code amongst nine FLAs, so for that I used #include of an external non-class AS file). I also made the MiXit apps on cartoonnetwork.com, and it has around 50 external AS class files, but also quite a bit of timeline layout and animation.
I just like how Flash Pro lets you work with graphical things and the code that drives them, all in one environment.

Multi-module Maven and Flash Builder 4

Sorry for cross-posting this, but I responded to:
http://forums.adobe.com/message/3235768#3235768
which was posted in the Flex forum, and this is more about Flash Builder. The issue is that content assist doesn't work with a multi-module maven project containing a Flex Project module. So here is my response to the above. Hopefully someone will see it here:
<quote>
I'm having the EXACT same problem reported by you as well as here:
http://forums.adobe.com/message/2580402#2580402
Steps to reproduce:
1) Install Adobe Flash Builder 4 Standalone (I initially tried with Spring Toolsuite 2.5.0, but thought I should try with the standalone version from Adobe).
2) Open FB4 and create a brand new workspace
2) Add Eclipse Galileo and M2Eclipse as update sites
3) Install m2eclipse
4) From the command line, create a basic maven project via 'mvn archetype:create'.
5) Remove the src folder and change packaging type to pom
6) In FB4, import the new maven project
7) Create a new Flex Project via File -> New -> Flex Project. Change the location so that it's in a folder under your newly created maven project
8) Open Main.mxml -- notice that the generated file has syntax errors in it (another issue). Fix those errors and attempt the Content Assist -- no dice
Notice that this is a vanilla FB4 standalone install. The only thing I added was the M2Eclipse plugin. Also, I am NOT using flexmojos, nor have I added a <modules/> section to the parent pom yet. As far as FB is concerned, the new flex project is just in a folder underneath another in it's workspace. Also note that this is a brand new workspace -- so a corrupted workspace shouldn't be an issue (as was apparent in the beta).
This has been driving me nuts. We need this functionality. We have a multimodule maven project and really want to use Flex and Flash Builder. We're still in the eval period for FB, but may have to forgo buying FB and instead go with FlashDevelop, even though it's not as powerful.
Justin
</quote>

Hi guy,
its actually quite simple.
The "Root Folder" "Root URL" "Context Root" define your server directory and its url.
as the root folder you put in
<your blazeds install dir>/tomcat/webapps/<your project dir> // you take the blazeds.war file and copy it , rename it and voila your app dir is ready
so it should read something like : c:\blazeds\tomcat\webapps\my_project --> this then has a WEB-INF/flex directory in it. Thats why you have that error of yours --> Invalid root. The WEB-INF/flex folder must contain either flex-config.xml or services-config.xml.
the root url is something like
http://localhost:8400/<your context root> --> is usually your project name in lower case
the context root is your project name, the same name as your copied blazeds.war file
<my_project_name> --> thats what you insert to access your app in a webbrowser
Hope that helped a bit
I am just getting started myself, so i hope i didnt make any mistake, if so I would also be happy if anybody you knows better corrects me
Have fun and good luck
einrocker

Flex, Air, Flash, Flash builder, ASC2.0

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