Real benefits of Flex 4?

I have read lots of articles on how to ugrade from Flex 3 to Flex 4, but I haven't seen too many testimonials on why I should upgrade my code from MX to spark components.
Can anyone answer this for me?
Why should I not use viewstacks anymore? Why are s:Groups better than H:Boxes? How can I minimize the number of framework files DL-ed to support my app?
I can see where Flex 4 is greatly improved over Flex 3 in terms of CSS, skinning, data visualization, but as for changing the mx to spark controls I'm not really seeing much on this.
Please advise, thanks.

I think Alex gave a bit of an over-simplified answer as to the benefits of Flex 4.
If the major benefits are the more consistent skinning model, right-to-left text support, and smooth scrolling in Lists, then because most people don't use the rtl text model (think Arabic, Hebrew, etc.), Flex 4 does not have much to offer.
In reality, Flex 4 offers a better skinning model, a better states model, and a more flexible layout model. Group used properly has its place.
Design mode has always had its problems, I never use it, and Flex 4 didn't seem to fix many of the complaints people had about it, though it does have some improvements.
Flex in general is great, really great, and I just don't think HTML 5 will beat it, but that's another discussion.

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    I must be missing something major because, it just doesn't make any sense to me. I know that I can always use the mx components to continue to work the way I am now, but to what end ? I get these warnings that all but tell me the mx buttons are going to be deprecated sooner or later so what should I do ? Just because it's possible to represent vectors with xml doesn't mean that it's a good idea. It seems as if Adobe took something that was optimized (at least for my workflow), and turned it upside down and made things so much more labor-intensive, with no real benefits. I'd use CSS until I couldn't achieve the appearance I wanted, and then for the rest I'd skin the components in Flash Professional.
    If you are still reading this, thank you. I really only have a couple of simple questions: Are MX components going to be deprecated ?, which, I know only Adobe folk can answer, and the more important question (for me): Does a workflow exist between Flash Professional and Flash Builder for the skinning of spark components. I have read a couple of other posts which ask similar questions, and some have 'solutions', but again, these seem to be ways to work around the new component architecture, rather than how to maximize it's efficiency and effectiveness.
    I feel like I should have just stayed with Flex Builder, and Flash Pro because the newest version of Flash Builder just seems more and more like a tweener version that I could have skipped altogether and waited for the platform to mature a little more.
    Thanks for staying with me, I apologize for the rambling.

    I can't really help you pick the best MVC framework, but I can recommend that if you are moving your Flex 3 projects to Flex 4, make as few changes as possible for moving components right now.  Like you said, we are in the middle of a transition.  The Adobe guys recommend not porting all of your mx Projects over to Spark.  I have a large Flex 3 project that I'm almost finished moving to 4.1 and I have changed as little as possible.  The only reason I converted it was to take advantage of some of the nice things they've done with data services and binding.
    I don't think it is a waste of time to take Flex 3 projects and make them run in Flex 4.1 or higher, but I do think it is a waste of time to convert all of those components over to their Spark counterparts at this time.

  • Just an advice for Adobe guys

    Hello Mr Adobe,
    First of all, congratulations to you (and your adoptive son
    Macromedia) , I think that Flex could represent a real revolution
    in the software development. I always have been a Flash fanatical,
    and Flex represents the solution to all weak points on Flash. But I
    think that you guys, aren't doing your best on one of the most
    important labours when releasing a new product: evangelization.
    If you want us to use Flex, why don't you built www.flex.org
    and www.adobe.com with Flex? I know that it's a great effort, but
    you are a big company, sure that you've got a huge and skilled team
    capable of showing us the benefits of Flex. If you are not the
    first on using your own products, this is not a good sign.
    Another issue: We need a good documentation. Only a few easy
    examples aren't enough to help us to program a complex application
    (whatever you can develop with JSP, ASP, PHP...) I think that there
    isn't enough support from your side. Please correct me if I am
    wrong.
    By my side, I will continue trying to learn Flex, I really
    love what you have done, the best I have ever seen. Sorry for my
    very bad English, and best regards!

    Spyder - I'm perplexed! You can't find out how to load XML
    from a web service? Have you looked at the documentation on
    livedocs? Have you searched this forum? Have you tried ANY of the
    sites below?
    http://www.adobe.com/support/documentation/en/flex/
    http://www.cflex.net/
    http://www.flex.org
    http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/flexcoders/
    .Net web services conform to the standards of ALL web
    services, so accessing a .Net WS in particular should not present
    any unique issues.
    I would suggest that if you guys have any specific coding
    problems that you post them, along with relevant code, to this
    forum.
    A word to the wise - if you are looking for people to do the
    work for you, you'll be out of luck, but there are a number of
    people who scan this forum who are Felx experts (including Peter
    Ent and Tracy Spratt) and will help out if you are truly stumped.
    Stick with it - the payback is worth it, for you, your
    company and your clients.
    Cheers,
    David

  • Lightroom Upgrade at a client - sucess? - keyword problem deal breaker

    Hi
    Just a small report, on how upgrading a client's LR 2 catalog went.
    Background: The client is a professional photographer specialized on garden photography. Her customers are gardening and lifestyle magazines who publish her photos regularly as illustrations to various articles. She has a professional Canon EOS 1Ds MK III equipment and shoots exclusively raw. In a shoot around 300 to 1000 images are shot. The Lightroom catalog has around 20,000 images currently.
    In Lightroom she uses mostly DAM and some basic development features, images are delivered either as raw of as JPEG images to the clients. Keywording is especially important. She has an extensive hierarchical list of plants most of them multiword keywords with spaces, and lots of other keywords indicating if images were sent to clients and other stuff.
    The upgrade went just very well. I exported the catalog to a new intermediate catalog without previews, installed LR3 and imported this intermediate catalog into LR3 generating new previews from scratch. The hardware is modest, and some functional tests (especially switching images in develop, spot tool, and adjustment brushes) revealed that everything performs well enough.
    Then she asked me where she would have benefits from using the new version. And then I told the whole benefit story, which can be read everywhere.
    - New process version, better details and noise reduction. She asked where she can see it? Hmm, I switched to 1:1 view changing the process versions, not really much to see on Canon 1Ds Mk III files. Even with noisier files, it was hard to tell, what has actually changed. So only a 4:1 view very tiny changes were visible. The impact on her business? Near to nothing as she does not print large. The differences would hardly be seen in the magazine prints.
    - Lens corrections and perspective control: does not really matter in garden photography, but she could see some occasional usefullness.
    - Publish services: no real need for it
    - Print packages: nope
    - Slightshow improvements: no use for it
    - Performance improvements: nothing visible
    - Effects: completely superfluous
    - New import dialog: at first glance a hindereance, as she has to get used to it
    Then she asked: did they correct the keyword handling, when entering keywords witrh spaces? (You know the nasty bug, where keyword completion is broken at keywords with spaces). We checked (I knew it wasn't fixed), and of course she was heavily disappointed. Thus, after 2 years of development nothing new for her, keyword bug not fixed? Of course she said, that I should tell her, when keyword completion works, then and only then would she consider an upgrade.
    So, despite all the bells and whistles about the new version, I doubt that for many photographers the benefits are really so overwhelming in the real world. It is a pitty that Adobe continues to neglect the DAM features (some fresh ideas for client management would be great), that existing features aren't consequently implemented (esp. the possibilities to query the catalog, and keywording), and that existing bugs are constantly ignored and not fixed.
    So, please Adobe, get keyword completion fixed for keywords with spaces immediately !!! This is what professionals need. A catalog without reliable DAM features, renders the catalog concept to a great extend useless. Please listen!
    Disclaimer: As I am not a professional for me the situation is not the same. I just report my experience I had, with a photgrapher, who needs a proper asset management. I recommended Lightroom to her because of the overall package (she moved from Cumulus), so I feel a little obliged to help her in this issue. In my case, as a user of a modest Lumix G camera system, I would consider the IQ benefits more signifcant. I don't know, if this is a general observation.
    Kind regards
    Thomas

    W.W. Webster wrote:
    tgutgu wrote:
    Just a small report, on how upgrading a client's LR 2 catalog went ...
    So, please Adobe, get keyword completion fixed for keywords with spaces immediately !!! This is what professionals need. A catalog without reliable DAM features, renders the catalog concept to a great extend (sic) useless. Please listen!
    I just report my experience I had, with a photgrapher (sic), who needs a (sic) proper asset management.
    So the over-riding conclusion from your experience with just one photographer is that Lightroom is 'useless', and this compels you to demand, in bold type, that Adobe must listen?
    That Lightroom has issues and areas for ongoing development is obvious, and Adobe won't dispute this.  But rants like yours add nothing and are unhelpful.  Julie's response is extremely tactful and far more moderate than your post deserves.
    Dear Mr. Webster
    I think when you post, you should definitely change your tone. Julie simply answered my original post by acknowledging the problem, your accusation that I did not use appropriate "netiquette" is ridiculous. Posts like yours are a real problem of this forum.
    I simply gave a user story example to show that not for everybody the shiny advertised new features provide real benefits and that paying attention to a thorough implementation of features can be equally important. I think Julie has recognized this. And the issue is nothing for ongoing developments. Lightroom supports keywords with spaces, so it has to be done consequently. Keywording is essential for DAM. If keywording gets too tedious or leads to wrong keyword assignments, then DAM is really pointless.
    The intention of my post was to point Adobe to an apparently small problem, which has quite a big impact to people, who depend on good DAM features. The issue is nothing new, existed since the first release of Lightroom, but nothing was done about it, unfortunately. Now that Lightroom addressed keywords with spaces even with a new preference setting, it was fair to assume, that they had done something about it with care. This isn't so obviously. The issue was discussed in previous threads, but did not get any visible notice from Adobe. I am glad that this has changed now with Julie's post.
    In no way did I say that Lightroom is useless or even that I regard it to be so. I merely said that the catalog concept is to a great extend (not completely) useless, if its implementation is sloppy. DAM starts with data entry and only after doing this, you can use it to your benefit. Therefore it has to be efficient, which currently is not. Lightroom is criticized by a large number of users that it is forcing them into a catalog system instead of just providing access to the file system. Long existing bugs like this, likely proves them right in their view.
    The competition (I mean complete workflow solutions) is not really better than Lightroom with respect to DAM features, however, my take is, that the developers should be equally ambitious with the quality of the catalog system as they are with IQ, especially if the achievements in IQ are apparently less relevant to owners of high end camera systems. (I could be wrong with the last statement, but it would be interesting to hear if others have similar observations).
    Kind regards
    Thomas
    Thomas

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