The Flash Professional Glossary page on ADC provides definitions of basic terms and common tasks you'll encounter as you work with Flash Professional. Each entry includes a definition along with step-by-step instructions (when relevant) for completing the task.
David Weldon interviewed me in researching his Computerworld story Time to de-Flash your site?. His key message? Mobile and desktop site needs are different, and on devices apps are often preferred to mobile sites.
Join Mike Chambers, Lee Brimelow, Paul Trani, and Renaun Erickson (different presenters at each location) as they chat about the future of Flash, gaming, and more. Upcoming locations include:
- Denver, CO - Tuesday, April 3
- Las Vegas, NV - Wednesday, April 4
- Tempe, AZ - Thursday, April 5
- Nashville, TN - Monday, April 9
- Atlanta, GA - Tuesday, April 10
- St. Paul, MN - Wednesday, April 11
- New York, NY - Thursday, April 12
- San Francisco, CA - Tuesday, April 16
- Los Angeles, CA - Date TBD
- Chicago, IL – Date TBD
"Smartphones and tablets are everywhere. If you need to reach your customers or employees on these devices, now's the time to start developing mobile apps. We provide essential information to help you get started, including development basics for Apple iOS, Google Android, RIM BlackBerry and Microsoft Windows. We also look at the pros and cons of cross-platform development and discuss how to build secure apps from the get-go."
Thus starts InformationWeek Reports' new report on Mobile App Development, for which I was interviewed, and which includes coverage of building apps with Flash/AIR and PhoneGap.
Fellow Adobe evangelist Tom Krcha visited Rovio and got to hang out with the team that worked on Angry Birds for Facebook. He has posted his interview with Ville Koskela of Rovio, who reveals some of the backstage tricks the team at Rovio used to build the Flash based Facebook game.
Flash and gaming go hand-in-hand, and have done so for a decade and a half. Hot on the heels of the release of support for Stage 3D and GPU use, the Flash Player team is hard at work on new features specifically targeted for game development. With all of this gaming focus, the time was right to launch a new dedicated Adobe gaming site. Enjoy!
Flash Pro remains the best tool for creating web based expressive interactive content. But, especially on mobile devices, there is real (and growing) need for a browser only web standards solution to animation and expressive content creation. In addition to projects like Edge, we've also got several other tricks up our development sleeves, including work in the ability to export from Flash Pro to HTML as introduced last week at FITC.
In this Adobe TV video, Lee Brimelow and Thibault Imbert discuss the enhanced graphics rendering engine and the Stage3D API, enabling developers to port their Flash games to mobile with performance greater than 60 frames per second.
The Flash based Angry Birds on Facebook that I mentioned last week? It's live, and here is some info on the project.
Rovio has announced that everyone's favorite Angry Birds are coming to Facebook on February 14th, complete with lots of fun new features. This Angry Birds experiences is built in Flash using Starling and Stage 3D.
Title says is all, click here to download.
Adobe is in the midst of a fundamental transformation. We are transforming from software in boxes to solutions in the cloud, and to a world of touch interfaces on devices, and social connections everywhere. This is a time of both innovation and change for Adobe and for the Adobe community. And this article on ADC explains Adobe's strategic transformation and the Flash Platform, and summarizes the recent announcements.
Continuing the stream of Flash related posts by Adobe colleagues, Mike Chambers has just weighed in on Flash Professional and the Future.
Continuing the Flash coverage, Pritham Shetty, Adobe's Vice President for Video Solutions, has posted notes on Adobe Flash for Premium Video.
Flash has always had an interestingly evolving job. It wasn't that long ago when if your web site needed a cool drop down menu you'd use Flash, until HTML and web browser improvements made that unnecessary. And it wasn't that long ago that developers who wanted pop-up calendars or controls in our web forms used Flash, until DHTML made that just as unnecessary. Then Flash powered the in-browser video revolution, and Flash remains the dominant web browser video player, but now there are alternatives there as well. Even transitions and visual effects, once exclusively the realm of Flash, now have alternatives.
You see, Flash's job has always been to pick up where the browser left off, with the understanding that the line between them was a grey and moving one. As HTML and web browsers have evolved and improved, Flash gets to back-off from specific use cases, handing them off to the web browser itself, and thereby freeing itself up to tackle the next challenge.
Or another way to look at it is this, Flash exists because browsers didn't do enough, and as they do more Flash willingly cedes responsibilities to the browser.
Where things get interesting is on devices. Unlike on desktops, where older browsers still reign supreme and where browser innovation has faced slower adoption, device browsers are actually really good and really current. The fact that there are fewer browsers and better browsers, ones that support HTML5 innovation and standards and specifications, in many ways makes Flash far less critical for an optimum web browsing experience. That coupled with the fact that Flash is excluded from the browser on many devices means that web developers already need to code for a non-Flash experience, and that then makes Flash even less compelling for in-browser uses on devices.
Which is why we announced today that we will no longer continue to develop Flash Player in the browser on mobile devices. For in-browser experiences on devices, browsers can finally do what they really should do, and we have HTML5 to thank for that. So that's where we are doubling down, and we're hard at work on making HTML5 better (as we showed at MAX) as well as on tooling to support HTML5 development.
But just to be clear, this announcement pertains to the browser plug-in on mobile devices only.
The Flash browser plug-in on the desktop remains important and viable and even critical for many use cases, and we've publicly committed to adding value and features and functionality to better address just these use cases, primarily gaming and video. (And at the same time we're aggressively driving in-browser HTML5 enhancements, including web motion and interaction design, another area where Flash used to be the only game in town).
Similarly, Flash based apps on mobile devices remain highly compelling, and AIR thus remains a great way to use Flash to build apps for Android, iOS, and RIM PlayBook. And with the recently released support for native extensions, the scope of what is possible in Flash based app has grown incredibly.
So, yes, in-browser Flash on mobile devices is reaching the end of the line. Flash on desktops continues to deliver in ways the browser can't (yet). Flash is one way to build apps, and HTML5 (using PhoneGap) is another. You, as a developer, have options.
While the delivery mechanism changes as technology and platforms change, our commitment to providing the right tools and services does not. Our job has always been to empower developers and designers to create the most engaging and compelling experiences. That's one thing that does not change at all.
Lee Brimelow has shared his own thoughts on Flash to Focus on Apps for Mobile (and his thoughts are similar to my own, which I'll be sharing shortly).
Beta versions of Flash Player 11.2 and AIR 3.2 have just been posted to Adobe Labs.
Coming out of MAX, and the Day 2 keynote specifically, eWeek's Darryl Taft has posted his thoughts (with input from EffectiveUI) on when to use HTML5, when to use Flash, and when to go native.
We've announced the pre-release of Flex SDK 4.6 and Flash Builder 4.6, and Product Manager Jacob Surber explains all in this ADC article.
