While I was at the Emerging Technologies for the Enterprise conference in Philly I was able to participate in a very fun podcast. The casual chat was hosted by Ken Rimple of Chariot Solutions. Participating in the podcast were Adam Coomes of Infegy, Ed Burns of Oracle, Cote of Redmonk, and myself. Topics ranged from cheesesteaks to turbo buttons. Give it a listen and let me know what you think!
Tomorrow night I’ll be in Austin, Texas speaking at the Java User Group about Better Software with Java and Flex (Try the Google Cache Page in case the site is not working). And then next week I’ll be at Stir Trek in Columbus, Ohio presenting about Flex and the Cloud. I hope to see some of you at these events!
The Flex 4 SDK has some great new features but for existing Flex 3 apps upgrading might not yet be an option. Luckily Adobe’s professional tooling for Flex, now called Flash Builder 4, is abstracted from the underlying SDK. This means that you can take advantage of many of the new Flash Builder 4 features while still using the Flex 3 SDK. I recently recorded a screencast showing how to use Flash Builder 4 with Flex 3 projects. Check out “Moving projects from Flex Builder 3 to Flash Builder 4” by Andrew Shorten to see my screencast.
In Episode 23 we chat with Adam Flater and Rob Rusher about some very controversial topics. Adam points out James’ wishful thinking when we discuss what defines something being a “Flex application”. Jon gets the award for best quote of the episode when we discuss Flex and its community. Things get fun as we discuss Silverlight and Flex differences. As we wrap up Jon rates the wonderful scotch we were drinking an 8 out of 10.
In this video I walk through the basics of building Adobe AIR desktop applications in Flash Builder 4 using the Flex 4 SDK. Let me know what you think.
Here are some upcoming presentations I’ll be doing about Flex:
I hope to see you at one of these events!
One of my most viewed blogs is one of the most simple demo apps I’ve built. It’s a simple Flex app that lets the user draw with their mouse and then lets them save their drawing. I’ve updated the Flex Paint demo to Flex 4. Check it out:
Flex 4 and its counterpart, Flash Builder 4, are now publicly available! We’ve also launched a new flex.org and added a ton of new Flex 4 samples in Tour de Flex!
Rich Internet Applications are the next generation of software. For the first time in the history of software the goal is not to simply collect or interpret data, but to make those tasks productive and simple. RIAs move us up the hierarchy of user and business needs. It is unproductive to change technologies and create the same old stuff. We change technologies because they provide new value like closing more deals, reducing task completion time, or gaining customer loyalty.
Two great Flex conferences have recently posted their video recordings:
There were numerous great sessions and speakers at each of these conferences. At Flex Camp Wall Street I presented “Flex Stuff I am Excited About”. Check it out and let me know what you think.
I’ll be attending and presenting at a number of great events over the next few weeks:
I hope to see you at these events!