Flash in the Peg

Implementing version control is like backing up your files - most designers and developers know they should do it, but don’t actually get around to it until after they really needed it. It’s that moment right after you’ve hit ’save’ and realized you’ve made a horrible mistake. Sure, you’ve got backups (you do have backups, don’t you?), but they’re from last night, which means all the work you’ve done since that last backup has been lost. You can see where they headaches start!

Flash in the Peg’s next meeting will be a crash course in version control - what it is, how it can prevent those headaches, and how to get it up and running with a minimum of fuss. We’ll look at a number of version control options and consider the benefits and drawbacks of each one. Whether you’re a one-person shop or a company with multiple employees and remote workers, there’s a version control solution out there for you. You’ll leave the meeting with a better sense of your version control options, and what would work best in your own situation.

We’ll be meeting on Thursday, August 7th, at 7:00 p.m., in Room W411, Red River College, Princess Street Campus. Please r.s.v.p. to me directly if you’re planning to attend.

I’ve created a Facebook group for Flash in the Peg, so if you’re on Facebook, feel free to join the group! I’ll be posting notices of upcoming meetings there, which some might find a more convenient way of being notified. Let me know if you have any suggestions!

Our next meeting is set for Thursday, June 19, from 6:30 to 9:00 p.m., room W411, Red River College.

We’ll take a look at some of the new features in the Dreamweaver, Fireworks, and Soundbooth public betas that were released on Adobe Labs last week. Come on out and get a look at what might be in store for the next versions of these programs!

In addition to the regular prizes, we will also hold our bi-annual software raffle at this meeting. You’ll have the chance to win the Adobe software package of your choice with a maximum value of US $2100! But remember, you have to attend the meeting (and have already earned raffle tickets) to qualify for the draw!

Please let me know if you’re planning to attend.

This zip file contains the slide deck from our last meeting on Mobile Flash, as well as the two Flash files that I used to demonstrate some of the features of Adobe Device Central. The code in the movies is heavily commented, so it should be pretty easy to figure out what’s happening. If you have any questions, please send me an email!

Right now, there are over half a billion non-PC devices on the market that are Flash-enabled, and the majority of those devices are mobile phones. Flash Lite is Adobe’s version of the Flash player for mobile phones and other devices.

At our next meeting, we’ll take a look at the mobile Flash ecosystem - what kind of devices are Flash-enabled, how Flash is deployed and used on mobile phones specifically, and how you can use Flash CS3 and Device Central CS3 to easily and rapidly develop content targeting these devices. We’ll take a look at some sample applications, and get the chance to look at some Flash content running on mobile devices that support Flash Lite.

As usual, there are some great prizes lined up, including a swanky Adobe messenger bag, a copy of Foundation Flash Applications for Mobile Devices, and more!

Our next meeting is all set for Thursday, May 1st, from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. We’ll meet in Room W411, Red River College, Princess Street Campus.

Please drop me an email to let me know if you’re planning to attend.

At our last meeting, we looked at Flex and AIR. If you want to dive into the land of the Rich Internet Application, you’ll need to learn ActionScript 3. Even if the RIA isn’t for you, the latest versions of the Flash Player support ActionScript 3. AS3 introduces a number of improvements over AS2 - most notably a substantial increase in the speed of code execution - but it also has some major differences from what you’re used to with AS2.

To help get you started climbing that learning curve, tonight’s meeting will be an introduction to ActionScript 3, with particular attention to some of the differences between it and ActionScript 2. We’ll take a look at a lot of side-by-side code comparisons to see how some things compare between AS2 and AS3.

To top it all off, there are some great prizes lined up, including a number of books on Flash CS3 and ActionScript 3. Plus, everybody who attends will earn a ticket towards the raffle of Adobe software to be held at our June meeting! Remember, the software of your choice up to a value of $2100 US will be given away in June - the more tickets you’ve earned, the better your chance of winning. As if the great content at the meeting isn’t reason enough to attend!

Our meeting is scheduled for tonight, Thursday, April 4, from 7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. We’ll meet at our usual location, room W411, Red River College, Princess Street Campus.

As you may have heard, Adobe has announced the release of Adobe Flex 3 and Adobe AIR 1.0. Now that the cat is out of the bag, this will be the focus of tonight’s meeting! Adobe is sponsoring this meeting with food, giveaways and a raffle copy of Adobe Flex Builder 3 Professional.

Flex 3 is a feature-packed release, adding new UI components like the advanced datagrid and improved CSS capabilities; powerful tooling additions like refactoring; and extensive testing tools including memory and performance profiling, plus support for automated functional testing in Flex Builder 3.

Adobe AIR is game-changing in so many ways, delivering rich Internet applications (RIA) on the desktop, enabling access to the local file system, system tray, notifications and much more. Now you can write RIAs on the desktop using the same skills that you’ve been already using to create great web apps including both Flex and AJAX.

We’ll watch a number of presentations to help bring you up to speed on what Flex and AIR are all about. I’ll demo some simple AIR apps to show you just what you can accomplish with AIR, and give a quick demonstration of how easy it is to create an AIR application from your legacy apps using the freely available AIR SDK. (Most of the meeting will be about AIR - we’ll take a closer look at Flex at a later meeting.)

In addition to the copy of Adobe Flex Builder 3 Professional, we’ll also be raffling off some books and other great prizes you won’t want to miss. Plus, Adobe has sent some great AIR 1.0 t-shirts and posters.

If you haven’t already, let me know if you’ll be attending! We’re meeting at 7:00 tonight at Red River College, Princess Street campus, room W411.

Adobe’s RIA technologies enable you to rapidly build and deploy the most engaging applications across browsers and on the desktop. Flash in the Peg is hosting a special event to share exciting new information on Adobe’s platform tools and technologies for building RIAs. You’ll see an exclusive user group video presentation by Adobe Chief Software Architect, Kevin Lynch, hear some important product news, plus get your hands on some exclusive schwag and other giveaways.

Be part of the fun and excitement and join the rest of the Adobe developer community by participating in this very special event.

The meeting will be held on Monday, February 25 at our usual location, Room W411, Red River College, Princess Street campus.

Please let me know if you’re planning to attend!

If you’d like to examine the sample files that I used for last night’s meeting, feel free to download them and use them as you wish.

Our next meeting is all set: Thursday, January 24 at 7:00 p.m. We’ll be meeting in our usual location, room W411 of Red River College, Princess Street Campus.

At this meeting we’ll take our first look at the Spry framework for developing Ajax-powered web pages. Ajax is a way of method of developing responsive, interactive web sites using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. It’s the backbone of a lot of those fancy new Web 2.0 sites you’ve been visiting.

Spry is an Ajax framework. It simplifies the process of building Ajax-powered sites by proving a set of ready-to-use widgets, visual effects, and data APIs to greatly improve the speed with which you can develop a web site.

We’ll jump into Spry by looking at some of the widgets and visual effects available (at a later meeting we’ll take a look at the data APIs). I’ll show you some of these elements in action and walk through the process of implementing Spry elements on a web site.

(If you already have Dreamweaver CS3, the Spry widgets are built in. You can also download them from Adobe Labs.)

Also, as I mentioned in an email before our previous meeting, we’ll be holding our biannual software draw. The winner gets the Adobe software package of their choice valued at up to US $2100! If you’ve attended one of the last three meetings, wrote a book review, or presented at one of those meetings, you’ve earned raffle tickets. But remember: you have to be present on January 24 for the draw in order to win!

(You may recall that back in September I sent out an email with the rules for these raffles; if you’d like another copy of that, let me know. Since those rules weren’t established until September, I’m only counting meetings held after that email towards the draw. If you’re interested in how many raffle tickets you may have earned, send me a private email and I can let you know.)

In addition to the software raffle, we’ll have our usual draw for books, shirts, and other goodies.

As always, please drop me a note to let me know if you plan to attend.