Thank you again.
Although ActionScript is not being developed for the FlashPlayer, is it
possible that it may still be developed separately for use in AIR? I
could deliver content through AIR instead of PDFs.
My problem is that the FlashBuilder / Flash Professional workflow is
such a seductive one, with that easy marriage of graphics and code, that
I don't want to lose it. I have used C++ to produce graphical programs
and the AS3 route is a godsend in comparison.
One wonders "Is HMTL5 going to use any less CPU cycles than AS3, once it
is doing similar work?"
John
On 18/12/2012 05:38, Alex Harui wrote:
Re: [flexcoders] Re: Flex alternatives
Things get lost in translation, but one goal of the parallel
frameworks is to not leverage things that get lost in translation.
Otherwise, since JS and AS are ECMA-based, the translation works
pretty well.
Keep in mind that, while Adobe is no longer investing in ActionScript
3 on the Flash Player, and not developing Flash Player for mobile
devices, and AIR may not run on all mobile devices, where the
FlashPlayer is today, it will likely be there “forever”. So, if alll
of your users are using desktops/laptops that have browsers that have
Flash, you can continue to use Flex and/or ActionScript 3 to build
applications and they will likely run there not just in five years,
but even after that. There is no time-bomb in the players that will
go off and stop running. Even though ActionScript Next and
FlashPlayer Next are not compatibile with ActionScript 3, the AS3 VM
will ship in the FlashPlayers that Adobe ships in the future. There
is the possibility that the browser vendors will stop supporting
plugins, but I would imagine they will keep a compatibility-mode
somehow. I think there is too much Flash content out there and to
block it from existing desktops/laptops would “break the web” and I
don’t expect the browser vendors or Adobe take such a risk. There
would be too much negative press. That doesn’t mean that new
computers with new OS’s may not support Flash (that’s what Apple did
with IOS), and many home users may forgo traditional computers for
tablets in the future, so keep that in mind as well.
I don’t know the PDF market that well, but again, I would expect PDFs
to continue to support Flash “forever” as well. At least for the
readers on traditional desktops/laptops.
On 12/17/12 10:48 AM, "John McCormack" <j...@easypeasy.co.uk> wrote:
Thank you.
That's interesting and very helpful.
One does wonder if a separate translation tool would do the job
faithfully, and so creates doubt.
For someone that wants to use SWFs in PDFs to deliver educational
content that is fully interactive, what workflow would you suggest
using for the next three to five years?
John
On 17/12/2012 16:31, Alex Harui wrote:
Re: [flexcoders] Re: Flex alternatives Adobe has no plans
that I know of to get ActionScript to work with HTML5 in the
same way that Google is proposing Dart as an alternative to
JavaScript.
The Apache Flex project is working on a compiler that will
translate ActionScript to JavaScript. In addition, the link I
posted proposes a component framework that would enable you to
build or prototype your app in Flash using FlashBuilder and
ActionScript and then run a separate tool outside of
FlashBuilder to translate it to JavaScript where it will run
and leverage HTML or HTML5 components.
Alternatively, the same ActionScript to JavaScript compiler
would let you write the script portions of your website as
ActionScript using FlashBuilder and have separate HTML files,
then use the same separate tool outside of FlashBuilder to
translate the ActionScript to JavaScript. And maybe
variations will be created that can output to various JS
frameworks.
At this time, there are no plans to change FlashBuilder to
integrate the translation workflow. Adobe’s focus for
FlashBuilder is on building ActionScript gaming and premium
video projects that run on the Flash player. I suppose if the
JS workflow became wildly popular and Adobe could see a
revenue stream by supporting such a workflow things might
change, but I wouldn’t count on it. There is a better chance
that someone in Apache Flex will start creating plugins for
Eclipse to support the workflow or one of the other tool
vendors will provide an integrated workflow.
The future of ActionScript 3 in Rich Internet Applications
(as opposed to ActionScript “Next” as mentioned in the Flash
roadmap) is actually being given more attention by Apache Flex
than Adobe. If you want to continue to use ActionScript 3 to
develop RIAs, I would encourage you to get involved with the
Apache Flex project.
On 12/17/12 2:16 AM, "John McCormack" <j...@easypeasy.co.uk>
wrote:
On 17/12/2012 05:12, Alex Harui wrote:
Re: [flexcoders] Re: Flex alternatives Adobe has
spent the year donating the Flex SDK and Falcon
compilers to the Apache Software Foundation. While
Adobe has a small set of people contributing to Flex
in Apache and a team that shipped Flash Builder 4.7
and is working on subsequent Flash Builder release,
Adobe is not leading the development of Flex and has
not been for a full year. The future of Flex is in
the hands of the Apache Flex community. This document
should have made Adobe’s plans clear:
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/whitepapers/roadmap.html
I followed this link through to
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flashplatform/whitepapers/roadmap.html
Under Flash Player "Next" this says...
" and provide a foundation on which Flash can move
forward over the next decade."
Does this imply ActionScript working collaboratively
with HTML5 or is it an alternative to HTML5?
I am asking because I am hoping Flash Builder will
continue to offer me a way forward (AS3+HTML5).
John
--
Alex Harui
Flex SDK Team
Adobe Systems, Inc.
http://blogs.adobe.com/aharui
--
Alex Harui
Flex SDK Team
Adobe Systems, Inc.
http://blogs.adobe.com/aharui
