Forthcoming Book: Learning Adobe Edge

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Happy to make known the fact that my forthcoming book with Packt has been officially announced: Learning Adobe Edge!

My editor and I actually began talking about this book while I was still in the process of writing Flash Development for Android Cookbook. This was right after the “EDGE Prototype” was shown at the Adobe MAX 2010 conference. I thought it was an interesting concept, at the time, but wasn’t personally hyped up around it at all. It was simply a conceptual prototype – not a real product… and I didn’t see an immediate need for a tool like that anyhow.

How things change over the span of a year! Since MAX 2010, I’ve been using early builds of the software and have honestly been so impressed with the team behind Edge and what they’ve been able to accomplish in such a short amount of time. It’s really quite amazing what can be done with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript if you have the right tooling. With each new build of Edge released on Adobe Labs, we gain more power through the application and the runtime behind it – all of this atop a constantly improving user experience. I’m also thrilled that the product that is so fun to use!

Adobe Edge is a solid application – I’m half way through what is turning out to be a solid book. It’s my hope that readers agree on both points.

The book will be out this Summer – in the meantime, we’ve come up with a small quickstart guide book (~100pp) which focuses on the Adobe Edge Preview and that should become available in the next couple of weeks!

(Special thanks to Christer Kaitila, author of the Adobe Flash 11 Stage3D (Molehill) Game Programming Beginner’s Guide, for taking some time to tech review the quickstart guide.)

Learning Adobe Edge

Create engaging motion and rich interactivity with Adobe Edge

Author: Joseph Labrecque
Publisher: Packt Publishing (~July 2012)
ISBN-10: 1849692424
ISBN-13: 978-1-84969-242-7
Pages: ~300

Learning Adobe Edge will detail how to use this professional authoring software to create highly engaging content which targets HTML5, CSS, and JavaScript. Content created in Adobe Edge does not rely on a plugin – so it can be run within any standard browser– even on mobile.

With the advent of HTML5 and CSS3, web designers can now create sophisticated animations without the need of additional plugins such as Flash. However, there hasn’t been an easy way for creating animations with web standards until now. This book enables even those with little knowledge of HTML or programming web content to freely create a variety of rich compositions involving motion and interactivity.

Discussing Apache Flex + Logo Contest!

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Discussing Apache Flex

Last week, I took part in a recording of The Flex Show that centered around Apache Flex and the state of Flash in 2012. I thought it was a pretty interesting discussion – a lot of good points were brought up and you can listen to the entire recording from the show website:
Flexing into 2012 w/ Joseph Labrecque and Mark Ehlert: The Flex Show Episode 159

Apache Flex Re-branding Initiative

Submit your design to the Apache Flex Logo Contest!

On the 31th of December, 2011, the Apache Software Foundation has accepted the Flex SDK into incubation. Apache Flex is now a community project managed by Apache (ASF). The migration from Adobe to Apache involves a re-branding and you can contribute by proposing the new Apache Flex logo.

Windows Server 2008 – Permanent Network Share Mapping

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I recently found the need for permanently mounted network shares on a Windows server. Not an obvious thing to do, unfortunately…

What do I mean by permanent? When mapping a share on Windows as a user, when that user logs off… the share will disconnect. For an installed Windows Service that requires access to defined network shares – this is unworkable. We need to create network shares that retain their connection no matter whether or not a particular user is logged on.

Why do I need to do this? For a server-based AIR project ;D

Took a lot of searching – but here is how to do it!

First, we need to get into the Windows Server Group Policy Editor. The simplest way to access this is to type “gpedit” into the start menu search. The Group Policy Editor will now appear.

Using the left navigation menu, drill down through Computer Configuration > Windows Settings > Scripts (Startup/Shutdown). Double-click on Startup to open the Startup Properties dialog.

From the Scripts tab, we will want to click on the Show Files… button to open a File Explorer window.

Right-click in this window to create a new text file called mapping.bat (or whatever you want to call it). This needs to be a .bat file though to execute commands properly.

Edit the file and add the following lines of code:
net use m: \\servername\share

Add one command like this for each share you wish to add.

Now, return to the Startup Properties dialog and click Add… to browse to and select the .bat file we just created. It will appear in the list of startup scripts.

Exit the dialog by clicking OK.

You’ll now need to restart the server for this to take effect. This will allow the startup process to run the required commands to mount these network shares without any user being logged on.

Questioning the Viability of Flex

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I often get private messages through the contact form on this blog. These are normally requests for advice, resources, or project inquiries. From time to time, a question comes in that I see as useful to a wider audience.

Such is the case with the email reproduced below regarding Flex. I’ve asked permission from the individual author but have blanked out his name for reasons of privacy.

Greetings Joseph.
I have several decades of programming experience on desktops and (in the old old days) mainframes, using a variety of languages and technologies.

I am interested in application development for mobile platforms, both Android and the Apple platforms. However I am unable to find anyone who can give an unbiased and straightforward answer to this question: Is the Adobe Flex platform (1) a good choice to devote my limited time resources to for learning mobile development (2) is it or is it not true that the Adobe Flex platform is dying / going away / not really a good choice etc. etc. etc.

Would you be kind enough to give me some guidance regarding this? I don’t have enough time available to learn every technology so I must focus and get the biggest bang for my buck.

What do you recommend?

Thank you so much for your guidance with this.

-Xxxxx

My response [though slightly modified for this public post] follows.

Hi Xxxxx.

I don’t think anyone has 100% fool-proof, solid-as-stone answers around this just yet… but I’ll answer you the best I can.

1) I believe that AIR/Flex is still quite valuable for mobile apps. Buried amid the 11/9 announcements is a repeated statement that Adobe is “doubling-down” on AIR for mobile. One of the reasons cited for dropping mobile Flash Player in the browser was to divert resources to mobile AIR. Furthermore, Adobe’s new line of Touch Apps for Android are (almost) all built upon AIR for Android (though my understanding is that Flex was not used).

2) Flex is now an Apache incubator podling. Assuming that the Apache Flex team is able to organize everything enough to put out a release or two (normally achievable over 4-6 months), the project is expected to graduate to full Apache project status – putting it on the same level as ANT, Tomcat, HTTPD, and other well-known, popular projects used worldwide. Note that PhoneGap was also contributed to Apache by Adobe directly after the Nitobi acquisition – so this is by no means a death sentence or dismissal of the framework.

With Flex in the hands of the wider community, there are actually more resources available in light of the number of individual contributors. Even if not an Apache contributor yourself, if you have a patch for Flex that would be useful for others – get in touch with a contributor to see whether they might see value in the patch and perform the contribution in your stead. Don’t forget that a number of contributors are Adobe engineers and that they the company has stated that even though the runtimes are still under their care – they will align releases in light of what is going on at Apache.

I am confident that we will see some great things come out of the Apache Flex effort from members of the Spoon project and the greater community.

I hope this is helpful.

-Joseph

I hope this is useful for others out there. If you want to gather information on-the-ground, be sure to check out the 360|Flex conference in April!

Adobe Education Leader for 2012/2013

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Happy to report that I received word this morning of my acceptance as an Adobe Education Leader (higher education) for a new two-year term!

For those unaware of the program:

The Adobe Education Leaders Program highlights the contributions of innovative educators in higher ed and K–12 who are effectively using Adobe tools and applications to promote excellence in the classroom.

Adobe Education Leaders are dedicated to enhancing creativity and collaboration and improving the teaching and learning experience. They share their expertise through workshops and conferences and help develop standards-based curriculums that are used worldwide. As Adobe updates it products and develops new ones, Education Leaders provide valuable input through beta programs and focus groups.

AELs serve for two-year periods, following which – they must reapply for a new term. I have been an AEL since Adobe expanded the program to higher education 3 years ago. I’m pleased and honored to be able to serve in this role for the next two years.