Archive for the ‘ Flash ’ Category
Alright EverythingFlex.com has released examples of a connection manager class to make sure your AIR app is connected to the internet and an update manager class that checks the internet to see if you’re application is up to date. Great examples.
Just in time! flickr implemented a crossdomain.xml on their flickr image servers. This finally allows to use the BitmapData.draw() command with images downloaded from flickr.com without having to route it through a proxy on your own domain first. Unfortunately their api was getting flooded and started slowing down on me considerably, like sloooooow.
One thing you have to watch out for if you are going to adapt your old AS2 code to these changes is that it is not enough to just download the images directly. You will have to instruct Flash first to download the new policy files from the flickr servers whenever it tries to access them. Since flickr distributes its images across several servers that have different domains like http://farm2.static.flickr.com, http://farm3.static.flickr.com and so on the easiest way to accomplish that is to use the MovieClipLoader class and to set its checkPolicyFile property to “true”. This will instruct Flash to check for the crossdomain.xml file automatically on the respective server. Attention: In order to do that you will have to publish your files to Flash Player 9 since Flash 8 doesn’t support that property.
Here’s a simple AS2 example:
import flash.display.BitmapData;
var holder:MovieClip = createEmptyMovieClip(“test”,0);
var mcl:MovieClipLoader = new MovieClipLoader();
mcl.checkPolicyFile = true;
mcl.loadClip(“http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1395/776413036_ea6bf98846_m_d.jpg”,holder);
mcl.addListener( this );
var holder2:MovieClip = createEmptyMovieClip(“test2″,1);
function onLoadInit()
{
var bm:BitmapData = new BitmapData( holder._width,holder._height,false,0)
bm.draw(holder);
holder2.attachBitmap(bm,0);
holder2._x = holder._x + holder._width + 2;
}
The alternative way would be to use System.security.loadPolicyFile() but you will have to do that for every farm that you access – it is not enough just to load it from http://static.flickr.com/crossdomain.xml
Adobe published the latest Flash stats, showing that as of June 2007, the Flash Player had more than 90% reach. From today, Flash Player 9 and AS3 should be the preferred format for publishing Flash content.
The latest Flash stats shows that Flash Player 9 is reaching the magical limit of 90% distribution – a number sought by many content providers. Mature markets, US and Europe are just above 90%, Asia is just below. The numbes are just as expected, but it also means that since this number is from June 2007, Flash player 9 should be well above 90% since the time of this survey.
This means that there is no more excuses to not learn Actionscript 3 and reap the benefits of the speed increases in Flash Player 9. Keep in mind that Flex 3 will be fully based on actionscript 3 and the Flash Player 9, so this is the standard for the months to come (and there’s more fun just around the corner…)
Check out this cool example of Papervision 3d with APE. Just click on the example to try it out, pretty slick. He also uploaded the source. Pretty sweet.
I must have missed this one, here is an awesome example of Aptana, Ext, and Air. There are two versions actually created two versions both online and offline.
Building a desktop application with Ext, AIR, Aptana and Red Bull
For those of you interested in actionscript 3, you’ll notice that FuseKit just hasn’t updated their code yet. Which is totally unfortunate cause I love FuseKit. Anyway, I use Tweener for AS3 which has gotten the job done even though I haven’t done anything major with it yet. Anyway draw.logic has an awesome post on the best animation packages for AS3 with pros and cons on each. Great little resource!
Also I know this is the first time I’ve mentioned this particular blog, so if you’re big on resources for Flash, this is an awesome blog to add to your news reader. My hats off to Ryan!
Some of the features are
So I was checking out “Moxie”‘s latest features at OnFlex.org and I must say, Thank God!! for skin importing with CS3 intergration. It could be a little better though…hint hint.
Found out about this cool project extending Flex/Apollo called the Artemis Project by EffectiveUI. Essentially what they’re doing is creating libraries you can include in your Flex/Apollo apps that provide additional functionality. So far they have…