Welcome...

This site is focused on Rich Internet Applications (RIAs), Flex, and AIR. This home page provides descriptions of site content (links at right). To play with some sample Flex apps check out my Flex Demo Apps.

Adobe Apache Flex!?!

Well, Adobe's November anouncements re Flash and Flex were interesting, to say the least. While I can understand Adobe dropping the Flash Player on mobile I'm scratching my head over their killing Flex (ok, not killing, they didn't actually strangle their baby, they just dropped it off at the orphanage).

I can see the logic of HTML5 for enterprise RIAs in the long term, but any migration now seems premature because HTML5 is still too immature. On the other hand, making Flex more open does present an opportunity — for an interesting discussion of some possible Flex futures listen to the Flex Show's recent Flex summit roundtable.

As for Flex's future, a lot will depend on how seriously Adobe works with Apache. It's in Adobe's interest, since their recent actions have damaged their brand, and showing they're serious about Flex will do some repair. Certainly their cooperation over the next year will be critical to Flex not just surviving, but moving forward.

Ok, that's all I'll say on this for now, until things clarify it's best to just keep your head down and keep on coding — I don't see Flex or AIR work going away anytime soon...

Update: Adobe has announced a "Flex User Group 2012 Tour" to discuss recent changes to Flex and Flash (info here). The New York Flex Users Group will host this on Monday Feb 13th, you can sign up via Eventbrite here. For more info on the NYC Flex UG go to meetup.com.

Site content

The rest of this home page is a summary of site content (links at right).

Flex primers

Pages in this category are intro-level tutorials for Flex fundamentals. They cover a variety of topics, things I happen to be working on or exploring, from mobile app development to the UIC Lifecycle.

Flex demo apps

I've created several apps that demo Flex functionality and RIA design. Quick links to these demo apps are at right. However, if this is your first visit I recommend accessing the Flex demo apps page for a brief overview of each demo app and a description of the Flex features it explores.

Latest demo app: World Data Explorer

Flex/AIR mobile dev

The really fun stuff - I've been playing with AIR mobile dev since the AIR 2.5 prerelease, through Hero/Burrito, to Flex/FB 4.5. The posts in this category may help you avoid/solve some mobile dev problems.

General Flex

This category has a grab-bag of Flex-related content. Some suggest good Flex reference materials (books and blogs, sites with training videos, etc.). The rest cover Flex topics ranging from tips on taking the Flex certification exam to the value of the Flex debugger and profiler.

SAS for Flexers

For quite a few years I was a SAS applications developer, so I've included some info on SAS appdev, especially the SAS+RIA connection. While these pages may be useful to SAS programmers they're primarily targeted at RIA developers unfamiliar with SAS.

About

This category has a couple of pages about me, essentially an online resume for potential employers/clients.