With the help of some very talented authors and editors, Wrox has finally pushed out Professional Adobe Flex 3, a fantastic resource and reference book for any Flex 3 developer! I was lucky enough to be able to take part in this project, joining the team as a Technical Editor, and as such, I've really been able to see the breadth and comprehensiveness of the topics covered. From the book...

In recent years, Flex has become the leader in rich Internet application (RIA) development...This comprehensive, in-depth resource provides you with the foundations of Flex 3 and shows how you can maximize your use of Flex 3 to create unique experiences on the Internet and the desktop.

I've read many Flex books in my time, and this book delivers. Weighing in at a hefty 1300 pages, Professional Adobe Flex 3 takes no expense in breadth or depth. It covers the basic topics such as ActionScript and MXML fundamentals, working with components, extending components, styling and skinning, working with complex data, states, charting etc. It also covers more advanced topics such as integration with various server systems, remote-procedure-calls (RPCs), streaming video, messaging and data services with LCDS, MVC application architecture using Cairngorm, etc.

Also, what I really like about this book is that it covers many other important, but often omitted topics, such as logging, unit testing, documentation, localization, coding standards and best practices, profiling, automation, and performance strategies! This book goes on and on. This is definitely a must-have for any serious (or upcoming) RIA developers!

^*If anyone here has picked it up and wanted to say a few words (good or bad), please do! Leave a comment or send me an e-mail...charles [at] whoischarles [dot] com :)

Charles

My team here at Adobe is looking to hire a White-Box QE in the next short while. We're working on some really cool stuff and solving some interesting problems, and we're hoping to find a QE who can help make sure we don't shoot ourselves in the foot :p Particularly, I work with the Adobe Services Infrastructure Team (ASIT) here at the Adobe Seattle site, working to build up a robust SaaS platform for hosted services the likes of Acrobat.com and Photoshop.com. The position will be a contract position, also out of the Seattle site, and we'd like to fill it ASAP. Enough chatter, here is the job description...

Position Summary

The Adobe Services Infrastructure Team is looking for exceptional people that want to work in a creative, fun, and fast-paced environment. Join us and help build the core components of Adobe’s SaaS platform, the foundation for online products like Photoshop.com and Acrobat.com.

The job includes participating in automation strategy and planning, designing and implementing test automation systems, and helping assess product readiness using test case management and defect tracking systems to collect, analyze, interpret, and summarize data.

If you are passionate about computer science and quality engineering, and are excited about driving quality and performance for large, distributed systems, then this job is for you.

Knowledge & Skills

• 4+ years of recent experience writing code and QE Test experience (testing web-based applications preferred).
• Excellent programming skills for developing a suite of white box automation and load test tools.
• Solid Java and JavaScript knowledge is essential.
• Flash ActionScript or Flex experience is desirable.
• Experience and understanding of issues related to large-scale web application development/testing.
• Experience with enterprise-class software products including Application Servers, RDBMS, Security, and hosted services is a big plus.
• Practical work experience is essential. Bachelor's degree in a technical field is a plus.
• Understanding of quality assurance practices and methodologies is essential.
• Be adept with multiple methods of communication (in-person, email, IM, videoconferencing) and comfortable interacting with remote teams.

So, if you think you fit the bill, do send me an e-mail with your resume at charlesb [at] adobe [dot] com. I hope to hear from you!

Charles

For the past few years, Adobe has helped us celebrate the holiday season by bringing us Flash Holiday Card Creators (2006 & 2007). This year, though, brings something new...a Holiday Greeting Slide-Puzzle AIR App!

This app not only makes the traditional holiday greeting a little more interactive, but it also supports Adobe's global sustainability goals by helping eliminate printed greeting cards. Install it, try solving it, and share it with your friends using your own picture!

Happy Holidays!

Charles

David Coletta from the Buzzword Team here at Adobe just posted an open position with his group. This is an excellent team working on a really great product. New and prospective grads, be aware! Jump on it, because I don't think this position will be open for much longer :)

Position Overview:

Buzzword, the first real word processor for the web, is a breakthrough in collaborative authoring for documents that matter. The Buzzword team joined Adobe Systems Incorporated last year in order to take Buzzword to the next level, building new features, integrating with the Acrobat.com product suite, and scaling up to hundreds of thousands of users.
The Buzzword application is built on the Adobe Flash/Flex platform, written primarily in ActionScript 3.0, an object-oriented language familiar to people who know Java and C#. Additionally, Buzzword incorporates a server that is written in C# using Microsoft .NET and SQL Server 2005.

Responsibilities:

• New features: if you're a strong coder with some Flex experience, you'll get started immediately on important new product features right along side the rest of the development team.
• Bug fixing: there's no better way to learn your way around a big code base than by fixing some bugs.
• Prototyping additional browser support: Buzzword relies on some small but critical bits of JavaScript to support keyboard control and system clipboard access, so we are currently limited to IE, Firefox, and Safari. You would prototype versions of this code for other browsers.
• Load and/or performance testing: In order to gauge future hardware needs, you would write a load simulator for our server, execute it, and analyze the results.
• Writing tests: Buzzword has a built-in automated test framework, with hundreds of existing tests that exercise product functionality and check for bug regression. You would write new tests, and analyze existing tests to remove duplicate functionality and improve coverage.
• Experimenting with Buzzword mashups: there are many unexplored possibilities for mashing Buzzword with other applications on both the client side (in the browser) and the server side.
• Site statistics analysis tools: both the Buzzword server and Google Analytics gather ongoing server usage statistics; you would improve on them and build new ways to look at how our users use the product.
• Secret projects: we've got new products coming down the pike that we can't tell you about in this ad.

Requirements:

• The Buzzword team is looking to hire a recent college or university graduate with a computer science degree or equivalent.
• You should have a passion for writing great code, learning new technologies, and discovering just what it takes to build commercial software.
• You'll receive mentoring from Buzzword team members, and you'll see every part of the software lifecycle: requirements, design, coding, testing, and release.

Contact:

• Erin Fife (efife at adobe dot com) - Adobe Recruiter
• David Coletta (dcoletta at adobe dot com) - Sr. Computer Scientist with Buzzword

Charles

As you may have heard, Adobe has made a partnership with Zend Studios (the keepers of PHP, and the Zend Framework) to ensure that Flex/AIR development with PHP is as seamless as possible. This is *huge* news for PHP developers out there, myself being one of them. Christophe Coenraets, Senior Technical Evangelist at Adobe, came by the Adobe Seattle site last night to give a presentation to a couple of local user groups in town and I managed to pick his brain about the new partnership...what to expect, and what's in the works.

Well, as mentioned in the press release, a key deliverable for the collaboration is integration of the Action Message Format (AMF) into the Zend Framework. For those of you unfamiliar, AMF is a binary message protocol supported by Flex. Using AMF is preferable to other types of messaging formats, such as RESTful XML and serialization over HTTP for various reasons. First, XML and serialization (say with JSON) is plain-text, and so it isn't very secure. Second, since it is plain-text, it's inefficient. Binary, not only obfuscates the message, but compresses it significantly. So, native AMF support in the Zend Framework is huge for developing enterprise-level applications!

Also, given this integration of AMF into the Zend Framework, Zend and Adobe are also working to make a more unified IDE! They already have a good start...Flex Builder is built off of Eclipse, and Zend Studio is also built off of Eclipse. What Christophe showed us last night is that even though nothing has been released in terms of a unified IDE yet, you can start using one now anyways. Simply download Zend Studio (the PHP IDE), and install the Flex Builder plug-in for Eclipse, but specify the Zend Studio installation directory as your base Eclipse folder instead. Once this is done, you have a single portal for both your Flex, AIR, and PHP projects!

All of this is in it's earliest stages, but seeing steps in this direction is very exciting. I can't wait to see what's next :)

Charles

It's about that time of year again and so a very creative team at Adobe has released a Flash Holiday Card Creator for 2007. They did one last year, but now they bring some new designs, images, and music. Send some out and spread the joy!

Charles

Adobe Flex has won InfoWorld’s 2007 Technology of the Year Award! InfoWorld sums it up saying…

Adobe Flex 2.0 constitutes a big leap forward for this RIA platform, thanks to a new Eclipse-based IDE for drag-and-drop layout and code management, and a separate data services application for server-side messaging and data integration. Easy connections for Web services and Java objects bolster this very good choice for enterprise RIA scenarios.

Thanks to Ryan Stewart for finding the link!

*taken from InfoWorld

The holidays are upon us and it’s about time for a Christmas post. A team at Adobe has just created, and made public, a Flash Holiday Card Creator. No instructions, in fact, no words at all. Very intuitive site to creates some nice e-cards to send out to friends and family. Enjoy!

Merry Christmas!

Charles