Viewing by month: November 2011
Cool Stuff with the Flash Platform - 11/23/2011
Posted on Nov 23, 2011
This week (in the US at least) we are giving thanks - so thank you to all the developers in the Flash and Flex community who contribute and share their knowledge with others. Thank you for continuing to prove the bias of many media outlets wrong and demonstrate Flash is very much alive. This week's hot topics seem to continue to be examples and demos using Stage3D and AIR native extensions.
Continue Reading →Cool Stuff with the Flash Platform - 11/16/2011
Posted on Nov 16, 2011
Oh, so you thought the cool stuff was over? Well, the community is still creating cool stuff, Adobe is still creating the Flash Platform and I still love both. Now, if you are looking for my thoughts on many of our recent announcements, you can check my post on the topic as none of that will be covered here. Going forward perhaps the format of these posts will change but I plan to continue them and for the moment, the only change is that I am not linking to any of the discussions of our more controversial announcements this week. Rather I am truly just focused on the cool stuff the community created.
On that note, this is obviously a light week as folks were probably a bit distracted to blog. However, there was still some great content - for example check out the ApplicationFinder and AIRKinect native extensions for AIR 3 below!
Continue Reading →Moving Forward with Flex and Flash
Posted on Nov 15, 2011
It would be an understatement to say this has been a tough week - both for those of us inside Adobe as well as for many of our developer community. In addition to the layoffs, you'd be forgiven for feeling as though we carpet bombed major changes to our developer products, In fact, it really was only two dramatic changes that directly affect our developer community: the end to the Flash Player plugin for mobile devices and televisions and the plan to donate Flex to the Apache open source foundation. Many people within Adobe have admitted, particularly in the former case, that the communications could have been handled better. In addition, we appear to have created some sort of Internet meme around variations of the term "double-down." I know that we, as a company, have lost the trust of many within our developer community. I am hopeful though that, at least as it relates to Flex, the most recent update begins the process of repairing that relationship with the community.
In this post I want to share some thoughts I have on these topics in the hopes of both, hopefully, helping to move the process forward but also to continue to maintain an open discussion with our developer community (as I mentioned in my earlier post, my job and focus on our developer community hasn't dramatically changed). Keep in mind, these are my own opinions and none of this has been vetted or endorsed by my employer.
Continue Reading →Still Here. Still Focused on the Developer Community.
Posted on Nov 09, 2011
Over the past couple days and for obvious reasons, many people have reached out to me to check on me and learn of my fate. The good news (at least for me) is that I am still employed in my position as a community manager at Adobe. Obviously while I am grateful, I am also saddened to see some of my friends and colleagues who are no longer with Adobe.
Throughout the past couple days, Adobe has begun to lay out its strategy for the future and, as one might expect, much of this impacts our developer community currently targeting runtimes like Flash Player and AIR. The truth is, in a position like mine, I am often working in the weeds without a clear view of the jungle, so I am not prepared to comment personally on the specifics of that strategy. However, it has always been part of my mandate to operate a two-way channel of communication with the developer community. By this I mean that sometimes, clearly, I hope to communicate outwardly about Adobe's priorities and direction but a co-equal part of my job is to communicate the issues and priorities of our developer community back to Adobe.
Sometimes this part of the job means I need to have a thick skin or wear a flak jacket but it is also a part of my job that I plan to continue to do until directed otherwise. Of course, the change in strategy has an impact on the ground and affects many of you. As you face these challenges, keep in mind that I am still here to listen to your questions and concerns and communicate them as effectively as I can within Adobe. As I have said before, I cannot guarantee that I will always be able to get you an answer or even that, when I can, you will like the answer. However, I can guarantee that I will always do my best to address your concerns honestly and urgently. So, please continue to feel free to email me at brinaldi [at] adobe [dot] com and I promise t continue to do my best representing the needs, concerns and questions of the developer community within Adobe. Thanks.
Continue Reading →Cool Stuff with the Flash Platform - 11/07/2011
Posted on Nov 07, 2011
A lot of great tutorials and projects in this week's update including: a discussion of orientation versus deviceOrientation from Adobe's Tom Kraikit, performance testing blitting versus frame assignment on AIR for iOS by Michel Wacker, a new isometric engine for Flash Player 11 and Starling from Jonathan Dunlap, and an extensive tutorial on encoding live video to H.264/AVC using Flash Player 11 from RealEyes Media - among many other outstanding entries.
Continue Reading →