I am sure most are aware of the downtime on MXNA this week. Since 2008 began, we have been seeing ever increasing downtime on the site as the demand on the server has skyrocketed. This week the server was taken offline and is being replaced by a pair of servers and upgraded to ColdFusion 8. The new server software Apache/CF/MYSQL is being configured as I write this and it should hopefully be up and running early next week if not sooner.

For me MNXA is such a vital source of information. It’s downtime has been very frustrating as I really enjoy seeing what the developer community is up to.

Hopefully with the new servers and software, MXNA downtime will be a thing of the past!

Cheers,

Ted

Sean Christmann has posted a excellent article revisiting one of mine from 2005. The article gets very fine grained about the elastic racetrack metaphor and goes into detail in regard to how AMV2 handles things.

Great work Sean!

Enjoy,

ted

I really like this app, it is a very simple use of Flex. I have yet to see another domain name search system use ‘as you type’ searching but it is effective at brandgopher.com. The text input field took me a second to find but once I did, I found 3 good domain names worth registering:

Check out brandgopher.com

cheers,

ted

Today Intuit announced Flex support in it’s new hosted QuickBase service and QuickBase Developer Program. I am continuously amazed at the scale and quality of the projects adopting Flex.

Great work Intuit!

Cheers,

Ted

Make sure to get your input in about the Labs (was Hands-On) computer survey below for MAX 2008. The MAX team is scaling up the Labs at MAX as we are seeing a growing demand for training and want MAX to meet customer needs. We decided to effectively double the number of Labs at MAX since they are almost always sold out and computers are often limited. We have dedicating conference space at San Francisco Marriott 100% to Labs, 11 rooms with over 40K square feet. There are 3 Mega-Labs at MAX that hold 500 people each and 8 Labs that hold 100 people. Compare that with 8 training rooms holding 50 people each last year!

This change also simplifies the Sessions at MAX as they will all be located at Moscone West just a block away. Logistically this simplifies how MAX is organized from the ground up.

I will be covering the changed for Sessions and Camps in a later post. MAX is changing for the better based directly on the feedback from last year. It will be the best yet!

Thanks,

Ted

We are expanding the Labs (was Hands-On) at MAX 2008. The team has a question regarding Lab computers.

Thanks,

Ted

At the onAIR tour I have been talking to many HTML/JS developers and one thing struck me as odd. HTML/JS developers do not compile and in many cases the ADL/ADT command line tools are very alien to them. With HTML/JS/AJAX development you simply hit refresh to test your creation but with Adobe AIR you must run ADL or ADT. I think this eliminates a ton of HTML/JS developers from being really effective with Adobe AIR and thus during the onAIR tour I have been writing a server called DARE.

What is DARE?

DARE is a local http server that makes it easy to create, test, and package AIR applications. It allows you to develop and test using your HTML/JS tools of choice and just a web browser. You can even use the “Refresh” button to test and package your application.

Why DARE?

There are tons of HTML/JS/AJAX developers that never use the command line. DARE lowers the barrier to using Adobe AIR effectively.

+ Developer + AIR = DARE
+ Sounds like AIR is in the name but isn’t.

Directions:

1. DOWNLOAD DARE 1.0 MAC HERE
2. COPY the DARE Folder into Applications
3. Run DARE (a browser will pop-up )

Before DARE can run or package AIR applications you need to copy the AIR SDK into DARE. Directions are shown when DARE starts up.

I will be releasing the Windows version of DARE soon but wanted to get those on MAC up and running first. I will also be fixing some known issues and making things much more stable. I am also going to see about licensing the AIR SDK so that configuring DARE is much easier.

Feedback:

Please email me feedback or bugs on DARE here.

Special thanks to FastIcon.com and Dirceu Veiga for the killer dinosaur icon for DARE.

Cheers,

Ted

MAX has a new home online at MAX.ADOBE.COM. The past few years of MAX have been hosted on custom urls, (adobemax2007.com and adobemax08.com). As our first item for this new year was to get MAX a permanent subdomain on Adobe.com.

MAX.ADOBE.COM

I really like MAX.ADOBE.COM as it is a simple URL, it is easy to remember, it works across multiple years, and supports our online plans for the annual event (more on this as things shape up).

As a side note, there have been over 200 sessions posted in the call for sessions/speakers and in reviewing the sessions thus far it looks awesome.

Enjoy MAX’s new home at MAX.ADOBE.COM!

Ted

Today Adobe launched a new Flex site called AdobeTV (tv.adobe.com). The site hosts many videos for creative professionals and works seamlessly with Adobe Media Player (also launching today).

Check out the videos.

Ted

Today Adobe officially launched the public bug base for Flash Player at http://bugs.adobe.com/flashplayer/. This has been a very long time coming and I think it will do wonders for the quality of Adobe Flash Player as developers can enter bugs and enhancements directly and watch the status of their requests. The bug base is the same one that Flex uses and is JIRA powered.

I highly encourage you to get an account to bugs.adobe.com so that you can file enhancements and log bugs. Obviously software development is anything but a perfect science and by expanding the number of users reporting bugs, the quality of Adobe Flash Player is sure to rise.

Great work Player Team!

Ted