Apple bans Flash CS5 iPhone App Compiler

April 8th, 2010
(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
6 Comments »

Update: Today April 9th 2010, Lee Brimelow, an Adobe platform evangelist responded to the latest poster from Apple with “Go screw yourself “ on his popular web blog TheFlashBlog.com. It’s hard not to notice the frustration of developers across the blogosphere fuel by Apple’s refusal to allow third party API compiled apps in to the iTunes store.

The language from Apple’s agreement states “Applications may only use Documented APIs in the manner prescribed by Apple and must not use or call any private APIs”. This stipulation is a loathsome move by Apple to render the new Flash CS5 feature of porting Flash files as iPhone/iPad apps totally useless.

I wonder how many flash developers will delay upgrade to CS5 once they get wind of Apple’s stipulation. I’ve noticed a few developers complaining that their apps were rejected because of the use of third party APIs such as Corona, PhoneGap & Titanium

Read the Titanium’s rejection forum post here:
http://developer.appcelerator.com/question/3921/about-the-iphone-private-api-in-use

John Gruber of Daring Fireball was the first to post these changes:
http://daringfireball.net/2010/04/iphone_agreement_bans_flash_compiler


Tags: , , , ,

Flash on iPhone coming soon via Adobe CS5

November 12th, 2009
(No Ratings Yet)
No Comments »

The new Adobe CS5 Flash will now give flash developer the ability to publish their flash content as an iPhone application. Flash alread allows developers to publish as SWFs, Projector files, and as QuickTime movies. This does not mean that iPhone users will be able to view flash content through the iPhone’s web browser. That’s Apples restriction. What Adobe has done is allow developers to repackage existing flash content as an iPhone application.

iPhoneAppsFlash

This will increase the number of apps available on iTunes store. This will also give agencies and software companies access to a market place that may have shied away from because of a lack of technical resources or fear of outsourcing.

Flash developers will have to follow the same requirement for deployment as other iPhone app developers. They will have to join Apples iPhone Developers Program and follow their guidelines. One of the requirements is to obtain a certificate from Apple in order to test and distribute your app through the iTunes store.

You can find books on Amizon already geared for Flash iPhone development. There is one by The Essential Guide to iPhone Application Development for Flash Users (Paperback).

If you can’t wait for Adobe and want to dive right in to iPhone application development, here are a few books to help you start building apps.

iPhone Advanced Projects (Paperback)
iPhone Application Development For Dummies

For more info on Apples requirements, you can view them here: http://developer.apple.com/iphon


Tags: , , , , ,

Flash and SEO. Why not?

April 22nd, 2009
(No Ratings Yet)
No Comments »

Google learns to crawl Flash
Google has been developing a new algorithm for indexing textual content in Flash files…
Source: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/06/google-learns-to-crawl-flash.html

How to SEO Flash
•    Search Engines and Flash
•    Requirements for Successful Use of Flash
•    SEO Flash Programming
•    Example: Making Flash Home Page Spiderable
•    Scalable Inman Flash Replacement
Source: http://www.hochmanconsultants.com/articles/seo-friendly-flash.shtml

Here are a few comments on this topic from SearchEngineGuide.com:
“Stoney, You hit the nail on the head and pounded it down with one stroke. I completely agree, I have turned down clients in my own business due to flash sites. Now that I am with an agency I find Flash more common, as many of the businesses are big enough and niched enough where they feel that they don’t need SEO for their website. Oddly enough they are often right. Unfortunately SEO can have a big effect on PPC marketing, and most of these accounts suffer from bad keyword quality scores and thus higher click costs in AdWords.”

“Susan: I disagree slightly. Mostly because it all comes down to the intent. Building a flash only website for Ozzy Osbourne is fine, but e-commerce is not. I think you know what I mean”

“ Working on seo for hotel sites, I’ve come across some stunning creative sites designed with Flash. If the designers had thoughtfully used the Flash applications to “wow” site visitors, ie embedding in otherwise SE-friendly pages, it could be a win-win situation.
Perhaps all of you have seen the June info about making Flash SE-friendly. ( http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/06/google-learns-to-crawl-flash.html )”
Source: http://www.searchengineguide.com/stoney-degeyter/why-i-still-wont-seo-flash-websites.php

And from SearchEngineJournal.com:
“Disney does it. And so does Oprah. Even my favorite pizza place does it…  Granted these are extreme cases of sites which use flash extensively, but there are other cases where even a little flash can be improperly used. There are also cases where flash is not only appropriate, it is recommended. The question then becomes how to best use flash without affecting search engine rankings”

“Yeah this article doesn’t help a bit. I thought after reading I would be able to find a solution for my all flash website for seo purposes. Thefwa.com is an all flash website, they rank no.1, they didn’t follow your mumbo jumbo about not using too much flash” (Note from Alex: TheFWA.com does not rank no.1. They rank 31,905. Still not bad for an all flash site.)
Source: http://www.searchenginejournal.com/flash-and-seo-using-flash-on-websites/2247/

Cool online tool that will probe a flash file:

http://www.flashprobe.com/


Tags: , , , , ,

Get current URL or Domain of current flash location

February 6th, 2009
(No Ratings Yet)
No Comments »

Get current URL or Domain of current flash location

ExternalInterface for Domain Name

/* -------- ExternalInterface for Domain Name ------- */
import flash.external.*;
var urlPath;
function geturlhttp() {
urlPath = ExternalInterface.call("window.location.href.toString");
}
geturlhttp();
trace(urlPath);

LocalConnection for Domain Name

/* -------- LocalConnection for Domain Name ------- */
import flash.net.LocalConnection;
var lc:LocalConnection = new LocalConnection();
var domain:String = lc.domain;
trace(domain);

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Loop through child movie clips in AS3 and AS2

January 30th, 2009
(No Ratings Yet)
3 Comments »

To iterate through all children in a display object container…

ActionScript 3 Code Sample:

for(var i=0; i<mcContainer.numChildren-1; i++) { 
var mc:MovieClip = MovieClip(mcContainer.getChildAt(i)); 
mc.doStuff(); 
}

ActionScript 2 Code Sample:

for (var Item in Parent) {
	if (typeof (Parent[Item]) == "movieclip") {
		Parent[Item].doSomething();
	}
}

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Formatting Numbers in Flash for Commas

September 14th, 2007
(9 votes, average: 4.67 out of 5)
1 Comment »

Here is how to use actionscript to format a number in Flash with commas per thousands.
Continue Reading »


Tags: , , , , , ,

Advanced PHP for Flash

December 20th, 2003
(No Ratings Yet)
No Comments »

A second level volume of the highly acclaimed and best-selling Foundation PHP for Flash. Provides a seamless learning curve from the Foundation Flash book and incorporates the new Flash version. Softcover.
Continue Reading »


Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Swift 3D v3 Image Sizing

February 11th, 2003
(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)
No Comments »

Here a few steps to control the sizing and scaling of your images in Swift 3d v3
Continue Reading »


Tags: , , , , , , ,