Everything you always wanted to know about flex* *BUT WERE AFRAID TO ASK Brian Genisio

What is Flex? How does it compare to Silverlight/WPF? What can we learn by studying both?

It Is OK To Be Curious!

Take Both Pills!

What Can Flex Do?

Toolset Overview Silverlight Application XAML/C#/VB.NET/F#/etc Silverlight Application XAML/C#/VB.NET/F#/etc Flex Application MXML/ActionScript Flex Application MXML/ActionScript Silverlight SDK Silverlight SDK Silverlight Runtime Flash Player Flex SDK Flex SDK Managed Code Resources Compiled AS3

Runtime Overview Browser Flash Player Silverlight Runtime Desktop Silverlight Out Of Browser Air Player iOS Android Blackberry Windows Phone 7 App Air Player Silverlight Runtime Flash Player in Browser Air Player ?

Side-By-Side

Declarative Story Flex – MXML – Flex Builder – Catalyst Silverlight XAML Visual Studio Expression Blend

Imperative Story Flex – ActionScript 3 – Haxe – C/C++ Alchemy – Converters Java C# Silverlight C# VB.Net F# Ruby Python

Primary Language ActionScript 3.0 – Dynamic by default – Static by option – Classes/Interfaces – MetaData Tags – Quazi-Generics – XML Literals C# Static by default Dynamic by option Classes/Interfaces Attributes Lambdas Generics

Integrated Development Environments (IDEs) Flash Builder – Designer – Refactoring tools JetBrains IDEA FlashDevelop Tofino Command line Visual Studio Designer Refactoring tools Rich plug-ins Mono Develop Sharp Develop Command line

SDKs & Toolkits Flex – Flex SDK – FlexLib – Cairgnorm – Robotlegs – Mockito – FlexUnit Silverlight Silverlight SDK Silverlight Toolkit Prism MEF Moq NUnit

Design Flex – Photoshop – Illustrator – Catalyst – Over-the-wall Silverlight Photoshop Illustrator Expression Blend Tight integration “The more designers are involved in the workflow, the more it looks like the original art” – Bill Wagner –

Silverlight Designer Developer Project XAML, C#, assets Designer uses Expression Blend to apply design Designer uses Photoshop/Illustrator to create mocks & assets Developer uses Visual Studio to apply behavior and architecture

Flex Designer Developer Designer uses Photoshop/Illustrator to create mocks & assets Flex Project New Flex Project Designer uses Catalyst to apply design Designer makes changes using Catalyst Developer imports Flex project and works on it Developer imports Flex project and merges it into existing

Separation Presentation Model View Model View Model

Data Binding Flex – Expression-based – [Bindable] – Execute Methods – Formatters Silverlight Declarative INotifyPropertyChanged ICommand Value Converters

Testing Flex – FlexUnit – Mockito / ASMocks – FB Runner Silverlight MSTest / Nunit Moq / Rhino Mocks VS Runner / TD.Net

XML Flex – ECMA 4 XML – XML Literals – ActionLinq Silverlight LINQ to XML XDocument

Data Display Flex – DataGroup – List – DropDownList – Item Renderers – Data Grid Silverlight ItemsControl ListBox ComboBox Data Templates Data Grid

State Management Flex – Current State – Inline Properties – Transitions Silverlight Visual State Manager (VSM) Visual States State Transitions

Mobile Flex – Air for Android – iOS Pakcager – Blackberry Playbook Silverlight Windows Phone 7

Top 5 Things Silverlight is Good At Designer-Developer Workflow Development Tools Language Support Third Party Support Performance (including mobile)

Top 5 Things Flex is Good At Data Binding Location, Location, Location Visual State Management Skinning Model Form Validation

Flex.org Get it! Try it! Learn it!

With James Ward – Adobe Evangelist 3 Day Jam

Questions – – – Twitter: Demos: – ActionLinq: –

Smart People Developing Smart Software.