Adobe launches AIR into cyberspace

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Monday, 25 February 2008 15:33

Business IT - Technology

Adobe says that Adobe AIR, Adobe Flex and the Adobe Flash Player are “the foundation of the Adobe technology platform for RIAs”.

Adobe RIA technologies include “tools, frameworks, servers, services, and runtimes that work together seamlessly, enabling the creation of engaging experiences with the greatest reach”.

To help developers, Adobe have placed a “variety of learning resources at the Adobe Developer Connection to help developers immediately start building RIAs for the browser and the desktop”.

Talking specifically on how Adobe AIR lets developers use skills they already have, Adobe says that AIR enables “developers to create RIAs on the desktop using the skills and Web technologies — such as HTML, Ajax, PDF, Adobe Flash and Adobe Flex — they already employ”.

In addition, Adobe says that “applications deployed on AIR have the advantages of browser-based RIAs, such as speed of development, ease of use, and access from virtually anywhere. Yet they also have the benefits of desktop applications, such as the ability to read/write local files, work with other applications on a user’s computer and maintain local data storage on the desktop”.

Turning our attention to Flex, Adobe says that it is “a free, open source framework for building highly interactive, expressive RIAs”.

There’s also Adobe Flex Builder 3, an Eclipse based development tool, which “accelerates Flex application development and includes new capabilities for deploying RIAs on Adobe AIR”.

For those already using CS3, Adobe Flex Builder 3 integrates with Adobe Creative Suite 3 software “making it easy for designers and developers to work together more efficiently. Powerful new testing tools, including memory and performance profilers and integrated support for automated functional testing, speed up development and lead to higher performing RIAs”.

Interestingly, part of Adobe’s project is open source, with Adobe AIR, the Adobe AIR SDK and the Adobe Flex SDK are now available free of charge, although Adobe’s Flex Builder 3 will be on sale. Please read onto page 3.