Adobe AIR alpha for Linux

By Stephen Withers
Tuesday, 01 April 2008 09:04

Technology

Proprietary technology doesn't always go down well with the Linux community, but Adobe is pressing ahead by offering an alpha version of its AIR rich Internet applications software for the open source operating system, along with an updated alpha of Flex Builder 3 for Linux.

AIR was previously available for Mac OS X and Windows. It allows the creation of web applications that run on a computer without requiring a browser and may be used offline.

AIR combines HTML and AJAX with Adobe's own Flash and Flex technologies. Any development tools supporting those technologies can be used in the creation of AIR applications. AIR extensions for Dreamweaver CS3 and Flash CS3 Professional are already available, and Adobe supports a variety of AJAX frameworks for AIR development, namely Dojo Toolkit, Ext JS, jQuery, MochiKit, MooTools and Spry.

The updated alpha of Flex Builder 3 for Linux includes support for AIR.

"With the alpha release of Adobe AIR for Linux and the Adobe Flex Builder for Linux alpha update, we're delivering early releases of a first-class application runtime and RIA creation tool to the Linux community," said David Wadhwani, general manager of Adobe's platform business unit.

"This allows us to have an open conversation with users during our development process, which will give us very valuable developer insights."