Flex Solutions: Essential Techniques for Flex 2 and 3 Developers by Marco Casario

From Barnes & Noble

Adobe Flex is revolutionizing Flash development. Finally, Flash developers have comprehensive tools equal to those available for computer languages like Java. With the latest versions of Flex, there's a solution to practically any rich Internet application development challenge. This book presents more than 100 of the best of these solutions.

Author Marco Casario is singularly well qualified to write this book. He's been working with Flex from the get-go. His company, Comtaste, specializes in building rich Internet, mobile, and Web 2.0 applications (including enterprise Flex projects that are right at the cutting edge). He teaches Flex on behalf of folks like, yes, Adobe. Maybe you've even heard him speak, at conferences like Adobe MAX, 360Flex, AdobeLive, or the O'Reilly Web 2.0 Summit.

The solutions he presents here run the gamut -- from basic stuff (adding global CSS styles, extending Flex's built-in controls with ActionScript, using data binding) all the way through improving application startup performance. Everything's been updated to reflect the brand-new Flex 3 platform and Adobe Integrated Runtime. (Casario had to stop in his tracks and make substantial revisions in his partially complete manuscript to make that happen: You'll be glad he did.)

To begin with, there's comprehensive coverage of working with data. Validating it. Formatting it. Managing it (including the use of Flex's new collection classes). Working with remote data using RPC (and consuming web services). Displaying data, with Flex's powerful list-based controls. But there's much more here: designing and coding application look-and-feel; application compilation and deployment; and the most thorough discussion of Flex security you're ever likely to need. Bill Camarda, from the February 2008 Read Only

From the Publisher

Flex is the quickest and most effective technology for the creation of Rich Internet Applications for the Web. Its extensive library of components and totally customizable framework, combined with the ubiquity of Flash Player, has guaranteed its success.

The ecosystem of products that rotate around Flex 2 and Flex 3 is really broad. Flex Builder, Flex SDK, and Charting Components are all essential parts of the technology that fit the different requirements of web development.

This enormous set of possibilities can easily lead to overload for developers like you. Theres just too much to learn and too many potential places to go when you hit a brick wall. Wouldnt it be nice to have a library of solutions to solve these problems quickly and easily?

This book provides just that, with more than 100 solutions to common problems in one handy volume.

Flex Solutions: Essential Techniques for Flex 2 and Flex 3 Developers faces problems and provides solutions that can be applied to any project, from the most simple to the most complex. The solutions range from customizing Flex components with ActionScript 3.0, using the data models and the ActionScript classes as Value objects, validating and formatting data, using RPC classes to access remote data, to optimizing data-exchange performance using AMF3.

Solutions are also provided for enhancing the security of Flex applications; and techniques are offered for optimizing the actual work environment by increasing the performance of Flex Builder, adding video content, and creating an AIR project to bring your web application onto the desktop.

If you want to learn about and start to develop RIAs in a short time, being immediatelyproductive and mastering the Flex development techniques, Flex Solutions: Essential Techniques for Flex 2 and 3 Developers is the book you need.

In this book you'll:

• Discover real-world solutions for everyday Flex development, saving hours of development time.



• Learn how to customize and extend the Flex Components Model and design and program the look and feel of your Flex applications.



• Learn best practices and tips from a Flex expert for structuring the architecture of Flex applications.



• Use the Flex Remote Procedure Classes to connect to remote data with HTTPServices and the Java Platform, PHP, ColdFusion, WebServices, and RemoteObject.



• Use the new Flex 3 features, such as the AdvancedDataGrid component and the Charting Enhancements feature.



• Port your Rich Internet Applications onto the desktop with Adobe AIR.

What youll learn

• Tips on using Flex components



• How to validate and format data



• How to manage complex data



• Filtering, sorting and using cursors on data with collection classes



• How to consume Web Services using RPC components



• How to display data using list-based controls



• How to effectively compile and deploy Flex applications



• How to customize the look and feel of your applications



• How to make your applications more secure



• How to become more efficient in using the Flex Builder IDE



• Unique tricks such as calculating memory usage, application into an active desktop, and customizing states



• How to use the ColdFusion Extensions for Flex Builder



• How to interface your Flex applications with server-side code written in PHP, Java, Rails, and ColdFusion



• Working with Flex in enterprise enviroment using the Flex Data Services, Java Remote Object and AMFPHP

Who is this book for?

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