Carlos dropped me a note to tell me about Treina Tom and even though I don’t speak Portuguese, it seems like a pretty cool application. Carlos says that it’s a tool for IT professionals and companies that want to create multimedia events around their products.

He’s built in audio, video, a common blackboard, slides and a cool code box that lets developers type code to share with the group in real time with syntax highlighting. He also mentioned that he’s hoping to build an internal framework so developers can build their own plugins. It would be neat to see an English version of this.

[tags]training, weborb, ruby on rails, flex, flash media server[/tags]

I’ve been heads down doing development and not feeling well so the blogging has been light so far (but I’m trying to keep the link blog updated with RIA-goodness). One thing I did want to make sure to mention was the Remix MIX07 contest that is happening over on the MIX07 website.

The idea is a lot like CSS Zen Garden; you change the CSS and submit the design so it shows up in the gallery. I’m helping to judge the contest and I know a lof of you are creative types, so give it a shot. If you have one of the top three designs you get to go to MIX for free, so it’s worth a shot.

[tags]MIX07, Remix[/tags]

I knew that Apollo was in demand, but I don’t think I quite realized how in demand it was. I got a tip about Mike Chamber’s book, Apollo for Adobe Flex Developers Pocket Guide, being available on Torrent sites and sure enough, the full book is available way before the scheduled ship date (which is supposed to be March 31st).

It’s been a long time since I occupied the world of the Torrents, and while I know everything is available, having it this early strikes me as pretty surprising. Excitement for Apollo builds in some very strange places.

[tags]Apollo, Adobe, Flex[/tags]

I feel like a giddy school boy right now after reading about Astra, Trillian’s new client over on Webware and the Trillian Blog. The new client is built on Flash, and there is a web client, but there is also a desktop client because the team thinks that sticking applications in a browser is silly (I love these guys!).

What’s fascinating is that it uses Flash 9 and has Apollo-like desktop functionality. According to the blog, they can access the system tray, the task bar, the local filesystem and some of the windowing APIs. So it seems to have a big chunk of Apollo technology but it isn’t using Apollo.  They’re terming it an “OS Layer” technology.

I haven’t gotten a chance to play with this yet, but as a long time Trillian subscribe and self-described Trillian addict, I’m hoping I can find a way to test it out. If you know anyone that can hook me up, I’ll be forever in your debt.

[via AnneZ]

[tags]Trillian, Flash, Astra, Apollo, Rich Internet Applications[/tags]

I’m catching up on feeds, blogging and development tonight and I came across Mulling over WPF/E by Rick Strahl. I think it is a fantastic look at WPF/E and is a must-read for anyone interested in comparing it to Flash.

He starts of talking a bit about his experience with Flash, then gets into some WPF/E code and creating a very basic WPF/E application. Then he breaks down his thoughts on the platform as a whole, what he thinks it’s valuable for and what he doesn’t like about it.

I haven’t seen anything quite this unbiased or detailed about what “WPF/E” can and can’t do, so while it’s a bit long, I suggest everyone take a look. Flash developers will realize that WPF/E is lacking in a lot of areas that Flash has had nailed for a long time. I wonder how much of that will change after the MIX announcements.

[tags]WPF/E, Flash, Rich Internet Applications, MIX[/tags]

There’s an interesting conversation over on the Wharton Computing Developer’s Center about their Flex 1.5 applications and their Flex 2.0 applications. I love this blog because it gives me a bit of insight into how a big company manages their infrastructure (Wharton computing is as sophisticated or more so than a big company).

I’ve had the luxury of not having to worry about building or maintaining any Flex 1.5 applications but it sounds like with Wharton’s apps, switching to Flex 2.0 would mean the loss of some document capabilities. Obviously Flex 2.0 is faster, better, easier to develop for and generally a more solid product, but I’m wondering if there are other people out there still using Flex 1.5. Is there a reason you haven’t ported your application over? Is Flex 1.5 still getting a lot of traction in parts of the industry?

Also, I really miss Flashpaper. I don’t care what anyone says, that was a great, simple, lightweight document format.

[tags]Wharton, Flex, Flashpaper[/tags]

Now that I’m a web worker, I’m feeling a little down that I don’t get to participate in a pool for the NCAA tournament coming up. Especially since my Quakers are again, representing the Ivy League (by the way, Lunardi, you can choke on a golf ball if you keep Penn as a 14th seed).

So to help with my feeling of loneliness, I’ve set up a March Madness Tournament group over on Yahoo, The Rich Internet Application Crew (unfortunately, you’ll have to join before you can see the page). Everyone is welcome to join, the password is just ‘ria’. I figured most people had Yahoo accounts, so this would be the easiest way to get people to join up.

Even if you don’t know anything about NCAA basketball, feel free to join up and pick teams based on the mascot. You people usually win these things anyway. If you are into NCAA basketball, then bring the heat.

A couple of notes. I love trash talking (both dishing and receiving), so if you’re planning to fill out a bracket, feel free to add me to your messenger list and talk trash as my first round lies in shambles. Over Twitter? Even better. Secondly, don’t take this too seriously. These things are fun because it doesn’t matter what happens.

So here’s the info if you want to join the group. The final 65 will be known on Sunday!

1. Join: http://tournament.fantasysports.yahoo.com/men/register/joinprivategroup
2. Group ID: 69343
3. Password: ria

[tags]NCAA Tournament, Basketball, Penn, Rich Internet Applications[/tags]

I’m having some Flex Builder problems and after talking to Sim, I realized I might be the only person on the planet setting up Flex Builder this way, so I wanted to blog and see if you guys had any tips. Here’s my setup:

I like to put my Eclipse plugins all in different folders. This allows me to mix and match my different workspaces depending on if I’m doing ColdFusion development, JavaScript development, Flex development or OpenLaszlo development, ect. So when I set up the Flex Plugin, I install the standalone version and then to get the plugin version, I open up my clean download of Eclipse, create a Local Update site and point it at the Flex Builder 2 directory. Sim thinks this is where I’m going bad because he says no one does it like this.

Until yesterday, I’ve been using a project created in the standalone version that I wanted to switch over to the plugin version. So I went through the steps above and then imported the project. But now, I get this error message:

unable to open ‘C:\Eclipse\extensions\flex_builder\eclipse\plugins\
com.adobe.flexbuilder.project_2.0.155577\resources\frameworks/flex
config.xml’

For some reason it is trying to find the flex-config.xml file deep inside my plugin directory. So then I discovered linked resources, and I changed my $FRAMEWORKS resource directory to the SDK directory and thought that would fix it. But no, my flex-config.xml file is still trying to find itself in my plugins directory. Anyone have any ideas what’s up?

[tags]Flex, Flex Builder, Troubleshooting[/tags]

Tonight I played with an application built with Apollo that I can’t wait for all of you guys to see. It’s the perfect blend of web and desktop because it relies on the strengths of both. The company has a great web brand that it continues to drive traffic to and support. Their Apollo version draws out some of the features and make some additions that power users will find very useful. I’ve been a fan of these guys for a while and I think they have this thing nailed. The “Web 2.0″ companies that are going to really drive Apollo adoption initially are going to be those that use the desktop to enhance the web experience.

Apollo isn’t going to be about bringing every web application to the desktop, so I always chuckle at the people that are afraid of having “900 desktop icons”. The thing I think Apollo will do very well is give web properties the ability to figure out who their “power users” are and give those people extra functionality. You can take the same development methodologies, a lot of the same code, and give your power users the opportunity to bring your application to their desktop with increased functionality. The people who download that are your power users. Then you can go about monetizing that base.

Apollo opens up a ton of possibilities, which is why I make statements like it’s going to “rock the web” without much in the way of embellishment. It’s going to expand what Web 2.0 can do and in the process give people new ways to monetize their work. That’s a big deal.

[tags]Apollo, web 2.0[/tags]

No, I do not have a job recruiting for Microsoft, but when I saw the Why Will You Work Here Campaign over at the Live Side, I had to share it. Why? Because Seattle is an awesome city and I want you all to live here. Tell me you don’t want to come to Seattle after reading this:

What is the Seattle spirit? Each neighborhood brings its own flavor to the melting pot that is Seattle. Check out the broad cultural atmosphere of Capitol Hill, the locally grown produce at Fremont’s Sunday markets or go back in time and enjoy the history of Seattle’s first neighborhood, Pioneer Square. And that’s only on the west side of the lake! Surround yourself with the gorgeous mountains and hiking trails in Issaquah, cycle your way through Redmond or join other art lovers at the monthly Kirkland Art Walk.

But hey, maybe Microsoft isn’t your thing . We have a lot of companies. Want to do Flex development? Check out Picnik or EyeJot, both very cool web startups. Flash? Well there’s Pluggd, Zillow and also a little company you might have heard of called Smashing Ideas. Plus we have the worlds coolest Adobe campus, so you can always work for them knowing your office is the best Adobe has to offer. 

Okay, so maybe I was a little homesick while I was at 360Flex, but hey, it’s a cool site.

[tags]Seattle, Microsoft, Picnik, EyeJot, Pluggd, Zillow, Smashing Ideas[/tags]