Flex & Drupal Integration

Flex & Drupal Integration Presented by: Matthew Connerton

Matthew Connerton Who the heck is he? Flex Developer Php Developer Drupal Developer YAY BEER!

Today’s Session Flex What?? Flex Myths HTML & Flex Flash & Flex CSS In Flex Flex & Drupal Example! Discussion!

Flex What? Flex is a framework Adobe has a commercial IDEs: Flex Builder 3 Flash Builder 4 Flash Catalyst Flex is a declarative language: MXML <button label=“Click me” click=“btnClicked()” />

Why Flex? Rapid Application Development Not complicated Large community Publish for web and desktop (adobe air) Open source

Who Uses Flex? IBM SAP MTV Intel E*Trade Citicorp FedEx MasterCard Symantec Xerox Kodak LG Playboy American Cancer Society Johnson & Johnson Kaiser Permanente Northrop Grumman Lockheed Martin Boeing Monster.com Raytheon U.S. Air Force U.S. Army U.S. Department of Defense U.S. Department of Education Brinks Inc. Macys FAA Cingular Wireless Alltel MCI Worldcom T-Mobile Wireless Oracle Cisco Systems Pfizer Johnson & Johnson eBay CDW Mercedes-Benz Disney

Flex Myths You need a “Flex Player” (Flash Player is the only thing you need) Flex is proprietary (Flex is open source – opensource.adobe.com) Flex only loads XML/RSS (Binary, Sockets, RPC, TXT, PHP/Java/.Net, ...) Flex costs money to run/use/get (Flex is free: SDK, Framework, knowledge) No “back” button or deep-linking (Flash/Flex have had this capability since v6) Flex doesn’t play nice with AJAX External Interfaces for seamless integration

Similarities Between XHTML & Flex Both are XML based languages/markup (tags) Both can use higher level interactive languages: HTML has JavaScript Flex has ActionScript Both support CSS Both have forms, text control, and support for the media trio (images, video, audio) Both support custom namespaces Both are free Both support the “back” and “forward” buttons

Differences Between HTML & Flex Flex and ActionScript are compiled languages, not interpreted like HTML/CSS/JS/PHP Compiled Outputs = SWF & AIR file formats HTML, by default, uses multiple files/pages Flex can be multiple pages or just one file. HTML doesn't have a framework Web standards HTML/CSS render natively, while Flash Player needs to be installed for Flash/Flex content

Similarities Between Flash & Flex Both run on the Flash Player and AIR runtime Both have ActionScript at their hearts same code, same effects & filters, same capabilities. Both have commercial and free IDE's Adobe.com, OSflash.org, RIAforge.org Both can share components (SWC), classes, and media (SWF, FLV, MOV/MP4/M4V, AAC/MP3/M4A) Both have a connection to open source.

Differences Between Flash & Flex Flash has a time line, and art design tools Flash is targeted for design and animation Flash does not have a native framework Flash isn't a language Flash will get you a rich, cool web site Flex is only code Flex Builder has design tools for theming (CSS) Flex is targeted for any developer. Flex is a framework. Flex is a language. Flex really speeds up development of rich applications (RIA's)

Just what is an RIA? RIA (Rich Internet Applications) Rich interface design, multimedia (images, video, audio) Examples: Twitter client, Adobe Media Player, Adobe Premiere Express, Agile Agenda, Adobe Photoshop Express)

MXML & ActionScript Code MXML: <mx:CheckBox label=”Click Me” click=”chkBoxClicked()”/> ActionScript: package com.mrconnerton.drupalcampatlanta { import mx.flash.utils.*; public class MyActionScriptClass { public function DynamicCall() { var someText:String = 'I like Drupal'; trace(someText); } } }

CSS in Flex CSS can be loaded CSS can be embedded CSS can be shared CSS can be compiled (SWF) Code your own custom CSS features, like the open-sourced Degrafa project

Drupal Integration AMFPHP (module) this is a binary gateway for you to pass your data through and send to Flex in an insane speed. Super tiny versus XML. Services (module) make “services” (functions) that Flex calls to get and send data (XML or AMFPHP)

Example: eVoiceSpot Builder http://www.evoicespot.com

New Stuff (Flex 4) Flash Catalyst will be the designer-developer liaison If Flash Player has 3D, Flex will have 3D Database Drivers Public beta and staying open-source

Learn More Flex.org Drupal Modules http://drupal.org/project/services http://drupal.org/project/amfphp Adobe Labs http://labs.adobe.org

Discussion Email me if you have any more questions [email_address] mrconnerton.com Huge Thanks to: Chris Charlton chrischarlton.us

Flex & Drupal Integration

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