The Essential Guide to Flash CS4 AIR Development

We all know what a great tool Flash is for creating dynamic, engaging web content, and Adobe's CS4 release just makes it even better. Among the newer features is the ability to take all the power of Flash for the Web and put in on the desktop using AIR. AIR capability is built right into the Flash CS4 integrated development environment, which means you can start writing desktop applications right away.

This book not only covers the essentials of using Flash with AIR (and AIR with Flash), but also shows you how to extend application functionality in new ways. Once you've got Flash on the desktop, you're no longer constrained by the limitations of running inside a web browser. You'll have access to the local desktop file system, and AIR adds SQLite functionality for native database support. And just as Flash animations have a consistent look and feel across browsers, AIR allows you to create applications that work consistently across operating systems—Mac OS X, Windows, and Linux.

For any Flash developer who wants to go from the Web to the desktop (and who doesn't?), this book is required reading. It not only tells you how to do it, but is full of practical, easy-to-follow examples that will have you building desktop AIR applications with Flash in no time. Expanding your existing Flash skills with the Essential Guide to Flash CS4 AIR Development will make you an even more potent and indispensable force on any development team!

Introducing Adobe AIR.- Introducing Flash CS4.- Building Your First AIR Application.- Setting AIR Application Properties.- Working with the Window APIS and the Screen Class.- Creating Menus for Flash Applications.- Accessing the File System.- Working with the Operating System.- Adding Rich Media: PDF, Video, and Audio Files.- Working with HTML Content.- Monitoring Network Connectivity.- SQLite Programming in Flash CS4.- Packaging, Distributing, and Installing AIR Applications.

Marco Casario is one of the most dynamic developers and consultants in the Adobe world. He has been passionate about informatics since he was little more than a child, and used to program games in Basic for Commodore 64 before dedicating himself, while still very young, to innovative projects for the web using Flash and Director (as far back as versions 3 and 5). In 2001, he began to collaborate with Macromedia Italia. Since that year, he has produced and headed a long series of presentations, conferences and articles, which you can find listed in detail in his blog, RIAvolutionize the Web (Casario.blogs.com), which is receiving several thousands of unique visitors every day. In 2005, Marco founded Comtaste (Comtaste.com), a company dedicated to exploring new frontiers in rich Internet applications and the convergence between the web and the world of mobile devices; MobyMobile (MobyMobile.com) and YouThru (YouThru.com) are representative of their work. Marco is the is founder of the biggest worldwide Flash Lite User Group (groups.yahoo.com/group/FlashLite) and of AugItaly.com, a reference point for the Italian community of Adobe users, for which he carries out the role of channel manager for the section dedicated to Flex (AugItaly.com/FlexGala.) Marco is busy working on the development (in Flex) of a very ambitious project concerning bank counters at European level, and in various consulting and Flex and Flash Media Server training activities for the realisation of rich Internet applications on behalf of buyers of the calibre of Capgemini, IBM partners, and Adobe Systems Software Ireland, Ltd.