I went to the Adobe Refresh conference in Sydney. There is some crazy stuff in the pipeline.
The theme was Flash as a platform in the browser, on the desktop, and on devices such as phones, game consoles, toasters, etc. I think they are making Flash what Java promised to be in the late 90’s: write once run anywhere. Java never really fulfilled that promise, and became bloated and complex in the process. In contrast, the Flash Player is light and the API much smaller.
The other major theme was improved workflow. They opened a magazine layout in InDesign, and with one click, exported the whole thing as a SWF. You could even turn the pages. My wife is a journalist, so she knows how hard the publishing industry has been hit. You could export the whole thing into Flash, and add shopping carts to the ad sections. You could publish as an Air file and make a desktop magazine.
PDF now supports embedded Flash files, video, 3D, and interactivity. So you can also leverage flash inside PDF and use that as an application deployment platform.
They demoed an alpha of a new product called Flash Catalyst. This tool will allow designers to create applications without any code. While I doubt it will put me out of a job, it will allow designers to do much more without my help. And since it generates Flex code, it will allow me to perform certain functions faster.
There was a lot to take in. I need to organize my notes and write another post. It’s an exciting time to be a developer; the tools and deployment options available to us at this point are insane.
