Adobe Open Sources Flex SDK Under MPL

andy_from_nc writes "Adobe announced that they are open sourcing their Flex SDK under the Mozilla Public License incrementally by December. This move comes on the heels of Microsoft's announcement of their Silverlight and Adobe's CEO's criticism of it. Adobe's action will likely please other open source developers who use Flex, like me, and offers hope that we'll see a full open source version of Flash one day. You can read Adobe's FAQ on the move as well."

Game UI

I've seen some talk lately about using Flash to create GUIs for games and other 3D apps. I would think that open-sourcing Flex would get those same people to think about using it instead. I think this is probably a pretty solid move for Adobe and will drive adoption of Flex quite a bit faster.

The ability to improve it yourself definitely doesn't hurt, either.

If they are really devoted to open source...

Open sourcing Flex is nice and all, but if Adobe really wants to score points with the F/OSS community they will release Linux-native versions of their development environments for Flex development, including a free or community version like Microsoft's "Express" developer products for dotNET.

Flex Builder 2 *DOES* run under Linux

Flex Builder 2 is provided as an Eclipse plugin, so it's platform independant.

Quick google for "flex under linux" returns a blog detailing support: http://blog.davr.org/2007/04/22/flex-builder-201-u nder-linux/ [davr.org].

Adobe really impress me with Flex..

Re:Flex Builder 2 *DOES* run under Linux

Clarification: You can HACK FB2 to run under Linux, but it does not have any native support (no installer, no technical support). We recently had a meeting with the Flex team at my company and their view is that Linux does not represent the majority of their market, and at the time they were here they expressed no immediate interest in moving toward a Linux-supported product. I really wish they'd extend the open-source movement to FB2 as well because quite honestly -- it sucks. It's a severe memory hog, it is lacking several key bits of functionality like automatic code formatting for ActionScript and MXML, no built-in support for refactoring, and is a pain to get working with relatively-pathed library projects.

Flex and db access

Does Flex have db access? If so this might make a fun alternative to using JAVA w/ Swing for creating portable applications for viewing datasets.

Re:Do you mean OpenLaszlo

Openlaszlo does all this, of course, and much like Flex, OpenLaszlo can output a Web2.0 app as a flash file requiring a flash plugin to run BUT it can ALSO output a dhtml file (which will run in all modern browsers) requiring NO plugin. There is a commitment to output Java ME as well, in the near future. You really have to see OpenLaszlo apps in dhtml to understand how powerful dhtml can be - Google apps are boring and dull in comparison (though astonishingly functional, to be sure..) The fact that the same source will be able to compile into any of these (and more, there is even a proof-of-concept SVG output generator..) is not only unique but opens up choices that none of the other players in this field can.

Not impressed

Adobe is putting small pieces on Linux (and other OSS), just when they feel attacked by MS. If they really wanted to keep doing well, they would move ALL of their work to Linux. Once they do that, they are no longer compete ting directly against MS IN MS's BACKYARD. That is a battle that adobe will lose if they try to take on MS directly.

Correct FAQ link

The FAQ is actually here [adobe.com].

You fell for it, huh?

Adobe's action will likely please other open source developers who use Flex, like me, and offers hope that we'll see a full open source version of Flash one day.

There's a sucker born every minute, isn't there.

What Adobe has done by throwing an "open source" SDK bone is made it appear like they're leaning toward open-source Flash without actually giving away any of the crown jewels. Adobe's move is very much like the gigabyes of "open source" code samples Microsoft makes available in its extensive MSDN library: you can use and modify them for free, but you still need Microsoft's core (and proprietary) software to make them work.

Re:You fell for it, huh?

Well, actually the GP has a point...Adobe isn't open-sourcing any of the server/data access/interop components. So while you might be able to freely assemble a great-looking webpage-embeddable UI, what use will it be without the ability to access/manipulate data stores and services? And if you can't do that...what's the point of using Flex in the first place? Wasn't it targeted at corp developer types? If all you want are pretty apps, wouldn't you be using the web designed-focused Flash tools in the first place?

Sure it's great the SDK code will be freely available and inspectable; I'm all for transparency in software and its licensing. But Adobe has still locked up the middleware and will continue to charge an astronomical amount of money for it. And the tool won't be terribly useful without it, unless you're one of the wildman-types who rolls his own data access remoting. So the GP isn't that far off, at least in my opinion.

What would be helpful for the dev community would be an FOSS interop gateway/platform where the remoting headaches have already been solved. Maybe it exists somewhere; if so, now would be a great publicity opportunity for it.

(And yes, I've done Flex development before, so spare me the snarkiness...)

Re:You fell for it, huh?

RemoteObject is also available with the Open Source Granite Data Services project. So for free you get:
- HTTPService (connect to any backend using any serialization you want)
- WebService (connect to SOAP)
- RemoteObject (Java remoting)

Why do Adobe even care about Silverlight?

Microsoft's only market for Silverlight is some universities and eLearning facilities that are too short sighted to use Flash for multimedia delivery; the only way MS could possibly even put a dent in Flash's ubiquity is if they traveled back in time and made sure that Silverlight something that was installed on every windows machine from Windows 98 onwards.

Adobe have a massive user base for the Flash plugin (perhaps one of the highest user bases for any software in the world? (barring MS paint).. interesting question) and the application itself, and I don't see Microsoft making a dent in it in any meaningful way- why should Adobe even bother looking over their shoulder when you can ask most users what Flash is and they'll say 'oh it's that thing you need on the interwebs that does ______'.

Anyway, I've been wanting to make the move to Flex (from hand-coding my XML requests etc) and this is a great chance to do so. Spry integration into Dreamweaver CS3, then open-sourcing Flex? Some moves in the right direction, Adobe :)

Now, about that XML into After Effects idea I had :p

*runs off to buy master suite*

Re:Why do Adobe even care about Silverlight?

I think Adobe cares about Silverlight in part because Flash development is still perceived to have a high barrier to entry because of the cost of Flash MX. I myself only became aware of the possibility of using the free Flex SDK to develop Flash apps recently. So in light of Microsoft's announcement, I think Adobe doesn't want those who might be swayed to forget about Flex. Open sourcing Flex is definitely a good move. It should result in some good free tools for Flash development which should help fend off the threat presented by Silverlight. I'm still planning to take a look at Silverlight, but I'll definitely be giving Flex a look too. And I'm sure that Adobe remembers that Netscape thought they had an insurmountable lead back in the day too, and look where they are now... Never underestimate the power of the dark side!

Adobe does Flash too?

Free development in Flash has been around for a while. I particularly like working in Haxe [haxe.org].

To me, I had never been interested in Flash development because the dev environments I saw always seemed semi-hostile to something other than timeline-based animation. With haxe, it's just you and your text editor - the way programming should be.

An unexpected smart move - Adobe deserves credit

This is a suprising move indeed, and changes the game for RIAs big time. As of now Flex is right up there with Laszlo and Co. when technical decision-makers talk about RIA generators and compilers. This dimishes the corporate media hype about Silverthingie from MS to a minor sidenote.

Kudos also to the Laszlo guys and the Motion Twin ActionScript Compiler and all the other projects listed at osflash.org for putting the presure on Adobemedia for the last few years. And Kudos to Sun for leading the way in open sourcing key technologies - I suspect that played a major role in this decision. And thanks to Adobe for scaring the living wee-wee out of Microsoft's Web Division. I can just imagine the look on their faces. Hehe.

Oh, and last but not least, to all the idiots here on slashdot allready ranting about Flash, Flex, Laszlo, RIAs and whatnot: Shut the f*ck up, you don't know squat what you're talking about.

Duh... flex is already open source

http://flex.sourceforge.net/ [sourceforge.net]

Adobe should concentrate on opening sourcing something of worth instead of reinventing the wheel. ;)

Nifty but confusing.

I checked the website, and Flex seems to be a bundle of different packages. The retail is over $700. Is that what they are open sourcing or just the SDK? Bottom line, can you use it without the 700 package? Kinda like how you can download the .Net framework and write apps without needing Visual Studio

Slow Death?

Right now their new product is not taking off fast enough and they are trying to head Microsoft off. They've got a more profitable product in Flash and it's their product as opposed to this project they inherited from Macromedia.

This is the last step before they abandon it. Which they won't do right away. First some exec that came over from Macromedia and forcing the project through will resign. Then a couple of months later the updates will stop.

As someone who has witnessed their business people in action at a very high level, the riskiest thing they've done lately is to try a new restaurant for lunch.

The last mile of software

There are eight ways to Sunday for solving the last mile problem for software (the presentation tier) in a robust fashion. For all but the most trivial of applications, this solution is more trouble than it's worth. Unlike the last mile of the network, the target is not a fixed location.

The shrewd architect knows that there is always a rewrite. A dependency like this at the presentation layer is a liability. Whether interpreter is proprietary or not has little impact on these costs.

It's no good alone

The only way to really utilize open source flex is if we could get an open source bison.

Flex has always been open source.

Flex has always been open source.

http://flex.sourceforge.net/ [sourceforge.net]

I don't know what Adobe's product is, but it is not Flex.

Why MPL?

The reason they licensed it under the MPL is so that it could be used in proprietary software. It is OK to call it "open source", but it is not "free software"

SilverLight Adoption is Easy, Bundle with IE

Thats all MS has to do to get wide adoption. Force it as part of IE, or make an option in the download by default. And then put it all over Microsoft.com and MSN.com and break stuff (like navigation) if you dont have it installed.

Granted it wont be forced on people on other platforms but it would get heavy adoption rather quickly. I dont put it beyond them to do this either.

I love Flex

Just thought you guys might like a developer's perspective: Flex is awesome.

I've been playing around with making some simple movies, the results are great. I wrote some performance intensive code and found that the VM performed great. I did a lot of procedural drawing and it performed great (I was particularly worried about that step).

Here is my favorite part: I wrote the whole thing with no IDE or anything. I typed out the .mxml and .as files in gvim, compiled with the command-line mxmlc, and out popped my .swf . I'm not saying I would recommend going without an IDE for a large project, I just like that I can.

The API is well set up and I consistently find that they have the features and organization that I want. It feels like me and Adobe are on the same page, design-wise (I certainly can't say the same for me and Sun).

The MXML organization works really well. You can embed source in the XML, your source code can refer to objects you declare in XML as if they were variables, and you include a custom class simply by adding an XML tag with your class's name.

Kudos to Adobe, they finally made a developer-friendly way to create flash content.

Flex

Will this app let me run raw binaries on everyone elses machine?

Re:Pay Attention

b) It's still interpretated as a virtual machine, so it's not native system performance

Actually, ActionScript 3 (introduced in Flash Player 9) is a JIT with excellent performance... not interpreted.

Your other points are valid, but you can still get impressive performance, e.g.,

http://www.papervision3d.org/ [papervision3d.org]
http://www.unitzeroone.com/blog/papervision3d/pape rvision3d_demos_cellshadin.html [unitzeroone.com]