Class Software

Second Talk at RIAcon

Fri, 29 Jul 2011 22:48:00 +1000

I'm giving a second talk at RIAcon (6th and 7th August) in just over a week.

Asynchronous unit testing with FlexUnit

A lot of operations in Flex are asynchronous. Even simple operations can be asynchronous like setting the selected item on a List box. This can make unit testing Flex code difficult. For this session I show how to you can use features of FlexUnit (in particular the Async class) to simplify testing of ActionScript/MXML code and easily test asynchronous code. I'll show how this via real world code examples and describe in detail how to testing asynchronous code.

RIACon

Tickets to RIACon are only $99 for two days and the conference is limited to 150 attendees. Here is the list of sessions. Come along and meet with some of the best people in the ColdFusion, Flex, JavaScript and jQuery communities.

Speaking at RIAcon in Washington DC in August

Thu, 28 Jul 2011 00:45:00 +1000

I'm giving a preview version of my Adobe MAX talk at RIAcon (6th and 7th August) in just over a week.

Realtime programming with Arduino and WebSockets

Arduino is a low cost, easy to program open source hardware and software platform than enables you to communication in real time with the physical world. This session looks at how to interact with Arduino hardware directly from a web browser using the WebSocket protocol and the Socket.IO javascript library. We'll start out by tuning LEDs on and off and progress to creating graphs that react in real time to environmental sensors.

RIACon

A Practical Guide to Connecting Hardware to Flex at Flash and the City

Tue, 21 Jun 2011 23:54:00 +1000

I recently gave a talk on using the Flex and the Arduino platform together for the Flash and the City conference in New York. You can download a PDF of my talk (2 Mb) or view on slide share. The talk was recorded as soon as I get the link I'll add it here as well. The talk showed how to to turn LEDs connected to an Arduino on and off from Flex, how to control the size of shapes in Flex from an Arduino and to communication with an Arduino XML web server from Flex. [More]

Speaking at Adobe MAX in Los Angeles in October

Tue, 07 Jun 2011 16:55:00 +1000

Bring your own device

I'll be running a 3 hour BYOD (Bring your own device) session at Adobe MAX in Los Angeles in October.

Adobe MAX

I missed out on Adobe MAX last year (and Droid and Google TV device giveaways). It's a long way to go from Australia and you can only go to so many conferences in one year. :-) I'm really excited to going this year, there's a huge amount of content (currently 137 sessions and I'm sure more will be added!). Here's the brief on my session:

Real-time Programming with Arduino using WebSockets

Learn how you can communicate in real time with the physical world using Arduino, a low-cost, easy-to-program open source hardware and software platform. This session looks at how to interact with Arduino hardware directly from a web browser using the WebSockets protocol and the Socket.IO JavaScript library. We'll start out by turning LEDs on and off and progress to creating graphs that react in real time to environmental sensors.

Arduino Platform (Part II)

Fri, 03 Jun 2011 03:02:00 +1000

Here is the pdf of the slides of my online talk on "Arduino Platform Part II" for asDevs Download a PDF of my talk (3.5 MB). The session was recorded and you can listen and view it here. Any questions on my talk just comment below or email me. [More]

Arduino Platform (Part I)

Thu, 02 Jun 2011 07:21:00 +1000

Here is the pdf of the slides of my online talk on "Arduino Platform Part I" for asDevs Download a PDF of my talk (5.8 MB). The session was recorded and you can listen and view it here. Any questions on my talk just comment below or email me. [More]

"Frameworks are Bad, OK?" at 360Flex in Denver

Tue, 12 Apr 2011 09:14:00 +1000

Here is the pdf of the slides of my talk on "Frameworks are Bad, OK?" at 360Flex unconference in Denver USA. Download a PDF of my talk (1.4 MB) and here the sample Flex application implementing MVC without using a framework. Any questions on my talk just comment below or email me.

Speaking at 360|Flex Unconference in Denver in April

Tue, 29 Mar 2011 02:10:00 +1000

360|Flex is just around the corner and it's looks like an amazing conference this year, there are more than 50 sessions, a full day of training, birds of a feather mettings and even a code war. Lake a look at the schedule to see this year amazing lineup. I'm going to be speaking at the unconference.

Frameworks Are Bad, OK?

I'll be talking about the dangers of framework use, the issues you run into when using them and reasons NOT to use them. But it's not all bad news, I'll also be taking about how to use them effectively. I'll go into a bit of teaching theory, Dreyfus model, Lmode vs Rmode thinking, what it takes to become an expert at something and why coders of different skills have different needs and work differently. My (possibly) controversial view is that reliance on frameworks and how they are typically used stops developers (especially those starting out) gaining real experience and skills. I want to thank RMAUG (Rocky Mountain Adobe Users Group) for organising the unconference and for letting me speak. I've not been to Denver before and looking forward to seeing the sights and catching up with everyone. See you at 360|Flex.

I'm now a Adobe Community Champion

Sat, 29 Jan 2011 20:34:00 +1000

Adobe announced the new Adobe Community Professionals for 2011 yesterday. They also announced the program is being split into two, the Adobe Community Professionals and the Adobe Community Champions. I'm privileged to have been accepted (along with 90 odd other people) into the Adobe Community Champion program for 2011 after being an Adobe Community Professional in 2010. See the the full list of people in the ACP program and the ACC program. It's great to see lots of familiar names on those lists and I'm looking forward to being a part of the new program and helping out in any way I can. A few other locals made it on the list. So congratulations to Kai Koenig, Campbell Anderson, Geoff Bowers, Andrew Muller and Mark Mandel. (If I've left any other local ColdFusion or Flex people off that list many apologies.)

Speaking at Flash and the City in New York in June

Sun, 23 Jan 2011 03:15:00 +1000

I'll be speaking about Arduinos and Flex at Flash and the City in New York in June. I attended Flash and the City last year and had a great time. The conference is unique¹with it's city track showing you the sights of of New York. If learning about the latest development in mobile programming and ActionScript coding gets a too much for you and you need a breath of fresh air you can go and visit the Statue of Liberty² with fellow geeks. ¹ In a good way of course! ² Or the Museum of Sex if that's more your cup of tea.

Web Video on Desktop and Devices - Flash and HTML

Wed, 12 Jan 2011 22:47:00 +1000

Right now video is a bit of a mess on the web.

The most widely supported platform for playing video on the desktop is Flash. But some devices notably the iPad and iPhone don't support Flash. If you want to be able to play your video on multiple platforms and devices what can you do?

[More]

Must have Flash Builder plugins

Sat, 11 Dec 2010 23:52:00 +1000

Here's the list of useful Flash Builder plugins that I use on a daily basis when working on Flex projects. What Flex Builder plugins and tools do you do you use on a regular basis? [More]

cf.Objective(ANZ) Melbourne 2010 Review

Thu, 09 Dec 2010 01:10:00 +1000

cf.Objective(ANZ) was on a couple of weeks ago in Melbourne Australia. This was my third cf.Objective() event that I've spoken at and attended (two here in Australia and one in the US). I almost didn't make it due to an unschedule stop in Iceland but managed to catch my connecting flight with minutes to spare. There was a wide range of sessions showing at cf.Objective(ANZ) covering new programming techniques, performance, security, frameworks and a lot more. [More]

ColdFusion Security and Risk Management at cf.Objective(ANZ) in Melbourne

Tue, 23 Nov 2010 07:21:00 +1000

Here is the pdf of the slides of my talk on Risk Management and ColdFusion Security at cf.Objective(ANZ) in Melbourne Australia. Download a PDF of my talk (480 Kb) or view on slide share. More information on some of the topics covered can be found in the related entries below. Any questions on my talk just comment below or email me.

Heavy constructor JIT optimisation in ActionScript

Thu, 04 Nov 2010 03:42:00 +1000

I was running FlexPMD the other day over some code and it brought up this warning: "HeavyConstructor. Constructor must be as lightweight as possible. No control statement allowed, whereas a cyclomatic complexity of 2 has been detected. The Just-In-Time compiler does not compile constructors. Make them as lightweight as possible, or move the complexity of the code to a method called by the constructor. Then the complexity will be compiled by the JIT." Huh? That's news to me, actionscript constructors are not compiled if they have a conditional statement in them? [More]