In an effort to spread as much information as possible on Flash Platform and PHP integration around the Web, I have created the Flash and PHP Development Center. The URL (flashandphp.com) should be easy enough to remember. And yes, I used the Ahimsa theme there as well because its good and I’m lazy. I have created a few video tutorials to get the site started, and all are available in glorious HD on the high-speed Mosso CDN. You can also save me a few pennies by viewing them on Vimeo.
I plan to add a lot more over time, but more importantly, I’m hoping to get some help from you. If you are a developer and have the ability to write articles or do screencasts, please contact me about it. I would really love to have videos from a wide variety of perspectives. Besides, you can probably do a better job than I can. So please don’t hold back. For those of you who are busy, I would definitely recommend the screencast route.
I will be contacting (read: begging) some of the developers I know and asking them to lend their expertise as well. To help along in that effort, please hit the blogs of community experts and post comments telling them you want to see them in action on flashandphp.com!
I am pleased to tell everyone that I will be doing the VTC video training series titled “AIR and PHP Development.” I am wrapping up the recordings today and tomorrow, and then they will be edited by the gifted VTC team. After that, you’ll be able to purchase the whole 11-hour-or-so series standalone or through a VTC subscription. Many of you have read my posts on VTC’s amazing course offerings before, but I just want to reiterate what an excellent resource it is. I find that video tutorials are the best way for me to learn, and if you are the same way, do yourself a favor and look through their course catalog. I certainly hope you’ll watch my course, but I can also personally vouch for their videos on Flex Builder, Ruby, Java, and C. And the PHP project solutions series is awesome too.
After a couple of quiet months in the CRUDdy Buddy development cycle, I am really pleased to announce that development is now going full-steam ahead! As part of the effort to make CB a truly useful development tool, the project welcomes a new developer, Niels Bjerg. Niels and I will be sharing the responsibility of CB development going forward, and I think this will result in a much better product for you guys. I may use the terms “owner” and “product” when discussing CB, but please know that this is no way means there are any plans to ever close the source or commercialize the license. CRUDdy Buddy is a free, open-source developer tool for all the talented and dedicated Flash Platform/PHP developers out there. And the bad ones, too. So stay tuned and check the Google Code page frequently.
As his first task, Niels has begun refactoring CB’s code to use the PureMVC framework. This will not affect end-users (except that CB will be more stable and more frequently updated). However, if you wish to change any core functionality, you’ll need to be familiar with PureMVC. In the near future, though, you’ll be able to add a lot of custom code output options through plugins or template files, without the need to delve into the core stuff. The specifics of this modularity are a long way from being set in stone, so please submit your ideas through the contact page. To give you an idea of the types of modules, though, we would like to support output for ORMs like Doctrine and Propel, and frameworks like CakePHP, Symfony, and of course Zend Framework. Once we have some input from you and the core code is refactored to conform to PureMVC, we’ll publish the roadmap on CB’s Google Code wiki. Thanks for your downloads, support, and input.
As you may already know, CRUDdy Buddy has always been free, and the source has been available since v1.1 was posted. But we didn’t have a license, SVN, bugtracker, or wiki like every good open-source project should have. Until now, that is. From this point forward, CRUDdy Buddy will be hosted at Google Code. You can check out the Flex Builder project from the Google Code SVN using Subclipse. I will be posting the AIR installer in the “Downloads” section as well, for those of you who don’t want to modify the source. If you’re not into Subversion or Subclipse, I’ll also post a Flex Builder project archive for each release milestone. The source code is governed by the MIT License, which is the most liberal OS license I know of. The documentation will be licensed under Creative Commons Share Alike, so it is open as well.
This is just the first post of many on expanded CRUDdy Buddy development. The next bit of CB news is so big that it warrants its own post, which is coming tomorrow.
I just wanted to let everyone know that my new article for Zend’s Developer Zone is now online. The topic is “Leverage Zend Framework Components from Flash Platform Applications.” In other words, its basically what we’ve been discussing on here for the past 6 weeks or so. It takes the discussion further, using different components from ZF a la carte. It also reinforces the basics of using Zend_Amf with Flex or AIR applications, so if you’re looking for more information on that, check it out.
I’m also working on a new article for PHPBuilder.com thats been a lot of fun, and it focuses on creating AIR applications and PHP web sites that work in tandem. By the end, you’ll have a very nearly complete, (hopefully) useful application. It will be in two parts, and the first part should hit in the next couple of weeks. Stay tuned!
I’m pleased to announce that my article in php|architect magazine is now available in the February issue! In the article, I go over building a RIA from scratch with Flex and Zend_Amf. This is part 1, and next month part 2 will come out. As always, this issue of php|a is packed with great info, and there’s much, much more than just my article inside. Right now, you can buy the February issue for $2.99! Thats a good deal, but why not get a year’s worth in print and PDF for $30? php|a is a great magazine, and they’re expanding their RIA coverage to make it even better. And before you ask, no, I’m not making a commission on the issue’s sales :). But it would be nice to let php|a know that we like the RIA coverage and want even more.
On another note, I’m happy to also let you know that one of our reader/developers, Marcus Fritze, has successfully set up a Linux-based PDF2SWF conversion rig of his own, cranking out AVM2 SWFs using some of the methods described here (along with some of his own magic). So, thats successful deployments on CentOS 5 and RedHat EL 5. I think it may be easier on Ubuntu, and I’m planning on trying soon, so I’ll post my results here.
As always, I’m here to help you out if you have issues with the topics in the article or blog posts, so drop me a line if you hit a snag.
Here it is. After lots of work, I still haven’t done as much to CRUDdy Buddy as I would have liked. However, there’s plenty of new stuff to warrant a new release. New features in 1.1 include:
Stuff that didn’t make it in yet:
Here are some shots of it in action:
Server Profile Form: Enter Your Details, Hit Save
Enter your class name in the toolbar above the design canvas
Select the parent class, then click the red rectangle in the toolbar to add a child. If you forget to select the parent first, click “Parent…” and connect them up! Yeah, there’s a glitch that erases one ’s’ from class sometimes.
And here’s a shot of a more complete class
The code generation on the last step is exactly the same as v1. Just specify your paths and Go! Here’s the .air installer:
CRUDdy Buddy v1.1 - View Source now enabled (still kind of a mess!)
CRUDdy Buddy 1.1 and later is now hosted on Google Code
So, it was about 5 minutes after I posted the first CRUDdy Buddy when I started getting emails like this:
“Interesting tool. Kind of a load of @$#%@$, but that’s what I expected. Thanks for the effort, ***-hat.”
So, I realized pretty quickly that another release was in order. The main new GUI feature will be a visual object designer. Rather than just filling out forms, you’ll be dragging and dropping and connecting properties to their parent classes. There will also be a config file for the MySQL connections, and an option to output AS3 NetConnections instead of mx:RemoteObjects for you Flash developers out there.
Here’s a screen shot of the Object Designer, so you know what I mean:
I plan to have a download for you by Monday.
Most of you guys are probably already very proficient with Flex and PHP, but just in case, I’m going to plug my new articles.
Integrated Flex and PHP Development - Adobe Flex Developer Center: This article walks through the setup and workflow of integrated Flex/AIR and PHP development using Zend Studio for Eclipse and the Flex Builder Plugin for Eclipse. Zend Studio is my favorite PHP IDE out there, but even if it wasn’t, this setup is just too convenient to resist. If you’re working with Zend_Amf or AMPHP, using these Zend Studio + Flex Builder Plugin together will make your life a lot easier. If you skip the article and just download/run the installers, be aware that there is a problem with the FB plugin installer, and you’ll need to set it up to work in Zend Studio manually. See the workaround.
Getting Started with Zend_Amf - PHPBuilder.com: This is the first in a two-part series on implementing Zend_Amf. In part one, I go over the conventional XML approach to cross-platform data exchange. I also cover passing variables to PHP via POST from a Flex application. While Zend_Amf is much more powerful, this method is useful for simple stuff like submitting a contact form from Flex. In part two, I cover Zend_Amf in detail, with some examples that will be pretty familiar to many of you. Basically, I walk through manually creating all the files that CRUDdy Buddy generates, so if you want unlimited code samples, download CRUDdy Buddy.
Feel free to drop me a line if you have any questions about the articles or the topics they cover.
I spend a lot of time just setting up the skeletons of my Flex/PHP projects, and lately I’ve found myself uttering those familiar infomercial words: there’s got to be a better way. I’m not sure how close CRUDdy Buddy comes to that description, but I’ll let you judge that for yourself.
CRUDdy Buddy is an AIR application I created to generate the code necessary to get started on a Zend_Amf project. It creates all of the PHP necessary, along with ActionScript classes and <mx:RemoteObject> tags you can paste into your Flex or AIR application. There is a video demonstrating CRUDdy Buddy in action, and its uploading now here it is on Vimeo. Hopefully, though, until thats done, the application itself and the usage notes will be enough to get you started. Drop me a line on here and let me know what you think.
LINKS:
CRUDdy Buddy AIR Installer for Mac (Uses Mac Fonts)
CRUDdy Buddy AIR Installer for Windows/Linux (Uses Arial font)
Usage Notes PDF - Seriously, you need to get this too.
