Programming using classes is essential to take advantage of the full power of actionScript 3.0. By using classes, you participate in object-oriented programming, a versatile way to think about and structure code. Objects are high-level building blocks, and classes are the constructs which define them. In this article you will learn what constitutes a class, how classes relate to objects and other language constructs, and how write a class in ActionScript 3.0
Classes in real world
To program using classes you must understand what classes are. Classes per-form multiple roles in object-oriented programming, and there are many ways to think about them. Classes often work best, and are easiest to think about, when they represent objects in the real world. You can, for example, create a class to represent a bicycle. That bicycle can have a color, a size , and two tires. You can pedal it, brake it, switch gears, and ring the bell. The bicycle has relationships with other real-world objects: your feet, the road surface, occasionally a bike pump. If we model bicycle as a class we represent all of these, and carefully design it to interact with the other objects in the right way.
Object
Object can have slightly different meanings in different contexts. An Objects is the basic unit of objects oriented programming. It is self contained thing that contains data and operations. Every objects is defined by a class. For example a bicycle object would be defined by the class Bicycle.
Class
A class is a blueprint for an object. It defines the object in full: the data and operations of that object. You write classes before you run your program, and when your program is running, they are set in stone. Classes contain the code you write. When your program runs, it’s an orchestrated production of objects, and that productions is directed by the code in the classes.
Instance
An instance is a specific object created from a specific class. It may be used by itself or with the name of the class to specify the type of the instance, as in “an instance of the FuzzyLobster class”. Instances are unique.
Since Apple has removed the restrictions from Adobe for publishing and submitting
applications for iPhone/iPod touch and iPad, developed using Flash/Flex and AS3. I hope all the Flash developers around the world have welcomed Apple’s decision. After this announcement from Apple Flash Developers have endless opportunities to develop apps for iPhone and iPad using Flash CS5.5 and AS3 rather than learning XCode and Objective C skills.
And another very good news for Flash Geeks is that with the release of Flash CS5.5 and Flex 4.5 they are not only restricted to develop applications for just Apple iPhone/iPod touch/iPad but also for All major tablet and smart phone device which are running Google’s Android Operating System like HTC, Motorola, Samsung etc. Once developer finished coding their application using AS3 they can use Adobe’s iOS packager or Android packager for publishing and running their games/applications for relevant devices. This packager basically converts all ActionScript byte code to native iOS/Android appellation.
But one thing I would like to point about which many Flash Developers might not be aware of is that they have to get registered for apple iOS Developer programme. It costs 99 USD per year and they can submit as many apps as they want to submit to Apple iTunes store. In iOS Developer programme portal developer will be able to create certificates which they will need when submit applications to app store and provisioning profiles which are required for testing of applications on actually devices during development. And same applies to for Android Market but sure for less annual fee which is only USD25. So in order to submit applications to Android market you need to do following three things.
1. Create a developer profile
2. Pay a registration fee ($25.00) with your credit card (using Google Checkout)
3. Agree to the Android Market Developer Distribution Agreement
So now all the browser based flash games can be converted as iPhone and other mobile device apps which will encourage the Flash Developers Community contribute more in mobile apps development.
Well done Adobe, Well done Apple
Now Apple has removed the restrictions from Adobe for publishing and submitting applications for iPhone/iPod touch and iPad, developed using Flash/Flex and AS3. I hope all the Flash developers around the world have welcomed Apple’s decision. After this announcement from Apple Flash Developers have endless opportunities to develop apps for iPhone and iPad using Flash CS5.5 and AS3 rather than learning XCode and Objective C skills.
And another very good news for Flash Geeks is that with the release of Flash CS5.5 and Flex 4.5 they are not only restricted to develop applications for just Apple iPhone/iPod touch/iPad but can also develop for All major tablet and smart phone device which are running Google’s Android Operating System like HTC, Motorola, Samsung etc. Once developer finished coding their application using AS3 they can use Adobe’s iOS packager or Android packager for publishing and running their games/applications for relevant devices. This packager basically converts all ActionScript byte code to native iOS/Android appellation.
But one thing I would like to point about which many Flash Developers might not be aware of is that they have to get registered for apple iOS Developer programme. It costs 99 USD per year and they can submit as many apps as they want to submit to Apple iTunes store. In iOS Developer programme portal developers will be able to create certificates which they will need when submit applications to app store and provisioning profiles which are required for testing of applications on actual devices during development. And same applies to for Android Market but sure for less annual fee which is only USD25. So in order to submit applications to Android market you need to do following three things.
1. Create a developer profile
2. Pay a registration fee ($25.00) with your credit card (using Google Checkout)
3. Agree to the Android Market Developer Distribution Agreement
So now all the browser based flash games can be converted as iPhone and other mobile device apps which will encourage the Flash Developers Community contribute more in mobile apps development.
In today’s fastest growing online marketing era if you make sure that your website is search engine friendly, your site will rocket to the top of Google ranking or Google search. Here I will discuss the fundamentals of SEO and how to apply them in the real world, including a look at the latest trends and emerging search technologies.
Search Engine Optimization is becoming more and more important to every site. With more than 113 billion searches conducted in july 2009 alone, the volumes speak for themselves. Some of the techniques used have given SEO a bad names, but while there are many techniques that are less than honest, there are several simple ways to ensure your site benefits from natural search results. Search can be classified as either organic (natural) or paid. Organic results are those that occur naturally in search engine results pages and high results depend on both the technical constuction of your site and the content within it. Paid results, often referred to as Pay Per Click (PPC), are the results site owner pay for and which usually surround the organic listings. Research shows web users prefer organic listings to paid listings, considering them more relevant and trustworthy. The goal of SEO then, is to improve your organic listings performance which in turn should boost traffic to your site.
Natural Search
Search engines index the web using large clusters of computers, known as bots, which spider the web by following links found on the web pages. These URLs are populated into the search engine indexes and it’s this index that’s queried every time a user performs a search. Search engines employ complex mathematical equeations, known as ranking algorithms, to order search results. Google’s algorithm alone relies on more than 200 individual factors to decide which results, in which order, to return to its web searchers. Natural SEO can be further split into two categories:
On page: The code and content you use to manage and deliver your web pages.
Off page: External factors effecting SEO. This is primarily focused around link building – getting other websites to link to your content.
There are two ways to get discovered by search engines. One is to submit your site directly to their indexes like Google, Yahoo, Bing etc. The other is to wait for them to find it through links to you from other sites during theur crawling process. To make sure your website is accessible to search engine spiders (bots), follow these simple steps.
1. Ensure you are not preventing the search enginess indexing your site via The Robots (bots), Exclusion Protocol with use of a robots.txt file, which is used to give instructions to search engine bots.
2. Ensure your content is machine-readable. Avoid using Flash, video or imagery to exclusively house your content. Remember, search spiders cannot see images or video: they can only read written text on a web page.
3. Ensure you have a clear internal linking architecture. Promote important content to the home page and link to key site sections via dedicated navigation. Group content into clear site sections reflected in your site navigation to aid both users and search engines.
4. Eliminate duplicate content. This could be cuased by the way your server is set up or how your CMS serves up content. Either way, this needs to be addressed.
5. Ensure you are targeting the appropriate keywords for your business objectives. Just as successfull advertising campaigns contain content that appeals to a target demographic, successfull websites need to focus on keywords that have the highest relevance to their target audience.
The bad and the ugly
There are many techniques used to achieve high search results and the industry roughly splits these into two categories: Black Hat and White Hat.
Black Hat SEO referes the practice of deceiving the search engines to artificially boost your rankings. Its always been popular as a seemingly fast and easy way of achieving high results, not the merit of your content but by hoodwinking the search engines into belief that your content is relevant to that term. The good news for users is as soon as Black Hat techniques are advised, the search engines find the ways of spotting them and penalising sites that use them. Some examples of Black Hat techniques include:
Gateway pages: Creating highly optimised pages targeting a particular search term, only to redirect the user to a completely different web page. Most search engines consider this practice highly dishonest and penalise offenders accordingly.
Keyword Stuffing: Overuse of keywords in an attempt to trick search engines into thinking your content is more relevant than it is.
Hidden content: Positioning large chunks of text off-screen or hidden using the same text colour as the background.
Real-time search
A recent development that is causing much excitement is the concept of real-time search. “As social networks have evolved, the idea of searching what people are writing on the internet right now has become a reality. The surge in popularity of Twitter is the core driver behind the wider acceptance of real-time search. Twitter’s search enables anyone to search what user are talking about on the web as it happens. As posts are made, they are instantly indexed and included in Twitter’s search. Initially, Twitter had the search facility at search.twitter.com, but in an indication of how the importance of real-time search has increased, its now available directly from the Twitter homepage.
Writing for SEO
When writing content for the web, it’s important to think about your audience. Every website is different, but by following a few simple guidelines you can produce content that’s friendly to both users and search engines. Apply this thinking to the following areas of content:
1. Friendly URLs: Boost SEO and make your URL easier to remember, improving user experience.
2. META description: Use the META description to provide a concise and accurate description of your content to entice visitors from the SERPS.
3. Page title: Choose a title that effectively communicate the topic.
4. Headings: HTML heading tags are used to structure your content. H1 is the most important tag and should be similar if not identical to your page title. Less important headings can use H2-H6.
5. Page content: The first 100 words of content carry more weight and should be used to provide a brief description of your content
6. Use of images: Choose a descriptive file name . Use the ALT attribute to describe images: for example ‘The perfect rich biscuit’. Provide an image caption to add content.
The future of SEO
The search engine landscape continues to become more complex and intriguing. The launch of new search engines such Wolfram Alpha and Bing; the partnership agrement between Microsoft and Yahoo; Google’s Caffeine’ updat; Facebook’s purchase of of FriendFeed. But what does this all mean for SEO? Do we need to develop advanced techniques to keep up with the advances in search technology? In a nutshell…no. Stick to the basics, create useful content, build on a accessible and adaptable platform, follow common sense and best practice when creating content and you will fare well.
Essentially, search engines are trying to behave naturally. If your site is more useful than your competitor’s and answers your user’s queries better, then its in search engine’s best interest to promote your site.
Tools to help you optimise
Here are a few of our favourite SEO tools and online resources to help you analyse your current SEO performance and imporve it further. With Google still dominating the UK market, we have focused on resources from and for this search engine. However, SEO should be considered a universal methodology applicable across all search engines.
Online Tools
Google’s Webmaster Tools: Get direct access to your Google diagnostics, descover site problems, crawl stats, find popular keywords and configure your XML sitemap.
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/
Google’s Keyword Tool: Google’ is official AdWords keyword research tool provides montly search volumes for keywords. Results can provide a great insight into what users are searching for and help you develop your website content accordingly.
Google’s Insights for Search: With Google’s Insights for search, you can compare search volume paterns across specific regions, categories, time frames and properties.
http://www.google.com/insights/search/
SEO Moz Term Extractor: Check that your web pages are optimised for the correct keywords and search terms. This tool analyses the content of a given page and extracts the terms that appear to be targetted at search engines.
http://www.seomoz.org/term-extractor
Essential Reading
Google’s SEO Starter Guide: Straight from the horse’s mouth, the official guide on how to optimise your site for Google covers all the basics.
Google Webmaster Guidelines: Official Google guide providing top tips to help your site get indexed and ranked. Pay special attention to the ‘Quality Guidelines’, which detail misleading practices that could lead to your site being removed from the Google index.
Open screen project is an initiative taken by technology giant Adobe Systems to fuel the world of innovation with the support from other technology partners worldwide which includes internet giant Google and smartphone manufaturer RIM Blackberry. With open screen project consumers will get engaged with seemless rich internet experience accross multiple devices like mobile, desktop and consumer electronics devices.
Open screen project will provide a consistent runtime environment for open web browsing and standalone flash applications using Adobe Flash player and Adobe Air. Using this runtime environment doors will be opened to publish content and applications accross wide variety of devices like Desktops, mobile phones, Televisions, Set top boxes and other consumer electronics devices.
Open screen project for Developers:
Adobe Systems and Nokia have come forward to be the first to contribute to Open screen project. This global initiative was created to fuel innovation by directly commissioning developers to create innovative applications and by providing education, support, and distribution guidance.
What Developers can build for Open screen project Fund?
Developer can develop the applications in following areas: health, finance, social networking, entertainment, productivity, gaming, travel, multimedia, news, sports, weather, education etc. Any application submitted to Open Screen Project Fund should be working accross multiple platforms. Nokia and Adobe Flash Player, Adobe Flash Lite and Adobe Air should be one of these. Developers can also submit the applications that work only on Nokia devices and that do not have desktop AIR application component.
Applying for the Open Screen Project Fund:
Fill out the Open Screen Project Fund Form.
Visit the Adobe Mobile and Devices Developer Center to learn how to create applications based on the Flash Platform.
If you already have good knowledge of Adobe Flash platform or you are professional Flash actionscript Developer you can skip above step.
Visit Forum Nokia to learn how to reach millions of mobile devices worldwide with your applications.
The Real-Time Media Flow Protocol (RTMFP) is a new communication protocol from Adobe that enables direct end user to end user peering (P2P) communication between multiple clients running an application built for Adobe Flash Player or Adobe AIR for the delivery of rich, live, real-time communication.
P2P term
Peer to Peer (P2P) has various meanings within the technology industry, but typically refers to the establishment of a direct connection between two or more end-users to aid in the movement of data and media.
Different types of P2P solutions -
* End User to End User: Two clients communicate directly without passing their data through the server for low-latency, real-time communication. This is the solution that Adobe is enabling with RTMFP.
* Swarming: Many to many communication typically used to share delivery a file via download. Swarming maximizes transfer speed by gathering pieces of a file and downloading these pieces simultaneously from other end-users who already have them. Swarming solutions typically require a standalone application designed to locate and connect to other end-users’ computers that have the relevant content. These solutions typically have local file system access. Flash player 10 and AIR 1.5 will not enable swarming solutions.
* Multicast: One to many communication over an IP infrastructure. Multicast speeds content delivery and reduces the burden on the network because a source sends the data packet only once for delivery to a large number of end-users. The nodes in the network take care of replicating the packet to reach multiple end-users only where necessary. Flash Player 10 and AIR 1.5 will not enable multicast solutions.
About Stratus
Stratus is a hosted rendezvous service that aids in establishing communications between Flash Players or Adobe AIR endpoints using RTMFP. Flash Player endpoints must stay connected to the server during the entire time of communications. Unlike Flash Media Server, Stratus does not stream video or support media relay, shared objects, or scripting. Stratus is being made available as a beta service through Adobe Labs to allow our developer community to begin building applications using RTMFP.
Stratus vs Flash Media Server (FMS)
When using Stratus, all data is sent directly from client to client. Flash Media Server supports client to server communication. Additionally features like shared objects and server side scripting that are supported by FMS are not supported with Stratus.
To use Stratus
You will need to sign in with your AdobeID to receive a unique Developer Key which will be used within your application to take advantage of Stratus. Then, get your Developer Key to gain access to the service.
Cost of Stratus
Stratus is a free beta service. You will need to register with your Adobe ID to get a unique Developer Key.
Developement Help
Following links provide usefull information about help and suppurt during Stratus application Development.
