AdvancED Flex 3

Out of a slew of new books devoted to Adobe’s Flex development framework, ‘AdvancED Flex 3’ is one that really caught my eye.

The plain truth of the matter is that many Flex books cover the same ground: namely, the fundamentals of developing Flex applications using ActionScript and Flash, with (as often as not) a short tutorial on Adobe’s Flex Builder IDE as an added bonus. This book from Friends of ED explores further afield. It starts on the assumption that the reader will already have mastered the basics and will now be ready to explore some of the more esoteric corners of the Flex framework. The chapter headings will give you a good idea of the topics covered:

 PART ONE: HARNESSING THE POWER OF FLEX 3

• Chapter 1 Leveraging Architectural and Design Patterns
• Chapter 2 Constructing Advanced Components
• Chapter 3 Turbo-Charging Data Binding
• Chapter 4 Tuning Applications for Superior Performance
• Chapter 5 Flex and AIR: Taking Applications to the Desktop

 PART TWO: INTEGRATING WITH CLIENT- AND SERVER-SIDE TECHNOLOGIES

• Chapter 6 Integrating with Java Using Services
• Chapter 7 Integrating via Data and Media Services
• Chapter 8 PHP and Flex
• Chapter 9 Talking with JavaScript and HTML: Web Page Integration

 PART THREE: GAINING REAL ADVANTAGE IN THE NEW WEB

• Chapter 10 Flex Mashups
• Chapter 11 Migrating Web 1.0 Interfaces to RIA
• Chapter 12 Sculpting Interactive Business Intelligence Interfaces
• Chapter 13 Working with Web 2.0 APIs
• Chapter 14 Facilitating Audio and Video Streaming
• Chapter 15 Using 3D in Flex

The book is packed with useful information and examples to explain how to program a broad variety of different types of Flex application. To take an example, Chapter 2, ‘Constructing Advanced Components’, takes you through the steps needed to create your own Flex controls using both MXML and ActionScript. It explains how to extend existing classes to make visual or non-visual controls, how to create default properties and to use styles and skins.

Other chapters go into a similar level of detail on all kinds of different topics such as integrating Flex with other languages and technologies (ranging from PHP and Ruby On Rails to Yahoo! Maps and Flickr images).

In a book as wide-ranging as this one, it is inevitable that some chapters will be of little or no interest to some readers. If you are only interested in one specific topic it would make sense to look for a book devoted to that topic alone. But if you already have a good understanding of Flex programming and are interested in exploring a broader range of its capabilities, this is the book you need.