flKinect: Socket server + AS3 library for Microsoft Kinect
Well… Now I may just have to get myself a Microsoft Kinect! I saw on Saqoosha’s blog that he was playing around with this and thought I would post this here. Koji Kimura wrote a Cocoa application to allow communication between the Microsoft Kinect and Flash. It looks amazing and opens up a whole new world of possibilities and it looks like the AS3 API is also very easy to use!
More info and downloads on Koji’s site.
As you may have guessed it is Mac only. If you know of any similar projects for Windows or Linux don’t hesitate to leave a comment below!
Update: Here’s another AS3 library + socket server app for Mac.
Update 2: Also check out as3kinect.org.
New on Adobe Labs: Squiggly – spell checking engine for Flash Player and AIR
One of the most requested features for both Flash Player and AIR is definitely a spell checker. Grant Skinner released a spell check engine about 2 years ago and it has been used in number of different applications. While it was totally worth the cost, I did hear from some people that they thought this was an expensive solution. Adobe also recognized the need for a spell check solution for Flash Player and AIR and a small team has been working on this for a while.
Today Adobe released a first preview version of Squiggly. The Squiggly library allows you to easily add spell checking functionality in any Flex 3 based text control. The distribution package consists of a utility for building your own spelling dictionaries, a sample English dictionary, an ActionScript package that checks individual words for spelling accuracy, and sample code that demonstrates “check as you type” functionality [demo]. At the moment the library only supports English but the team has promised to address this limitation in a future release.
Links:
Squiggly on Labs
Download Squiggly
Download Squiggly ASDoc
Squiggly forum
Building Flash applications for Facebook just became a whole lot easier
Facebook and Adobe have just released an ActionScript 3.0 Client Library for the Facebook Platform API. This will make it a whole lot easier for Flash developers to build applications for the Facebook Platform using Flash, Flex and AIR.
If you have already built a Flash based application for Facebook in the past, you’re probably wondering what is so new about this release. While there are some unofficial libraries out there, many of these struggle to stay up to date with the rapidly evolving Facebook Platform. Today’s release makes ActionScript one of three officially supported languages of the Facebook Platform. The new AS3.0 Client Library is fully supported by Facebook and Adobe. Both Facebook and Adobe are committed to making sure that this library is kept up to date and provides the best experience for developers building on both platforms.
Danny Dura published a quick start video tutorial that will get you building Flash apps for the Facebook Platform in no time. We’ve also created a dedicated area on the Adobe Developer Connection that has everything you need to get inspired and get started.
Flash on!
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