Flash Player settings go native
One of the major gripes about Flash Player is the tiny little settings dialog box. If you’re anything like me and have also cursed and sweared while using this dialog box you may will be happy to hear that that is changing now.
If you downloaded and installed the Flash Player Incubator release you can already check it out yourself. Not only does this new native settings panel allow you to set your camera and microphone preferences but it also allows you to delete your Flash cookies, set your P2P preferences and automatic update preferences.
I’m sure you’ll agree that this is a big improvement! Flash on!
UPDATE: A few people on Twitter asked me if this was OSX only. The answer is “No”. You’ll soon see this on other platforms as well.
Flash Player “Square”: 64-bit on Windows, OSX and Linux
Native 64-bit support is one of the most requested features for Flash Player so I’m sure this news is going to make a lot of people happy. Today we’re releasing a preview of Flash Player “Square” which includes native 64-bit support.
Today we’re making available a preview of Adobe Flash Player that we’re calling “Square.” This preview includes support for two new areas, namely enhanced support for Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 9 Beta and native 64-bit support for all major desktop operating systems including Linux, Mac, and Windows.
This is obviously very exciting news but please keep in mind that this is a preview release.
We’ve found “Square” to be stable and ready for broad testing, but keep in mind this a sneak peek and not everything will be fully baked. Those using the previous 64-bit version of Flash Player for Linux should find this new version even faster and more stable. If you encounter any issues, I’d encourage you to file a bug in our public database [https://bugs.adobe.com/flashplayer/] so we can investigate.
More info on the Flash Player Team blog. The download is now available on Adobe Labs.
Auto update API for AIR Native Installer Apps
If you’ve played around with native installers for AIR 2, you probably already found out that you cannot use the update framework. My fellow evangelist Piotr just released a solution for that.
Piotr’s NativeApplicationUpdater library works in exactly the same way as the update framework you use for AIR applications. When your app starts it loads an XML file that has all the update information. If an update is available you will be prompted to download and install it. Piotr actually uses another AIR 2 feature to launch the downloaded native installer. By opening the package with openWithDefaultApplication() the installer launches and installs the update.
I’ll definitely add this to the next release of my Package Assistant application (an update is coming soon!).
Check out the video where Piotr explains how it works and download the library from Google Code.
If you haven’t played with native installers for AIR 2 and want to learn more, then check out my video tutorial.
Package Assistant Pro
A few months ago I released an early version of my Package Assistant application. The application made it easier to compile native installers for AIR 2. While it was a lot easier to use compared to using the command line the application wasn’t very user friendly. A few weeks ago I started working on a brand new version and I think you will like it!
When you first launch the application, it will ask you to enter the paths to ADT and your code signing certificate. When you have access to the AIR For Android Beta you can also add the AIR 2.5 ADT to package native Android installer packages. AIR For Android is currently in private beta but you can sign up to be notified when it is publicly available. When you have set your preferences, you are ready to go. Just point Package Assistant Pro to your application descriptor XML file and it will read and set all your parameters from it. Package Assistant Pro will also check if you correctly entered your code signing certificate password.
If you don’t mind playing around with beta quality software then check out http://bit.ly/papinfo for the downloads (available for OS X and Windows) and more information. If you run into an issue, have feedback and/or have a feature request, feel free to get in touch or leave a comment on this post.
Package Assistant Pro would not be possible without AIR 2. To learn how to use native processes in AIR 2, check out this article on Adobe Devnet.
Introducing: Package Assistant (AIR 2 package utility built with AIR 2)
Update: A brand new version of Package Assistant is available. Check out this page for more info.
Two of the most requested features for AIR were the ability to create native installers and to launch/talk to native applications. Among other new features, AIR 2 allows you to do that. To build these native installers you have to use the command line compiler.
A while back I was thinking if it would be possible to write an AIR application that would talk to ADT (the command line compiler) and that would make it easier to compile a native installer. And here it is… Well… It’s not quite finished yet but it’s very close. I just couldn’t wait sharing this screencap with you guys because I think it’s a great example of how powerful AIR has become.
The wizard style application allows you to easily identify the files it needs and after just 4 steps you simply
hit the compile button. A lot easier than fiddling around with the command line ;-)
I should have this finished before the holidays so stay tuned!
Feel free to follow me on: 
