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August 29, 2007
Work on a cool new Flex project at Adobe
Interested in working at Adobe on a cool new project, built with Flex? We've got positions available, especially for folks with real user interface experience. Check out the opportunity here! (job id CC080731 in case the link doesn't work).
Posted by mchotin at 03:04 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 27, 2007
Flex Boot Camp at MAX
One thing that we're very excited about at MAX this year is the Flex Boot Camp at MAX on Wednesday morning (if you're not as interested in Flex there are Boot Camps for other topics as well). This will be an opportunity for folks to get together, talk about interesting projects, and code. We'll have a large contingent of the Flex team there to go around and answer questions and we're hoping to have a number of folks from the community share what they've been working on if it's something that others can take advantage of (e.g., APIs, components, etc).
If you'll be attending MAX and have something that you'd like to share (or know of something that you'd like others to talk about) please mail me and let me know (mchotin AT adobe DOT com). We'll be coming up with a list of 10-minute spots for folks, and I don't want to be the only one up on stage :-)
Posted by mchotin at 04:29 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 20, 2007
Performance Tips Needed
David Coletta is putting out a call for Flex performance tips for his MAX talk. Please take a moment and think about any ideas you might have and send them his way!
I've gathered up some hints from some of the folks who've been thinking about compiler performance recently. Most are related to your system setup at this point, and admittedly they may be big requirements. We're trying to make major improvements as I write this :-) But in the meantime, these may help you...
System and Java related
- Turn off virus scanning software
- Don't compress or encrypt your filesystem (major cause of fragmentation and slowdown)
- Windows users -- defragment regularly!
- For plug-in users: Make sure you are running Eclipse under the 1.5 JRE:
- On Windows, add -vm "C:\Program Files\Java\jre1.5.0_12\bin\javaw.exe" to your Eclipse shortcut
- Command-line users: Make sure your JAVA_HOME is pointing to a 1.5 JRE, as well
- Java is very sensitive to disk swapping/paging; make sure you've got 2Gb of RAM to start with, and:
- Give Eclipse more memory so it doesn't need to garbage collect as often: (on Windows, e.g.) -vmargs -Xms512m -Xmx768m (the bigger -Xmx is, the better)
- Give FCSH more memory by editing the jvm.config file in the SDK's bin directory
- Untested: If you have a 64bit computer, you may be able to give the 64bit JRE more than 2gb of memory (if you have it) -- Flex does NOT need this much memory, but the more Java has, the less it will garbage collect...
- Some users report that removing the -XX:MinHeapFreeRatio=20 setting for Flex Builder/Eclipse improves performance.
- On Windows, just remove this argument in the Flex Builder shortcut that you use.
Flex Builder-related
- If you do not need to run your applications in a web browser for development, you can improve your app's startup time and memory usage (from when you press the Play button in FlexBuilder) by turning off Generate HTML template in Project | Properties | Flex Compiler -- this will start your application in the standalone Flash Player (this should be sufficient for most applications that don't rely on running in a browser, or customized templates).
- Disable Copy non-embedded assets in Project | Properties | Flex Compiler -- you will need to remember to copy/update these assets manually into the bin folder (if you have any).
- For each non-library project, make sure you are building as few Application and Module MXMLs as you need. It's common for the list to increase over time (and accidentally) when you run temporary or unused applications (they get automatically added to the build list). Manager this list in Project | Properties | Flex Applications.
- Close projects that you do not need open -- they consume memory!
- If your application is composed of more than (roughly) three Flex Builder projects (e.g. a Flex Project and two Library Projects), you may find that refactoring your code into fewer projects will speed-up compile time, and reduce overall memory usage. You should, of course, keep your source code seperated into logical units, so this is for people that want to try a more extreme measure at the cost of elegance (and note that this hint goes against practices we recommended in the past, so we're looking to improve things here).
- Another method that may work for you (and allow you to maintain your original code seperation and projects) is to take advantage of external source folders. In a new workspace, create a new project which will combine existing source from multiple locations, and use Project | Properties | Flex Build Path | Add Folder. For day-to-day development, you can use this project, and still keep the seperated projects.
- Another method that may work for you (and allow you to maintain your original code seperation and projects) is to take advantage of external source folders. In a new workspace, create a new project which will combine existing source from multiple locations, and use Project | Properties | Flex Build Path | Add Folder. For day-to-day development, you can use this project, and still keep the seperated projects.
Posted by mchotin at 01:50 PM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
August 07, 2007
Flex Camp Video now available
Want to see what the experience of Flex Camp was like and hear from top developers who attended? Check out the latest video on the Flex Developer Center!
Posted by mchotin at 06:28 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 06, 2007
One more week till 360Flex
Should be a ton of fun with lots of good information. If you haven't decided whether you're going I think you should!
Posted by mchotin at 09:54 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 03, 2007
MAX isn't just in Chicago
This year is especially exciting for me because I'm going to be able to attend the MAX conference in Barcelona! I'll be bringing some other folks from the Flex team as well, so if you're in Europe (or looking to travel to Europe) make sure to register soon so you'll be able to attend all of the great sessions and meet great folks!
Posted by mchotin at 10:20 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
Want to learn a lot about Flex and Java?
One of the things we're offering as part of MAX this year is a pre-conference session on integrating Flex with Java. Given the amount of interest in connecting to various backends I think this will be a great course for folks to learn about the power of LCDS. If you think you'd like to learn about LCDS is more detail I encourage you to sign up! More details here.
Posted by mchotin at 10:14 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack