> The current volume of the documentation is mostly given due to unoptimized html output. Documentation is known to be the major volume of just any software. Well, good documentation :) Read on on what is minimal install, so you'll see why / how the actual size can be reduced below that of documentation.
What would be minimal? ;) I think it having a separate download for each > section > would be a good idea: Being able to compile stuff, being able to build > MXML apps and being > able to use UI components gives an easy understanding of how it works. - A lot of people don't need UIComponent and other framework stuff. IE. a great number of SDK users are not at all interested in having the framework bundled with the SDK. So, technically, the whole frameworks folder can be removed from the minimal download. - Most of Flex users don't need the sources, neither Java nor AS. Now, I know that under Apache license you have to distribute sources instead of binaries, but no one says there may not be a binary download that comes w/o sources if anyone wants to provide one. Cutting this down, you'll be basically left with bin and lib folders of the existing SDK + ant tasks + xslt required for asdocs + couple of config files and that's about it. This would be less then 5% of the entire SDK as it is today, and a lot of users wouldn't even know the difference. So, looking at it from end user perspective, the vast majority of users need: - Group 1: the very minimal download including bin, lib, ant tasks and configuration files needed to operate them. - Group 2: the minimal + SWCs with frameworks and locales. - Group 3 (users who want to commit their code to SDK or patch it for their own purposes) would need the sources and the testing suite. - regardless of the category any group might or might not want the documentation (I'm not certain here, which would be best, a single package or multiple). By the way, the Java part of the code is only rudimentary documented and no official documentation of Adobe / Macromedia packages existed before - so that's another huge undertaking for this working group... === Regarding installation options: - It would be cool if Flex SDK was install-able via Eclipse site mechanism (i.e. downloaded by Eclipse). - It would be cool if Flex SDK was install-able via package managers (RPM / DEB or both). - Not sure how other editors handle their plugins / installations, but I guess their users might provide more feedback on that. I certainly will try to come up with some flex-mode.el for Emacs, when we will figure out the stuff about what and how gets downloaded etc. Best. Oleg
