I'm not as convinced that this is a problem that Adobe could solve. Flex and Flash are so open ended, that there are dozens of combinations of server and client technologies that can be used to produce a Flex or Flash (or Ajax for that matter) application. I don't think a single product could be made that would be flexible enough to be used with every possible server side technology (and combination of technologies).
Without knowing for sure, I am going to guess that your are not an FDS or cold fusion user. If you are using one of these tools, things really aren't that open ended. Adobe cant solve all problems, but they certainly can solve it for use in their own products. This entire thread is really a problem of understanding. If Adobe should
do anything to clear this up, they should explain the situation, and let people know that a search engine, which indexes documents, will need some documents to index, and some links to follow to get them. Search engines are not going to be able to index a Flash, Flex, Ajax, Expression Blend, etc. apps, any more than they could index a Windows or Mac OS X app.
I don't have a problem of understanding that search engines need documents to index. My problem is I am using adobe tools and do not believe I can build this kind of a thing using these tools, or if I can hook in and do it someone would definitely need to show me how because its not obvious. Perhaps most importantly, this is the kind of non domain specific code that is really not the kind of stuff app writers should be working on. The solution is to create those html documents using a traditional
server side app (php, asp, etc.) and link them up.
Ahh.. reinforcing my suspicion that you aren't using adobe server side tools. I agree that if I were using php, it would actually be easier to solve this problem. But I don't think blending php with FDS or cold fusion is practical. But even if I were writing in pure php, it would require writing the kind of code that really can be put into a general library that everyone can use. It basically involves taking data in the form of a table (coming presumably from a database) and turning it into html that ends up being transparently inserted into a the swf wrapper. This is certainly the kind of canned generic work I don't want to do myself and is perfect for a tools vendor. Even if adobe just did it for their tools, it would provide a framework for everyone else to follow. Regards, Hank
