Hi
Wish list, that I think it is important to those who want to start.
Just my opinion, things that took me long time to understand, that could
be very simple and quickly if I could found in one place.
1) How to download Flex. Looks stupid but once you download and install
you start to wondering. OK now what I do? It was my first reaction when
moved to apache. It was my first time downloading separately from Adobe
builder.
2) How to setup Flex with adobe builder
3) How to setup Flex with Intelij
4) Probably the most important in my view: How to connect a flex
application with a database (maybe how to setup tomcat, blazeds)
5) How to use external resourses with Flex like javascript. To show that
Flex its not a competitor of other languages but a language to build the
entire application, doesnt matter if will need to put together
javascript, applet...
6) Show how to make 3d objects, not sure if the 3rd solution will allow
this one.
7) How to print. Any business application will need that at some point,
and many times we need a clear text to print, not a postscript image,
maybe how to convert in PDF.
8) How to check why your application is crashing the browser and how to
debug.
thanks for starting this book
Thiago Maia
On 1/22/2014 7:59 PM, Joseph Balderson wrote:
Thanks Justin.
One rule of thumb for time involved is 1-2 hours per page for authors -- that's
me -- and 5-10 minutes per page for tech editing -- that's you Justin. Which is
why, if a book goes past 400 pages, you need more than one author, unless you're
David Gassner who can crack off a 1000-page Flex Bible book all by himself (god
only knows how the hell he does it). Given the scope of the book, I'm probably
looking at 6 months to write, with tech editing as it's written, so there's
time. Professional Adobe Flex 3 only had two tech editors, and that was a
1400-page book (in retrospect we probably should have had three, but
whaddyagonnado?) If you find you need help with the tech editing Justin, we'll
cross that bridge when we get to it, but for now consider that post to be filled
by you.
There are three possible classic "animal" books I could do with O'Reilly for
Apache Flex -- one is the "Programming Foo" series, the other is the "Foo
Cookbook" series, and the third are "Developing Fum Applications for Foo"
micro-books. The last book on Flex in the "Programming" series was "Programming
Flex 3" by Chafic Kazoun & Joey Lott, so we're due for an update. There is a
"Flex 4 Cookbook" and some Flex 4.5 micro-books by Rich Tretola back in 2011,
but nothing recent.
I think we'll go with a "Programming Apache Flex" book this time, with an
emphasis on the Spark portion of the framework, and what's been updated since
Adobe Flex 4.6, rather than going over everything, considering the wealth of
information already published on Flex 3 and 4. And also because I don't want to
embark on another monster book project; we'll keep it at around 400 pages, which
would be easier to sell to O'Reilly.
Doing an "Apache Flex Cookbook" would be a nice second book, but as a
collaborative effort, because it would be a bit of a monster to do, considering
that the "Flex 4 Cookbook" weighed in at 740 pages. If O'Reilly gets a good ROI
(i.e. it breaks even ;) on this first book, they might consider doing the
cookbook. But we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.
What I will need people's input on, when the book proposal is approved, are
general ideas, or rather a wish list of "what you'd like to see in the book",
keeping in mind what kind of book this will be.
I'll keep everyone updated as I hear from them.
_______________________________________________________________________
Joseph Balderson, Flex & Flash Platform Developer :: http://joeflash.ca
Author, Professional Flex 3 :: http://tinyurl.com/proflex3book
Justin Mclean wrote:
Hi,
You'll do fine, Justin. As long as you're willing to put in the time to read and
double-read the entire book (usually as it's written chapter by chapter)
OK I'm in - but that shouldn't stop other people from wanting to help out as
well.
Thanks,
Justin
