The Phantom Reference

Adobe Certified Expert (ACE)

phantom — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 07:41:32 +0000

Now, I am an Adobe Certified Expert in Flex 3 and AIR.

I am professionally qualified to build RIA-based Flex/AIR applications for the Web/Desktop. Thanks Adobe for certifying me.

Original post blogged on b2evolution.

The Heart Beat Effect

phantom — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 05:41:43 +0000

Do you know that you can create cool and realistic effects using the open source Flex SDK? Here is the one that I created to simulate a heart beat with minimal MXML and ActionScript.

A little bit of elasticity and rotation along with the correct timing will bring the heart to life! Here is the code:

<mx:Script>
		<![CDATA[
			import mx.effects.easing.*;
		
			private var beatSync:Boolean = true;
		
			private function beatHeart():void {
	                    beatEffect.end();	
	                    rotateEffect.end();                
	                
	                    //Init the beat effect
	                    beatEffect.xFrom = heart.x;
	                    beatEffect.yFrom = heart.y;
	                
	                    if(beatSync){
	                	//beat it
	                	beatEffect.xTo=beatEffect.xBy=heart.x+1;
	                	beatSync = false;
	                    }
	                    else{
	                	beatEffect.xTo=beatEffect.xBy=heart.x-1;	
	                	beatSync = true;
	                    }
	                
	                    beatEffect.play();
	                    rotateEffect.play();
	                }
		]]>
</mx:Script>	
	
<mx:Move id="beatEffect" duration="600" target="{heart}" 
         easingFunction="Elastic.easeOut" repeatCount="0"/>
<mx:Rotate id="rotateEffect" target="{heart}" duration="700" 
         angleTo="1" repeatCount="0"/>

Isn't Flex too easy to learn? Get the open source Adobe Flex SDK today!

Original post blogged on b2evolution.

Movie in the AIR

phantom — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 17:05:13 +0000

Adobe Air is increasingly being used to promote movies. You can watch the latest HD movie trailers from this AIR application.

And here is the interactive movie trailer of Avatar

A year from now or much sooner, Adobe Air might become the preferred platform for providing customer entertainment.

Original post blogged on b2evolution.

3D Game with 2D Sprites

phantom — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 14:04:52 +0000

I'm building a really scary FPS-based 3D game with just 2D sprites freely available on the internet. This doom like game is built using GML, Direct 3D, Inkscape, and Gimp.

As the game is completely based on Direct X, the game now runs only on the Windows platform.

Here is a screenshot:

More Info.

Original post blogged on b2evolution.

Java and Web Services Special [JDJ]

phantom — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 12:37:37 +0000

Here is a really old issue (Sep. 2003) of the JDJ magazine made available as a PDF, which you can download from their official site.

7 years later, still most of the articles in that magazine reads relevant except for my lame article on Jini and MBeans that sounds very primitive now. But that said, building a self-healing, services-based distributed system is still an acceptable topic to debate on-to Jini or not!

You can follow the developments of Jini through the Apache River project.

Original post blogged on b2evolution.

My New Home

phantom — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 07:41:47 +0000

...Thank you for following me from my Sun blog.
Here, I'm going to blog more on Java/JavaEE/RIA and other cool technologies that I encounter in my day job!

Original post blogged on b2evolution.

The Java IDEs I Like

phantom — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 07:33:47 +0000

When it comes to IDE+App. Server, you have at least 2 options for building Java EE-based applications:

Use the Eclipse IDE for Java EE + JBoss Application Server. [Good]
Use the Eclipse IDE + GlassFish Application Server. [Good]
Use the NetBeans IDE + GlassFish Application Server. [Great]
Use the NetBeans IDE + JBoss Application Server. [Bad]
Other Non-OSS/commercial options that I don't care about.

I don't really recommend using the NetBeans IDE along with the JBoss Application Server, as NetBeans thinks JBoss is not fully Java EE 5 complaint, and disables all those injection features. For instance, you can't have "@EJB" annotation in your application client code.
I'm using and will suggest the NetBeans IDE + GlassFish combo for Java EE 5 development as the IDE is well integrated with the GlassFish tools. For instance, I can directly invoke the GlassFish Verifier to validate my annotations and other descriptors.

Go NetBeans!

Original post blogged on b2evolution.