Hot Flex and ActionScript 3.0 APIs, tips and tools for Autumn 2008

43 Hot Flex and ActionScript 3.0 APIs, tips and tools for Autumn 2008

Autumn is here again and it’s time to review some of the happenings from the summer. Here are 43 hand selected Flex and ActionScript 3.0 libraries, APIs, tips, and tricks.  There have been several new APIs launched, Cairngorm was open sourced, a Flex 3 update was released and Grant Skinner created a new tweening engine. There have been new Flex application development frameworks released. There was a Flex code generator update and there have also been some design pattern updates released. You don’t want to miss out on this link round up!

Introducing Flex SDK 3.1 and Flex Builder 3.0.1
Flex SDK 3.1 is what the team considers a milestone build, a certification of all of that work and a roll-up into a build that is recommended for all users
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/articles/sdk3_fb301.html

Cairngorm Moved to Adobe Open Source
http://weblogs.macromedia.com/amcleod/archives/2008/08/cairngorm_moved.html

Flex Architecture Basics - Models & Data Transfer Objects
Demonstrates a relatively easy way of setting up a small Flex application using a model and a data transfer object
http://nwebb.co.uk/blog/?p=228

Tutorial: ActionScript 3 Dragging Methods
This tutorial is all about dragging an object around the stage.
http://flashmymind.com/Tutorials/Actionscript/Advanced/actionscript-dragging.php

Flex Paginate Component
A little paginator component
http://www.darklump.co.uk/blog/?p=112

ModuleManager and IModuleInfo - loading Flex Modules dynamically
http://lowpitch.com/blog/2008/08/17/modulemanager-and-imoduleinfo-loading-flex-modules-dynamically/

Getting started with Degrafa
Simple code example by Mike Huntington
http://www.mikehuntington.com/?p=22

Advanced CSS with Degrafa
Another great code example by Mike Huntington
http://www.mikehuntington.com/?p=31

Alcon 3
Rewritten for Adobe AIR. This is a little debuger/logger, I used to use this back in the AS2 days and really enjoyed it. I still need to check this out but I’m sure it’s really cool.
http://blog.hexagonstar.com/alcon/

Remove css type selector warnings in Flex Builder
Quick little tip to remove css type selector warnings from the Flex Builder problems panel
http://www.nutrixinteractive.com/blog/?p=135

VBox, HBox with gradient background
http://www.igorcosta.org/?p=160

Flex designer/developer workflow video tutorials
A series of short tutorials that cover using Fireworks CS3 and Flex Builder 3 to create a visual theme for Flex applications.
http://www.ashorten.com/2008/08/11/flex-designerdeveloper-workflow-video-tutorials/

Six reasons to use ActionScript 3.0 - Lee Brimelow
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/actionscript/articles/six_reasons_as3.html

Custom flex skins
Creating web-applications with flex 3 is great. there are a ton of pre-made components, and an open-ended architecture to allow you to create your own.
http://the.fontvir.us/b10g/?id=111

Writing components in Flex, part 1
http://labs.flexperiments.nl/writing-components-in-flex-part-1/

Writing components in Flex, part 2
http://labs.flexperiments.nl/writing-components-in-flex-part-2/

Flash Enabled Blog Actionscript 3 API roundup
http://flashenabledblog.com/2008/08/26/as3-actionscript-3-classes/

Create bitmap data object from a display object
http://www.flexer.info/2008/08/20/how-to-make-a-bitmapdata-from-a-displayobjectuicomponent/

FCG 1.0 (Flex code generator)
Goes final and open source
http://www.dehats.com/drupal/?q=node/45

New ActionScript 3 Singleton Method
Daniel Love’s version using static initializers
http://www.daniellove.net/blog/?p=81

CSKDebugger
AIR debuger for Mac
http://ultra-web.co.uk/?p=178

Fill Colors
Fill Colors is the embodiment of the separation between style and layout in Flex and a demonstration of what’s possible in terms of skinning a Flex application
http://www.fillcolors.com/

gTween
Animation tweening library by Grant Skinner
http://www.gskinner.com/blog/archives/2008/08/gtween_a_new_tw.html

Functional Testing Framework for AIR AJAX apps based on Selenium
http://corlan.org/2008/08/15/functional-testing-framework-for-air-ajax-apps-based-on-selenium

Yahoo! Music API
The Yahoo! Music API gives developers access to the Yahoo! Music catalog of artists, albums, tracks, videos, ratings and more. It provides numerous ways to browse the catalog: through charts, search, similarities, genres, artists, and user recommendations and ratings.
http://developer.yahoo.com/music/

ActionScript 3 Flexible Layout Class
The NpFlexLayout Class is designed to simplify aligning DisplayObjects to stage dimensions and responding to changes in stage dimensions at run time by a user or between different users.
http://www.blog.noponies.com/archives/109

mediacorelib - media core library for ActionScript 3.0
The MediaCoreLib is an Actionscript 3.0 library toolset for playing audio or video files effortlessly. MediaCoreLib allows you to manage a playlist and seemlessly crossfade tracks.
http://code.google.com/p/mediacorelib/

Servebox ActionScript Foundry
An ActionScript 3 / Java framework designed for Flex 2 applications development. Its design is based on several design patterns,
http://www.servebox.com/foundry/doku.php?id=

Flest Framework
Flest is an ActionScript3 / Flex application framework for building enterprise level RIAs. It uses such design pattern as Controller, Factory, Command, etc. High efficiency, simplicity and practicality were set as its mandatory design features.
http://code.google.com/p/flest/

Guasax Flex/AIR MVC - The MVC Flex/AIR Framework
Guasax is an ease of use programming framework to provide ordered and scalable Flex applications. Life cycle of guasax framework is based in the MVC pattern to take on our program actions
http://www.guasax.com/guasax/web/en/index.php

Flex Mojos - HelloWorldTutorial
Tutorial for building a simple Hello World Flex application with flex-mojos
http://code.google.com/p/flex-mojos/wiki/HelloWorldTutorial

Scott Evans - public discussion of new FlexBuilder 4 IDE features
Scott Evans, a lead engineer on the FlexBulder team, has started a new blog - Getting and Setting  that will be for public discussion of new FlexBuilder 4 IDE features.
http://gettingandsetting.com/

dpHibernate - Hibernate lazy loading with Adobe BlazeDS
dpHibernate is a custom Flex Library and a custom BlazeDS Hibernate adapter that work together to give you support for lazy loading of hibernate objects from inside your flex applications.
http://blog.mikenimer.com/index.cfm/2008/5/21/dpHibernate–Hibernate-lazy-loading-with-Adobe-BlazeDS
http://code.google.com/p/dphibernate

Alternativa3D — browser 3D-engine based on Adobe Flash
Create 3D-scenes in Flash: objects, mechanisms, buildings visualization. Import geometry from 3D-formats, upload textures (including animated). Three-dimentional projects and games, basic physics simulation (friction, collision).
http://alternativaplatform.com/en/alternativa3d/

KwikUML - build UML models of ActionScript and PHP classes
A tool to quickly build UML models of ActionScript and PHP classes and interfaces, as well as, SQL Entity Relationship Designs (ERDs). Built on Adobe’s AIR runtime, this desktop application allows you to not only build those models but export PNGs of the models for use in specification documentation and generate stub code from the models to use as a starting point once it’s time to actually begin development.
http://labs.otuome.com/kwikuml

KitchenSync
KitchenSync is an ActionScript 3.0 library for sequencing animations and other time-based actions.
http://code.google.com/p/kitchensynclib/

as3xls - read and write Excel files in Flex
Supports reading text, numbers, formulas, and dates from Excel version 2.x-2003 and writing text, numbers, and dates. Formulas also update to reflect changes in cells they reference.
http://code.google.com/p/as3xls/

ASDebugger - A run-time debugger for AS3 Projects
The ASDebugger allows you to trace variables. It has support for strings, integers, arrays, dates, arraycollections, objects and everything in between.
http://labs.flexperiments.nl/asdebugger/

as3corelib update
This is an ActionScript 3 library that contains a lot of useful APIs for working with AS3.
http://code.google.com/p/as3corelib/

swix framework - Flex development framework
Swiz is a framework for Adobe Flex that aims to bring complete simplicity to RIA development. Swiz provides Inversion of Control, event handing, and simple life cycle for asynchronous remote methods. In contrast to other major frameworks for Flex, Swiz imposes no JEE patterns on your code, no repetitive folder layouts, and no boilerplate code on your development. Swiz represents best practices learned from the top RIA developers at some of the best consulting firms in the industry, enabling Swiz to be simple, lightweight, and extremely productive.
http://code.google.com/p/swizframework/

Gaia - open-source front-end Flash Framework for AS3 and AS2
Gaia is an open-source front-end Flash Framework for AS3 and AS2 designed to dramatically reduce development time.
http://www.gaiaflashframework.com/

Penne Framework - lightweight framework for developing in Flex and Air
version 1.0 of The Penne Framework, a simplified Flex and Air framework, as a second option to the popular Cairngorm Framework.
http://www.flexpasta.com/index.php/2008/04/19/introducing-the-penne-framework-for-flex-3/

An ActionScript Compiler Written In ActionScript
“It’s enough to warm the cockles of one’s heart. ActionScript nerds around the globe can celebrate their graduation to “real programmer” status (whatever that means).”
http://www.brooksandrus.com/blog/2008/08/27/an-actionscript-compiler-written-in-actionscript/

Adobe Developer Connection Write and Give Program Donations

Adobe Developer Connection Write and Give Program Donations

The Nature Conservancy - Protecting Nature, Preserving Life

Thanks to the Adobe Developer Connection for putting together this awesome program! Authors that contributed work to the ADC from June through August in 2008 were each given an opportunity to choose from 5 charities to donate $100 to. The ADC Write and Give Program generated $6200 USD in Q3 of 08!! That’s fantastic! I donated to the Nature Conservancy for my work on the Flex Best Practices series. Shout out to the other authors who also contributed to the ADC Write and Give Program.

Sheri German
http://www.swanilda.com/

Paulo Caroli
http://caroli.org/

Ayo Binitie
http://mrbinitie.blogspot.com/

Louie Penaflor
http://www.restlessthinker.com/blog/index.php

Jonathan Tabak
http://www.panachetech.com/

Jim Babbage
http://www.communitymx.com/blog/index.cfm?blogger=32

Nick Myers
http://www.cooper.com/

DryIcons
http://dryicons.com/

Tom Green
http://www.tomontheweb.ca/

Kumar Vivek
http://blog.i2fly.com/

John Wylie
http://www.activata.co.uk/

Samir Dash
http://www.mobilewish.com/

David Tucker
http://www.davidtucker.net/

Bill Bejeck
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/articles/flex_grails.html

Henrik Lindahl
http://www.kodgruppen.com/

Sebastien Arbogast
http://sebastien-arbogast.com/

Zee Yang
http://www.flexlive.net/

Thanks again to Hong Qiu for all the help with the article. The second part of the Best practices series is in the works and should online in the next couple months. Thanks to Edward Sullivan the Product Manager at the Adobe Developer Connection as well.

Additional information can be found on the ADC Blog.

Important Flash Platform Developers

Important Flash Platform Developers

Here is a list of over 50 Flash Platform developers that share great information and resources through their websites and blogs. From Adobe employees to independent developers all of these individuals have contributed very useful material to the community. Hopefully this list will help you discover some new developers and information. I check their blogs pretty regularly and I recommend you check them from time to time as well. Here is my list of 50+ Important Flash Platform Developers.

UPDATE: please contact me to add anyone I missed. I’m open to expanding this directory/list for sure!!! Sooo many great Flash Platform devs out there and they’re all so helpful and nice!! It’s an awesome community for sure!!

Samuel Agesilas
Designgineer. Creator of Saffron UML editor.
http://twitter.com/samuelagesilas

Aral Balkan
Designer, developer, author, teacher, entrepreneur, and performer; a Renaissance Geek with a passion for designing user experiences and a desire to make the world a better place through technology and oratory.
http://aralbalkan.com/

Luke Bayes
Since early 1998, Luke Bayes has worked with companies such as America Online, Microsoft, Applied Materials, Entertainment Arts, Hewlett Packard, PowerBar, RockShox, Levi’s, Macromedia and Adobe to deliver an expansive set of distributed applications, business tools, and instructional content. He is the coauthor of the Certified Macromedia Flash MX Developer Study Guide and two Macromedia Flash Developer Certification Exams. He is a frequent speaker at industry events, has served on the steering committee of the San Francisco Macromedia User’s Forum and is cofounder of both AsUnit, a tool set for Flash Application Developers, and the San Francisco Design Patterns Study Group.
http://www.lukebayes.com/

Jens Brynildsen
Jens has been working with Flash since version 3 came out. Since then, he’s been an active member of the Flash community. He’s created more than a hundred Flash games (thus the name of this blog) but he also makes web/standalone applications, does workshops and other consulting. With the help of some good friends in the community, he maintains the site Flashmagazine.com.
http://www.flashgamer.com/

Thomas Burleson
Thomas Burleson has been building consumer and e-Commerce software solutions for more than 20 years. During the last 4 years, Thomas has provided product development skills and senior leadership for Universal Mind; one of the largest RUX and Web2.0 consultancy firms. In Oct 2008, Thomas joined Ustrive2
http://www.thomasburleson.biz/

Christian Cantrell
Christian Cantrell is a Product Manager and Application Developer on the AIR team. Really nice guy and an awesome developer.
http://blogs.adobe.com/cantrell/

Mike Chambers
Mike Chambers has spent the last eight years building applications that target the Flash runtime. During that time, he has worked with numerous technologies including Flash, Generator, .NET, Central, Flex, and Ajax. He is currently the Principal Product Manager for developer relations for the Flash Platform at Adobe. He has written and spoken extensively on Flash and Rich Internet Application development and is coauthor of the Apollo for Adobe Flex Developers Pocket Guide, Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR) for JavaScript Developers Pocketguide, Flash Enabled: Flash Design and Development for Devices as well as Generator and Flash Demystified.
http://www.mikechambers.com/blog/

Andre Charland
Andre Charland is the co-founder and CEO at Nitobi Inc. He’s been at the forefront of Web 2.0 software development for almost a decade and is an expert on the next generation web. Andre is an advocate for usability and user experience and speaks regularly about how to keep users engaged and active on websites or web-based application. Most recently Andre presented on the Adobe AIR Tour throughout Europe. He’s also been a speaker at the Voices That Matter web design conference, Adobe MAX, JavaOne and AjaxWorld. Andre is the co-author of “Enterprise Ajax”, published by Prentice Hall last summer and is the lead blogger for O’Reilly’s InsideRIA.com.
http://blogs.nitobi.com/andre/

Christophe Coenraets
Senior Technical Evangelist at Adobe Systems. Really nice guy!
http://coenraets.org/blog/

Critter
Creator of SeesmicAIR. Tattooed and pierced developer. Down to earth and keepin it real.
http://critterscode.com/

Jen DeHan
Jen deHaan was raised by wolves in the deep woods of the Canadian north. Later in life, Jen worked with Flash as a deseloper, then wrote about Flash for five versions, and then worked on stuff that didn’t include much Flash. She came to her senses in 2007 by rejoining the fabled Flash team at Adobe as a QE, focusing on the good stuff—Motion (on timelines). Jen enjoys long walks in the rain pondering how many times she can use the word Flash in a bio, and admits that after numerous years in California she is no longer addicted to Tim Horton’s coffee.
http://blogs.adobe.com/jdehaan/

Peter DeHan
Peter deHaan currently works for Adobe on the Flex SDK QA team. Peter also contributes to the Flex Examples blog. In my opinion Peter has one of the best jobs in the world!
http://blogs.adobe.com/pdehaan/

Eric Dolecki
Old school Flasher. Currently works at Bose, in the R&D Design Center. Interested in: AS3, AIR, Flex Builder 3, Spry, Dojo, SVN, Eclipse, MTASC.
http://www.ericd.net/

Mike Downey
Mike Downey is Director of Platform Evangelism at Microsoft where he focuses on platform adoption of Microsoft Silverlight and related technologies.
http://madowney.com/blog/

Brandon Ellis
Flash/Flex/RIA/web/.net/SQL developer, 45, married, kids. Likes: C#, Flash, Flex, AIR, web standards, punk rock, beer, hot peppers, vegetables, cycling, skateboarding, cartoons. Dislikes: people who don’t use their turn signals, people who have something to say about everything, empty beer bottles.
http://www.brandonellis.org/

Yakov Fain
Managing Director at Farata Systems. Adobe Certified Instructor. Java Champion. Author. Leads the Princeton Java Users Group.
http://flexblog.faratasystems.com/

Eric Fikes
Internets, Skateboarding, Ice Hockey, and the family. Lead Technologist for Atlanta based design firm Wiretree.com
http://ericfickes.com/

Dan “polyGeek” Florio 
Dan Florio - aka polyGeek - is a freelance Actionscript Flex/Flash/AIR developer living fulltime in a 35′ RV with his wife. Creator of RunPee.com
http://polygeek.com/

Jesse Freeman
A homeless Flash Developer from NYC.
http://flashbum.com/

Eric Garza
Technical Architect at Adobe Consulting.
http://www.questioveritas.com/

David Gassner
Owner at Bardo Technical Services. David also did the Flex training for Lynda.com. He’s a really great guy and a great trainer. I learned a lot from his videos.
http://www.bardotech.com/

Ely Greenfield
Ely has been a developer at Macromedia / now Adobe for over 10 years, with an extended vacation in the middle working for the best little startup you probably never heard of, E-Quill. Over the years he’s worked on a variety of different products and technologies, from Desktop authoring tools to multimedia engines, Web Applications to browser add-ons, Workflow engines to Platform technologies. He currently works with a bunch of very smart engineers designing and developing the Flex SDK — the core compiler, framework , and MXML language for Adobe’s next generation RIA technology.
http://www.quietlyscheming.com/blog/

Chris Griffith
Flash developer at Qualcomm, Inc. Also co-manager of the San Diego Flash Users Group and an author for InsideRIA.
http://chrisgriffith.wordpress.com/

Romke de haan
Devloper focusing on Cocoa Touch, Flex, AIR, Flash technologies. Romke also does Motion, Design, Art & Music.
http://www.romkedehaan.com/

Alex Harui
Principal Engineer at Macromedia/Adobe. He runs the great blog Alex’s Flex Closet.
http://blogs.adobe.com/aharui/

Shannon Hicks
Cold Fusion and Flex developer.
http://www.iotashan.com/

Jeff Houser
Computer programmer, a business owner, a musician, an author, a recording engineer, and loves old school style adventure games.
http://www.jeffryhouser.com/

Scott Janousek
Scott Janousek is a Flash and Flash Mobile developer currently working in the Boston area of the United States. In addition to his experience with mobile development, Scott has an accumulated ten years of diverse software engineering and Web consulting background, and several of those years were dedicated to the creation of interactive multimedia, including CD-ROMs, DVDs, webcasts, kiosks, RIAs, and web sites.
http://www.scottjanousek.com/

Lawrence Job
Founded an international new media startup known as GridFusions.
http://twitter.com/lawrencejob

Chafic Kazoun
Chafic Kazoun is the founder and Chief Software architect at Atellis, and is widely considered one of the world’s top experts on Flex (outside of the Adobe Flex engineering team). He has worked with Flash technologies since 1998 and with Flex since its inception, and he has a deep understanding of the internals of the Flex framework. He maintains a busy speaking and consulting schedule. When he’s not busy developing solution-based applications, Chafic is actively involved in the Flash community, delivering presentations at numerous conferences including Adobe’s MAX, Flashforward, FITC, Spark Europe, and MXDU. He is also the contributor of numerous published works and is the author of Programming Flex 2.0, a book recently released by O’Reilly Publishing. He is also an Adobe Community Expert, and shares his thoughts on his blog http://www.rewindlife.com.
http://rewindlife.com/

Colin Loretz
Colin is an entrepreneur, web developer, designer, thinker, dreamer and cyclist. Project Manager and Force.com Developer at Twelve Horses. Co-founder of Reno Collective.
http://colinloretz.com/

Joey Lott
Joey Lott is a founding partner of The Morphic Group, a Flex and Flash consulting company. At The Morphic Group Joey serves as a technology director, building some of today’s most innovative Flex applications and advocating for the use and adoption of agile software development methodologies. He has written many books on Flex and Flash-related technologies, including Programming Flex 3, ActionScript 3 Cookbook, Adobe AIR in Action, and Advanced ActionScript 3 with Design Patterns.
http://www.themorphicgroup.com/

Peter Martin
Senior Technical Architect at Adobe Systems. Senior Technical Architect at Adobe Consulting. Senior Technical Architect at Adobe (formerly Macromedia).
http://blogs.adobe.com/pmartin/

Sean McCracken
Head of Research and Development at Influxis, AS3 coder, Flash Media Server dude, Dad of 2 coders2be, Husband, Dog and Cat owner!
http://themindofseantron.blogspot.com/

Josh McDonald
Twitterer, Flexcoder, Maroon, Designer, Java lover, That loud-mouthed Aussie yob, Blogger, Problem solver, Contributor, Cricket Fan, Lousy photographer, Great cook.
http://flex.joshmcdonald.info/

Grant Michaels
CAD and CAM engineer, dj, producer, 2nd shooter, & solo web developer.
http://grantmichaels.wordpress.com/

Ali Mills
ActionScript programmer with solid experience using the technologies that power rich internet experiences.
http://www.alimills.com/

Jonathan Moore
With a strong focus on innovation, technology, and customer experience Jonathan utilizes a broad skill-set spanning strategic marketing, art direction, interactive design solutions, motion design, and innovative development to bring projects to life. Jonathan is passionate about emerging and fresh methods to creatively communicate a client’s message. Jonathan has worked closely with clients such as Activision, Disney, Lexus, EA, Ford, Infiniti, Chevrolet, Adobe, Motorola, Warner Brothers, and Mattel over the past eight years. Through direct involvement with the projects, Jonathan’s work has been recognized by AIGA, Adobe, ADDY Awards, FWA - Favorite Website Awards, Flash In The Can, STEP Inside Design, SXSW Interactive Festival, Webby Awards, and numerous books and magazines.
http://www.newezra.com/

Stacey Mulcahy
The one and only Bitch Who Codes. Old school Flasher. Super cool developer!!
http://bitchwhocodes.com/mt/

Rober Penner
super talented ActionScript developer. Author of Programming Macromedia Flash MX. Original author for many of the easing equations used in ActionScript.
http://www.robertpenner.com/

Juan Sanchez
Experience Architect for EffectiveUI. Graduated from California State University, Chico, with a B.A. in Communication Design. Juan’s background is primarily in print design, branding, and advertising, however, his skills have quickly expanded to include Web technologies like HTML, CSS, Flash, and eventually Flex. Creator of Scalenine and founding member of Degrafa.
http://scalenine.com/

Ryan Stewart
Rich Internet Application Evangelist for Adobe. Colorado Avalanche fan. Backpacker, rock climber and hiker.
http://blog.digitalbackcountry.com/

Ben Stucki
Ben Stucki is an independent Flex developer and consultant with a background in standards-based web development. After a long love affair with Flash experimentation, Ben got his hands on Flex and created some of the first custom Flex components available on the web. Today Ben continues to post sample code through his blog and contributes to many well known open-source Flex projects including FlexLib, Degrafa, and OpenFlux.
http://blog.benstucki.net/

Jeff Tapper
Jeff has over a decade of experience developing Internet applications for a myriad of clients, including Harley Davidson, Toys “R” Us, IBM, Dow Jones, American Express, and Morgan Stanley. As an instructor, he is certified to teach all of Adobe’s courses on Flex, ColdFusion, and Flash development. He has been working with Flex since the earliest alphas of Flex 1.0. Jeff has worked as author and technical editor for several books, including Adobe Flex 3: Training from the Source and Breaking Out of the Web Browser with Adobe AIR, and sits on the editorial board of Web Developers & Designers Journal.
http://blogs.digitalprimates.net/

Andrew Trice
Andrew Trice is the Principal Architect for Flex & AIR for Cynergy Systems, based in Washington, DC. He specializes in data visualization, client-server architectures, object-oriented principles, and rich application development. He has been developing for the web for over 10 years, with over eight years development for the Flash platform
http://www.tricedesigns.com/

Josh Tynjala
Josh Tynjala discovered Flash in late 2004 as an intern working for a marketing company in Duluth, Minnesota. Flash Player provided the perfect way to combine his degree in Computer Science with his lifelong interest in visual arts. In 2005, Josh moved to California and established his first blog, Zeus Labs, to begin sharing his ideas and experiments. Around the same time, Macromedia released the first public previews of Flash Player 9 and Flex 2. Excited and driven to jump immediately into the future of Flash, Josh earned some recognition with one of his early AS3 experiments, a Flex app that used binary sockets to connect Flash Player to AOL Instant Messenger.
http://joshblog.net/

Chad Udell
Currently employed at The Iona Group, a multimedia agency located near Peoria, IL. There he designs, develops and manages web and interactive projects and the client relationships that go along with them. Chad has developed web presences for Caterpillar, Tyson Foods, Rawlings, Worth Sports, Maui Jim Sunglassess and many more B2B and B2C web sites along with creating interactive experiences for museums like the Museum of Science and Industry and Shedd Aquarium and numerous other tradeshow and kiosk installations. In Chad’s free time he is an instructor in web and multimedia for Bradley University, focusing mainly on standards based web design. Many of Chad’s students have gone on to become successful designers or developers in their own right and he’s proud to have been part of their success.
http://visualrinse.com/

Simon Wacker
Simon is 21 years old and loves working as a freelance (web) developer. Simon is studying computer science and mathematics at the university in Karlsruhe, Germany. His main interests are programming, juggling and reading.
http://www.simonwacker.com/

James Ward
James Ward is a Technical Evangelist for Flex at Adobe and Adobe’s JCP representative to JSR 286, 299, and 301. Much like his love for climbing mountains he enjoys programming because it provides endless new discoveries, elegant workarounds, summits and valleys. His adventures in climbing have taken him many places. Likewise, technology has brought him many adventures, including: Pascal and Assembly back in the early 90’s; Perl, HTML, and JavaScript in the mid 90’s; then Java and many of it’s frameworks beginning in the late 90’s. Today he primarily uses Flex to build beautiful front-ends for Java based back-ends. Prior to Adobe, James built a rich marketing and customer service portal for Pillar Data Systems.
http://www.jamesward.com/blog/

Steven Webster
Director, Technology and Innovation at Adobe Systems Incorporated. Technical Director at Adobe Consulting. Practice Director, Rich Internet Applications at Adobe Consulting.
http://blogs.adobe.com/swebster/

Aaron West
For the past eight years Aaron has been heavily involved in the Web development space building enterprise-level, database-driven Web applications and leading technology teams. Aaron is incredibly passionate about what he does and attempts to inject his enthusiasm and love for technology in everyone around him.
http://www.trajiklyhip.com/

John Wilker
Community Evangelist for EffectiveUI. Organizer for Ignite Denver, an O’reilly Ignite event. Co-host of The Flex Show. John is a really, really nice guy!!
http://johnwilker.com/

Dan Wilson
Principal partner of DataCurl LLC, Dan Wilson runs the consulting practice and TheHealthChallenge.com, a health and wellness product for organizations. Before launching DataCurl, Dan held numerous senior program and development positions in such industries as Technical Consulting, Health Care, Online Publishing and Government Contracting.
http://www.nodans.com/