This wont be a long post, mainly because I don't have much to say other than BUY THIS BOOK!! This is the FIRST O'Reilly book I have ever been able to read cover-to-cover. O'Reilly books traditionally have seems very dry, albeit the perfect technical resources, just not a "reader". This book changes that (for me anyway).

Anyone who has coded anything in AS 1 or 2 doesn't need me to tell them that Colin Moock is a bad ass and any book he writes is a must have for any Flash developer. The only thing missing from this book is a reference like the ActionScript Definitive Guide had. I know Adobe has LiveDocs (although I really wish they'd post the HTML source for them so I can host it locally like Macromedia used to do), and thats great an all, but I really like having a written reference to go to.

Other than that, I just had to get a quick post to say thanks again to Colin for a kick ass book.... and to say it again, BUY THIS BOOK!!

(fyi.. all links to the books in this post will give credit to Colin via Amazon... he deserves it!)

First let me start off by thanking Mike Potter (Program Manager, Developer Relations at Adobe) for sending me this book. According to Mike,

"Every once in a while I’ll go through Amazon and find wishlists with Flex or ActionScript books on them."

So if you dont have a wishlist set up at Amazon, you should do so now, you never know who may be willing to make your day. Thanks again Mike! Now on to the book...

The Essential Guide to Flex 2 with ActionScript 3.0 was a good book. There I've said it, I liked the book. As with all Friends Of Ed Books (or at least the ones I have in my library) this book is extremely easy to read cover to cover. I dont know what it is about the books this company puts out, but they are by far the easy programming/technical books to read that I have ever purchased. I am constantly recommending the Foundation series books to people new to Actionscript, and/or Flash because of how easy they are to read.

The author, Charles E. Brown covers a wide array of subjects in this book which does well to give an insight into how much there really is to learn. I have to say though that the title of the book is rather misleading when it comes down to the content presented. The fact that the book is titled "The Essential Guide..." is where I have the problem. This book should have absolutely been part of the foundation series, in fact could have been a primer to a Foundation series book as it really just skims over most of the aspects of Flex 2 and ActionScript 3.0. The major flaw of this book, in my opinion, is that it tries to cover way to much. With nearly 60 pages devoted to ColdFusion, another 22 to Charting, and over 100 more to case studies, that's roughly 38% of the book devoted to option components and case studies. Case studies, however, at least benefit hose that have become comfortable enough with the concepts to try and put it into practice with an example, but if your not a ColdFusion developer, or have purchased the Charting component add on for Flex, there's 80 pages that have no relevance for you.

Having said all of that I think this book is a great start for those with zero knowledge of Flex OR Flash. If your a Java or ColdFusion developer who has yet to explore the world of Flash or Flex this is a great intro book to help you decide if its something you want to investigate further. If your someone who has done any amount of working with Flex (or even playing around, as in my case) or your an experienced Flash/ActionScript developer, this book will seem very low level to you. There where several moments during the book where I though "huh, that's interesting..." but I kept waiting for that one big moment where I though "ahh this is a book I will refer back to"... that moment just never came for me.

The author has set up a website as an extension to the book which can be found at www.CharlesEBrown.net. At the time I was reading the book, and at the time of this post, the site is mostly a short description of the book with a few coming soon links to Java, ColdFusion, and PHP tutorials. I will keep checking in on the site and post back here if/when I see any of the tutorials go live.

While this review may seem very negative (that wasn't the intention when I sat down to write this), I wanted to offer my honest perspective as a Flash guy reading a book about Flex. I encourage you to also read the reviews from other consumers who may offer additional insight.

Note:I think I should also clarify my background just a tad for perspectives sake. I am NOT a Flex developer by trade, I am a Flash guy. I have done a few small (read : extremely small) projects in Flex, tinkering around more than anything else. Flex was a lot easier to pick up than I had originally anticipated, and I think it wouldn't take much to get real comfortable using Flex to build a large scale applications. So for other Flash developers out there who are considering checking out Flex, its a lot cooler than you might think, give it a try!

It's nothing fancy but it was a cool project for me to get my feet wet with JSFL. Here's what the extension does:

• Sets Frame - rate to 31fps
• Creates basic layers -
---- actions : a layer for all code
---- interface : a layer for interface elements
---- background : a layer to place the background graphic or color box
---- trace : a guide layer for placing graphics used for placement only
• Creates basic folders in the library -
---- Audio : place your sound files in here
---- Bitmaps : place your imported images in here
---- Buttons : place your button symbols in here
---- Components : place your components in here
---- Graphics : place your graphic symbols in here
---- Movies : place your MovieClip symbols in here
• Locks actions layer prevents stage elements from being placed on that layer

Once installed you can access the command "Create Default File" from the Flash Commands Menu.

I'd like to figure out a way to have it automatically run this command every time I create a new file, but I haven't figured out if that's even possible yet. I picked up the Extending Flash MX 2004 book by Keith Peters and Todd yard as well, it's always good to have a nice reference handy.

Download (.mxp) | Source (.jsfl)

The book that really got my feet wet with Actionscript was the Foundation Actionscript book by Sham Bhangal (granted the version I read was for Flash MX). This is a must read for anyone just starting out in Actionscript, it is well written, easy to follow along and very little errors (if any).

However if your past the basics, and ready advance and get more familiar with the likes of inheritance, encapsulation and polymorphism (its okay if you have no idea what the heck I just said) this book will have you up to speed in no time.  The book I am speaking of is Object-Oriented ActionScript For Flash 8 by Peter Elst and Todd Yard (with Sas Jacobs and William Drol). This is my second time through the book (I typically skip around the first time through and then come back and read it straight through if its good enough), and I have to say its probably the best book I've read yet for programming with Actionscript. I know that there are many of you saying "yeah but AS3 is out now and it changes the game", but that's where you'd only be half right. AS3 is out now, but this book will still help. The fundamentals are all the same, this book moves you from timeline coding to class based coding, encapsulation, abstraction, and inheritance. All of which are needed for programming in AS3.

If your a designer wanting to learn how to code, A flex guy who wants more than just what MXML has to offer, a coder from another language wanting to get into Flash, or even if your a proficient AS coder already, this is a book that you MUST HAVE in your library.