Finally much waited new Adobe AIR beta 2 has been released on Adobe labs.

The features which are available in this version looks awesome. You can download SDK and runtime beta verison from the following link.

Download Link : http://labs.adobe.com/downloads/air2.html

The new capabilities are available in Adobe AIR 2.0

• Native process API
  Beginning with AIR 2, developers will have access to a native process API that will enable applications to invoke and communicate with native applications on the local machine. In order to preserve the cross platform nature of the .air file format, applications that take advantage of the native process API must be deployed as native installers such as .exe and .dmg. The AIR runtime SDK will include support for generating basic native installers.
• Support for detecting mass storage devices
  Now your AIR application can detect when a mass storage device is connected or disconnected. An AIR 2 application can listen for when a user plugs in a Flip video camera or USB Flash drive so that it can, for example, automatically synchronize files to the local system or prompt the user to upload photos to Facebook or videos to YouTube.
• Improved support for accessibility
  Runtime dialogs such as the installer dialogs will be readable by supported screen readers such as JAWS. In addition, it will be possible to build accessible Flash-based applications in AIR leveraging the existing accessibility API’s and features available in the Flash Player and Flex SDK.
• Open document API
  Support for opening a document will be possible from an AIR application. With this API, AIR asks the operating system what the default application is associated with the file. For example, specifying a file path to a PDF file will launch Adobe Reader or a .doc file will open Microsoft Word.
• Improved performance
  Applications that run using AIR 2 will consume less memory and use less CPU than AIR 1.5 without recompiling the application. We will share more information about this when we launch the beta.
• Local microphone access API
  Currently, audio must first pass through a server before it can be saved locally. Using the upcoming AIR 2 local microphone API, it will be possible to record audio locally, which can be important if your application is running in a disconnected mode.
• Multi-touch & gesture support
  AIR 2 will include support for multi-touch (Windows 7) and gestures (Windows 7 and Mac OS X 10.6).
• Faster, more powerful WebKit
  An updated version of WebKit that includes a faster JavaScript engine and new HTML5/CSS3 capabilities will be included inside of AIR 2.
• Improved socket support
  It will now be possible to create local servers and lightweight P2P applications with enhancements to AIR’s socket support.

Really Adobe is doing great job with clear goals and proper planning to make this product stronger and stronger. We need to appreciate for this great work.

I built one small application using this new Map 3D feature. (India’s Independence Day is on August 15th, so i built this application based on this concept. The Destination location is India’s Parliament House, New Delhi.)

Project Demo :

Download : Download the Flex 3D Map project source here

Code Description :

• How to build Google Map in flex please check the previous post here.
• The Following changes to the code to use Google 3D map in flex

* Import the com.google.maps.Map3D, com.google.maps.View, and com.google.maps.geom.Attitude classes.
* Instead of extending a Map object, extend a Map3D object.
* Within the map’s MAP_PREINITIALIZE event, set the map’s view to VIEWMODE_PERSPECTIVE
* Optionally, you can also set an initial attitude for the map to display at an oblique angle. The attitude defines the angle of the map in several directions.

Use of 3D maps within the Google Maps API for Flash requires use of a new object, the Map3D object, which is used in place of the standard Map object. Rendering of 3D maps is supported on both Flash 9 and Flash 10 players. However, due to geometry support, use of Flash 10 is recommended as it results in faster rendering.

API changes

• Before AIR 1.5.2, pressing the ESC key in full-screen or full-screen interactive mode would exit full-screen mode, and there was no way to prevent it. With AIR 1.5.2, when using the full-screen interactive mode an application using the 1.5.2 namespace can capture the keyDown event and call the preventDefault() method of the event. This change only affects the full-screen interactive mode; the full-screen mode is not affected.
• Before AIR 1.5.2, SWF content embedded in and HTML container in a transparent window could not be displayed. With AIR 1.5.2, SWF content can be displayed with certain wmode settings.
• The network timeout is now 60 minutes on Windows and Mac OS.
• In addition, new APIs have been added. Update your application descriptor file to the 1.5.2 namespace in order to access the new AIR 1.5.2 APIs and behavior. To update the namespace, change the xmlns attribute to:
  xmlns=”http://ns.adobe.com/air/application/1.5.2″
• Capabilities.supports32BitProcesses and Capabilities.supports64BitProcesses – These properties indicate whether the system supports 64-bit or 32-bit processes.
  • LocalConnection.isPerUser – This property indicates whether LocalConnection objects are scoped to the current user (true) or are globally accessible to all users on the computer (false). This property only affects content running on Mac OS; other platforms ignore this parameter. For example, local connections on Windows and Linux are always per-user. In previous versions, all LocalConnection objects on Mac OS had a global scope. For security reasons, always set this property to true, unless you need to preserve compatibility with previous versions. In future releases, this property is likely to have a default value of true.
  • System.disposeXML(xml:XML) – This static method makes an XML object immediately available for garbage collection. This method removes parent and child connections between all the nodes for the specified XML object. This method takes one parameter: the XML object to be made available for garbage collection. Use this method to ensure the efficient disposal of memory associated with XML objects.

• AIR 1.5.2 includes WebKit version 34190.
• AIR 1.5.2 includes an updated version of the Flash Player plug-in (10.0.32), which is used when displaying SWF content embedded in HTML

Fixed bugs

For more information please click here

The place and food was nice. Totally the whole event was good for both who does not know flex and who is already in the flex development.

Some of the session was really very nice and informative. I like the Key note session from Ben Forta and Serge Jespers. And also Flex and Java/J2EE integration at its best session from Sujit Reddy was very informative.

Thanks to Adobe for conducting this event and organized very well.

See some of the snaps we taken in that place: