MXML/AS3/Flex are conceptually identical to XAML/C#/WPF. They borrow a
lot of ideas from previous XML UI technologies.
MXML/haXe/Flex does sound quite viable.
The issue is that both Silverlight and Flash are dieing and haXe
represents a future for Flex because it is clever cross compiler
technology that targets lots of platforms - native o/s including mobile
via nme/cpp, vm via neko, browser via js and swf and in time java/c#.
The problem with haXe is that a language/compiler is only a part of a
development environment - libraries/frameworks for persistence and GUI
are as important. If I could develop in haXe and use a haXe enabled Flex
as my GUI framework and a haXe enabled ORM (on the lines of
JPA/Hibernate) as my persistence framework and then could target
desktop/javascript/swf/mobile from the same code base, that would be
awesome.
It may be a pipe dream if every library has to be rewritten at the
source level and I can understand anyone baulking at that. I will ask
Nicolas
if there might be a way of interfacing Flex or say Hibernate (when the
java target is ready) without rewrite at source level. I imagine he will
point at the migration tools and say that once the migration from AS3 to
haXe is done, one would dump the AS3 code.
I live in the town where "Flash on the Beach" had its last year - there
was a big local Flash community but now it has moved on to Javascript
(with canvas)
and to mobile and they are much more interested in
HaXe/Corona/Titanium/Marmalade than Flex/Air mobile.
Java/Swing failed on the desktop and the browser (applets) mainly
because of runtime issues (and competition from Microsoft/Apple) and I
would be sorry to see Flex die because the runtime (Flash) died under it.
I would certainly see a future for Flex on Flash/Air technology if Adobe
donated the defunct Air for Linux to Apache and Apple issued a statement
embracing it
on OSX but I do not see this happening soon.
James
On 12/03/2012 20:10, Martin Heidegger wrote:
To be honest: if I would have to write a framework for haXe I would
focus it on other things than I do in AS3.
AS3 is not a perfect language (by a long shot) but in Flex MXML is a
key concept and it does take some time to implement a hxml of
the same logic, same goes for quite a few other aspects (that now
"just work"). I am not opposed to that but like I said before:
I wouldn't call that Flex because it most likely will not resemble
Flex a lot.
yours
Martin.
On 13/03/2012 04:56, James Cowan wrote:
haXe's ability to compiled to many targets (native cpp, java/c#,
javascript, as3/swf and neko vm) does make it very attractive
and it is open source.
I noticed that ASwing (the port of Java Swing to AS3) is making the
plunge and moving to haXe to take advantage of the cpp
target: http://www.aswing.org/?cat=26.
I did not get a sense from looking at the thread that there was much
enthusiasm for moving from AS3 to haXe and not porting
to haXe would mean 2 code bases which does not sound ideal.
James
