It is now more difficult to find Flex Builder 3 for download. I just got a new laptop and wanted to install Flex Builder 3 because I am still working with projects that are based on it. Searched all over for the official download but had to hit a 3rd party site that referenced the link below.

Still works at the time of this post (6/14/10): http://download.macromedia.com/pub/flex/flex_builder/FB3_win.exe

Adobe is making it difficult to find past versions of Flex Builder as they want you to upgrade to Flash Builder 4.

This past week I was able to write a small application with the Flex 4 API and FlashBuilder. I have quite a bit of previous experience with Flex 3. As a side note, it seems that the name change from FlexBuilder to FlashBuilder came about to emphasize the new integration capabilities with Adobe’s new Catalyst product. Catalyst advertises as a visual (no code) designer tool to create composite applications with existing Photoshop, Fireworks and Illustrator artifacts. These can then be imported with FlashBuilder into your Flex 4 projects.



One of the major changes is an entirely new set of UI components called Spark. These will take a little bit of getting used to as you create separate mxml files (FXG Flex 4 XML Skinning markup) to handle visual aspects of your components. Once you get a grasp of this new architecture it will become apparent how much easier it will be to skin your custom components and work with state. This will also enable the separation of the visual design from the component. You can now have someone that specializes in visual design more easily skin components. This is also where Catalyst comes in to work with FXG to create your skinning.



Another aspect that I really like is the ability to continue to use Flex 3 objects with Flex 4. This will allow you to gradually integrate some of the new features. A piece of advice though is to remember which component group you are using. For instance, MX RadioButton events are not always captured by a Spark RadioButtonGroup. Make sure you are always paying attention to your name spaces:

Spark Component

<s:RadioButton/>

MX Component

<mx:RadioButton/>

Some of the other aspects that win kudos:

• Two way binding e.g. @{object}. Cuts down the amount of code, that’s always a good thing!
• The new Group and Scroller classes. Using the Group to handle layout while having a defined scroller object makes it easier to work with containers and makes dynamic scrolling easier. For Instance, bring a component into view:
  • Mxml:

    <s:Scroller width="100%" height="100%">
    <s:Group id="content">
    <s:TextInput id="myField"/>

  • ActionScript:

    var myFieldBounds:Rectangle = myField.getBounds (this)
    content.verticalScrollPosition = myFieldBounds.bottom;

• Faster compile times. It is not as fast as Java but it is helping with one of the gripes developers have about Flex.
• Find/Replace across the entire project. Another extremelly useful feature is now part of Flex and FlashBuilder.
• FlexUnit integration, improved refactoring and new data tools are all new features that should make Flex even more enjoyable to work with.

Just scratching the surface with the changes but they do look very positive. Like any tool set there are always frustrating aspects, but all-in-all, I believe Flex is heading in a very positive direction.



Lastly, owning a MacBook Pro allows one to appreciate Apple’s innovation and craftsmanship. Apple’s reluctance to install the Flash player on the iPhone and IPad is problematic for all. There are an enormous amount of websites using Flash and now Flex/Flash applications. There needs to be a meeting of the minds between Steve Jobs and Adobe. Any concerns voiced or changes that need to be made should be in an open and transparent fashion. It will be interesting watching this story play out.

I like seeing Oracle leverage non-Oracle technology, like Adobe Flex and AIR. I hope that trend continues for Oracle…while Microsoft goes off to build things like Silverlight and Apple simply decides to avoid support for Flash altogether on their iPhone and iPad devices. I haven’t played with these widgets myself yet, but I do like the idea and sure we will be leveraging them.

• Click to Download - Oracle Enterprise Manager 11g Desktop Widgets
• Click to Blog - Oracle Enterprise Manager 11g Desktop Widgets

Service Level & Monitoring

High-Load Databases

Target Search & Monitoring

Setting up Windows Native Authentication (with Kerberos) Single Sign-On (SSO) within WebLogic can be tricky. One way to accomplish this is to use IIS to front-end the WebLogic cluster. You need to use an IISIdentityAsserter in this scenario. Using an Identity Asserter based on HTTP headers has security implications and it’s important to ensure the communications are locked down between the IIS front-end to the WebLogic cluster. I don’t have much time to type more about this, but was excited about some recent work and wanted to get a quick post up in reference to this.

Like me, some people may have gotten excited about using XMLFOREST in SQLX, only to find that NULL values result in altogether MISSING elements, as opposed to simply EMPTY elements. Many times avoiding printing elements with null values is desired functionality, but in some cases the consumer of the XML might require those elements to generated anyways, with a null value (i.e. [tagname][/tagname]).

Thus, I have found it is easiest to use XMLELEMENT instead of XMLFOREST for these cases. Note: IBM offers a directive to print empty elements for null values, but until Oracle implements such a feature, your best best is probably to leverage XMLELEMENT:

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SELECT xmlforest(a).getstringval() FROM (SELECT 1 a FROM dual);
--returns: <A>1</A>
 
SELECT xmlforest(a).getstringval() FROM (SELECT NULL a FROM dual);
--returns: null
 
SELECT xmlelement("A", a).getstringval() FROM (SELECT 1 a FROM dual);
--returns: <A>1</A>
 
SELECT xmlelement("A", a).getstringval() FROM (SELECT NULL a FROM dual);
--returns: <A></A>

I just can’t wait for Flash on Android…and for Apple’s hand to [hopefully] get forced into supporting Flash as well.

I have seen multiple custom solutions and packaged applications store their SQL outside of stored procedures. I am focusing this article on custom enterprise solutions, which I feel is one of the fastest growing areas in development. Some people who choose to store SQL outside of their database have touted database independence/abstraction, others easier maintenance, and I’m sure many other “excuses” have been communicated. In my opinion, if you have 1) a custom enterprise application and 2) an Oracle database(s) as the backend, all of your SQL — and associated DB logic — should be written, stored, maintained, etc. within Oracle stored procedures. I can dream up very unique scenarios where a valid argument could possibly begin to be made to keep SQL outside — but I think 99% of places that have done this, or will be considering this, really should have kept SQL inside their DB.

I’d like to hear your reasons for maintaining your Oracle SQL outside of Stored Procedures.

I have been somewhat enamored by Google Apps and its potential. Many enterprises have been happy with Exchange for mail, calendaring, contacts, and more. I have been one of those people. However, I have found Google Apps to be getting better and better for use in the enterprise and I will not be surprised to see it begin to take significantly larger chunk of market share from Microsoft over time.

I have been tasked with coming up with a modularized approach for logically separating out an extensive Flex application I am developing. I see Flex 3.4 might have some features I can take advantage of.

The site search game is changing with Google CSE.