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Table of Contents
Digitally signing Adobe AIR applications
Testing the AIR installation
Double-click the AirProject.air file and the AIR installation process will begin (make sure you have the Adobe AIR runtime installed). The first step of the installation process is the Adobe AIR installer displaying the information about the publisher of the code. If you've signed with a self-signed developer license, and since the operating system doesn't trust certificates signed by you, the user will be shown a dialog box announcing that the publisher is UNVERIFIED (see Figure 14). This should cause them all sorts of discomfort and cause them to immediately stop installing your application. However, for testing purposes, this is just fine for you to test your installation. And users living on the edge can still select Install to load your untrusted application.
Figure 14. The verification of an UNKOWN Publisher about to install an application.
However, if you've signed your AIR application with a valid certificate, the user will be presented with an Adobe AIR installation dialog box with a valid publisher identity that should make your users all warm and fuzzy (see Figure 15).
Figure 15. An installation dialog box with a known publisher identity.
That's all there is to signing and installing your Adobe AIR application.
Where to go from here
Adobe offers many options for developing and signing AIR applications. And there's just as many options as to where and how you purchase your certificates (for more information refer to the Adobe AIR documentation for Flash, Flex, and HTML developers). We strongly suggest getting your certificate from Thawte as was done in this article because it's really easy to manage with Firefox, but any class-3, high-assurance certificate should suffice. Remember that VeriSign and Thawte root certificates are installed on all PCs and Macs by default, though.
The process for signing your AIR applications will be the same whether you're using the ADT command line tool, Flex Builder 3, or Dreamweaver CS3 and Flash CS3 with built-in AIR support. First, acquire the certificate from a CA. Then make it available in the proper file format (P12 or PFX), depending on the tool you use. Finally, sign your application from within your Adobe development tool.
Don't wait until the night before you expect to release your product to start worrying about your certificate and signing. Get started right away on procuring your certificate from the CA, and then allow half a day for understanding and getting everything set up within your build process for signing your Adobe AIR application.
