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Christophe Coenraets

Christophe Coenraets

Adobe

Table of Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. Using HTTPService
  3. Using RemoteObject
  4. Using WebService
Created:
26 October 2004
User Level:
Intermediate
Products:
Flex

Exchanging Complex Data with Back-End Systems

Retrieving server data in a Macromedia Flex application is generally easy and demonstrated in many sample applications. Sending complex data back to the server can be slightly more involved, however.

Depending on your role, and on the structure of your development team, you may have the luxury to choose—or at least influence—the architecture used to exchange data between the client and the server: web services, XML over HTTP, or remote method invocation.

In a service-oriented architecture, however, it is also likely that your application will have to access services that you didn't build and over which you have no control. In that case, you have to use the data exchange architecture implemented by the service provider.

This article takes a close look at different strategies to send complex data to the server using the three data services available in Flex to accommodate the heterogeneous data access requirements of your application: HTTPService, RemoteObject, and WebService.

Requirements

To complete this tutorial you will need to install the following software and files:

Macromedia Flex

Macromedia Flash Player

A text editor or Macromedia Flex Builder

Tutorials and sample files:

Prerequisite knowledge:

Basic experience with the Flex programming model and application framework.

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About the author

Christophe Coenraets is a Technical Evangelist for Adobe where he focuses on rich Internet applications and enterprise integration. He has been working on Flex since the early days of the product in 2003. In his previous role at Macromedia, Christophe worked on JRun, the company's J2EE application server. Before joining Macromedia, Christophe was managing Java and Internet applications evangelism at Sybase. Christophe has been a regular speaker at conferences worldwide for the last 15 years. He blogs at http://coenraets.org.