First
and foremost are the sessions, which I divide
into two types; technical and “how
in the world did they do that?” While
the technical sessions are the most useful,
I really look forward to the sessions where
some of the top designers and developers
in the Flash Community (and the world) show
what they have been working on and playing
around with. I am constantly amazed and awestruck
by how designers and developers such as Erik
Natzke, Josh
Davis, and Yugo
Nakamura are able push Macromedia Flash
to its limits and take it in entirely new
directions.
Outside of the sessions, Flashforward is
all about meeting with other members of the
Flash Community. These are people that I
know and respect, but usually don’t
get a chance to actually meet. While I think
the Flash Community is one of the strongest
and most active Macromedia communities, there
is nothing like being able to actually meet
each other and exchange ideas. I think that
this is the biggest benefit of Flashforward
to the community. It allows everyone to get
together and meet each other, and adds a
more personal touch not possible through
traditional means of communication (email,
forums, and so on), which ends up further
strengthening the online community.
Finally, I always look forward to the Macromedia
keynotes at Flashforward. While I usually
know about the contents of the keynotes before
hand, I am always excited about seeing the
community's reactions to the announcements,
sneak peaks, and generally cool stuff that
we show.
My personal favorite was last
year's keynote at Flashforward in New
York. Not only was this the first Flashforward
keynote that I participated in (which is
reason enough for it to be my favorite),
but it was also the world premier of Macromedia
Flash Communication Server MX.
During the keynote, Kevin Lynch showed video
of Doug
Engelbart’s famous 1968
presentation about distributed collaboration
and real-time video in a graphical computer.
In the video, Mr. Engelbart was able to collaborate
with someone remotely using text and video
(remember that this was 1968!). He discussed
his ideas and vision about how technology
could be use to enhance and increase cooperation
and communication (foreshadowing a lot of
what we are seeing today). After the video,
Kevin premiered the Communication Server
by using it to talk with Mr. Engelbart live
using Macromedia Flash Player. The audience
was very excited, and there was a sense that
this was something that could drastically
expand our ability to create new means of
collaboration and communication between individuals.
Flashforward2003 San Francisco
This year’s keynote was just as exciting.
Not only did we give a sneak peak of DevNet
Resource Kit Volume 3, but we also announced
Macromedia Flash Player 6 for Pocket PC.
However, I think that the biggest event was
the announcement of Macromedia
Central, an environment for running Macromedia
Flash based, occasionally-connected applications,
which has the potential to create an entirely
new class of applications, as well as a new
market for developers.
Let’s take a quick look at the announcements:
DevNet Resource Kit Volume 3 Sneak
Peak
I was fortunate enough to be asked to give
a sneak peak of DevNet
Resource Kit volume 3 (DRK 3). We have
launched two DRKs thus far, both of which
have been doing very well. DRK 3 is shaping
up to be the most comprehensive DRK to date.
It contains (in my opinion) the strongest
Macromedia Flash content to date, as well
as a full offering of ColdFusion content
for the first time.
I showed a sample application included on
the DRK, which creates, edits, and manages
RSS XML Feeds. Macromedia actually uses this
application to create our new DevNet
Center RSS Resource feed.
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