Comments for FlashCanon

Comment on One dev’s fluff is another dev’s lesson by Joeflash

Joeflash — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 05:55:54 +0000

We faced this issue when writing Professional Adobe Flex 3. The way which I and some of my co-authors solved it — since I aware of this issue from years of reading Flash books, as a beginner right through to where I am now — is to take a topic most would consider basic, like, say, using MXML and ActionScript together, and write about it in more depth than most sources do.

For instance, even though it is not considered good practice, most beginners and some advanced people might not be aware that you can code actionscript right inside of an MXML property tag. What Moock did with basic ActionScript when he wrote Essential ActionScript 3.0 is what makes this book a well-read classic to this day, nearly four years later, and probably won’t be obsolete for some time to come.

So it is possible to write a book for a wide range of skill levels. And yeah, the beginner will be intimidated by some topics, and the advanced reader will skim through some stuff. A tech writer needs to be an extremely detail-oriented person and know how to communicate that detail in a way that is succinct and useful.

If the book is intended for a different skill levels, then two things need to be left out: step-by-step instructions in basic how-to style, unless you’re describing an uncommonly known technique. And describing topics without any code: your advanced users may be able to follow, but intermediate and beginners will be thoroughly annoyed.

On the other hand, the author needs to avoid the temptation of “code dumps,” or pages and pages of code which do not directly contribute to the technique described: it bores the hell out of advanced readers who already got the point five pages ago, and annoys the beginners, who may actually think they have to type all that in. Give enough code to cement the concept, and the reader can go to the download site for the full application (although we do have a bit of a whopper on page 510 that slipped by

Comment on Flash Advertising cover art by Jason

Jason — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 05:50:10 +0000

Thanks Chris!
Yeah, it was kinda sad to find out that there are people out there who will give a book a 1 star rating based on the cover and then go on to admit that they don’t own it and won’t read it because they don’t like the cover. Very odd.

Comment on Flash Advertising cover art by Chris Griffith

Chris Griffith — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 05:21:10 +0000

Wicked. I like it much more than the previous edition’s cover. Maybe fewer Amazon Trolls will come out of their dank caves to rail against it…maybe.

Comment on ClickTagger by Dimitree

Dimitree — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 09:52:26 +0000

Thanks for this! It s about time we start using the privileges of AS3 in the banner campaign field.

Comment on ClickTagger by Jason

Jason — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 01:41:50 +0000

Thanks Bodie! It’s too bad that they lag behind like they do, but I think there are a few here and there that can be convinced if asked. Hopefully the number of them will start to increase soon.