Macromedia Flash 8 @work: Projects and Techniques to Get the Job Done: Projects You Can Use on the Job [Paperback]

I was very pleasantly surprised to find this book. I've enjoyed Mr. Kerman's books in the past, they're always very informative and practical. And I think that's the key: practical. I like using Flash and I love making Flash projects, but I find ActionScript a really cumbersome language. It's no Ruby. That's fine, but I don't want a book that's cumbersome too.

Creating Flash projects over and over again, you definitely realize there are certain patterns to your work. You need video, you need a preloader, you need to parse XML files, etc. A lot of books try to cover everything available to a Flash programmer and end up really telling you very little. By focusing in on what's important, Mr. Kerman has written something very close to a masterpiece in the field.

Chapter 1 is an excellent overview of the new features in Flash 8, and frankly I wasn't even aware of half of them because Macromedia doesn't really emphasize the new features of the ActionScript language, they emphasize the authoring environment and the visuals. Chapter 2 is an overview of constructing a real-world Flash project and it is priceless. You become a great Flash developer when you see how a Flash project is really just a lot of pieces put together. You learn in this chapter how to break apart your projects, how to arrange content, and so forth. It's an excellent prelude to the rest of the book.

The rest of the chapters of the book (and contents of the CD-ROM) cover eight projects similar to the types of real-world projects I've been doing lately. I'm not going to cover them all, they're all really good, but let's take some examples from the Portfolio chapter. This is an excellent example of what's great about this book. This chapter takes you through building modular components that you put together to make a portfolio. The thumbnails are separate from the larger views, and they are separate from the chapter navigation. You don't build one project, really, but as many as you want! You can combine these things as much as you want. And when you're ready, dig into the libraries that you didn't have to study in detail. You have worked up from a great foundation, but you're well entitled to play with the foundation too, if you want!

If you find yourself building Flash projects, especially websites, that are of any real size, you should really get a copy of this book. The writing is great, the code is solid and the possibilities are endless. And for this price it's a downright bargain.

Finally, a really great book on Flash 8!

I debated whether to give it 4 stars or 5 stars, at the end I gave it 5. Here is the run down of the book:

What this book does NOT do:
- Teach you how to create an API.
- Teach you Flash 8 from beginner to expert (this is NOT a tutorial or anything similar)
- Teach you ActionScript

What this book does do:
- Give you working APIs for real projects.
- Explain to you how to work with the particular APIs.
- Get you thinking about ActionScript as a full featured programming language.
- Get your work done, hiding in the API a lot of the complexity.
- Saves you time.

If you are looking for a tutorial on flash, you will find many, though I haven't been particularly impressed by any Flash tuotrial book up to date. And this book was never set to be a tutorial, it goes straight to the project.
I would highly recommend this book for those busy professionals that have a lot of projects come up and who don't have the time to learn yet another programming language. I consider myself at an intermediate level in flash, but a beginner in Actionscript.
Phillip Kerman did a very good job in providing several "projects and techniques to get the job done". Which was what he set up to do with this book, and hence he gets 5 full stars. This book saved me about 20-30 hours of research and coding I would have required to create a couple of projects.

If you are looking for a tutorial on Flash 8 or Actionscript stay away from this book. However, if you are looking for high quality, working Flash 8 code that you can customize for your own projects, it would be hard to find a better one.

My overall feeling on this book is that it is great guide for those readers transitioning from one skill set in Flash to another. While it is ok for beginners it is best you have had some experience with Flash before reading this book as it is designed more to make existing users better then getting newbies up to speed in a hurry. The author uses a most practical perspective in each chapter to solve common problems and makes it a point to highlight best practices and the common pitfalls to avoid and why. In this way the he carries the reader through the logical reasoning behind each technique so that one can relate the more complex and technical aspects of programming to the visual design elements with which you are already familiar.

There are many examples where the author shows how various techniques can be achieved without programming in the timeline, which some readers may be more comfortable with, and he then shows how the same goal is accomplished with programming for comparison. He takes the sensitive tone of a mentor as he shares his insight on the benefits and drawbacks of each approach in order to help the reader decide which may be best for their own projects.

Those wanting to jump into scripting have the benefit of the file templates provided on the CD-ROM. The book walks through the design and construction of each project. Completed samples are provided with the book and more templates are available for download from the author's web site,. This way you can focus on the concepts of design and construction or the details of implementation depending on your needs and interests.

If you have a background in JavaScript programming or you have been doing ActionScript 1 for some time this book provides assistance with project design and architecture. Many of the examples and templates make use of custom classes and Object Oriented Programming with ActionScript 2. In my personal opinion practical examples are about the best way to pick up a new language. Between the guidance in each chapter and the example files, a causal script writer can easily go from copying code snippets that create nifty visual effects to writing their own from scratch.

Whenever possible the author encourages the reader to remember the end user's experience as they develop their design. He points out how the use of visual effects should enhance the experience of the content for the user and not distract from it. He also shows how the techniques in programming and some practical steps in authoring can be leveraged in other projects, thus saving time and effort.

I think that the practical project based approach used in the book and the author's familiar and casual tone is really what distinguishes it. It makes the large range of topics easier to absorb and many of the concepts and techniques used to develop each project are indicative of what is required for most website and e-learning applications. Regardless of your focus and reasons for using Flash, this book will help you to expand your skills and provide a useful reference as you embark on new territory with your own projects.