ActionScript.com launched their ActionScript Reference library this week. Complete with user contributed notes. Its a joint venture between several Flash resource sites, and many of the top ActionScripers in the community.
Building a reference for ActionScript has been something that the community has talked about for many years, and Macromedia has failed to deliver the reference resource so many developers and designers have been wanting for.
True, Macromedia have their ActionScript Dictionary, but that reference is both unsearchable and un-noted. Not allowing for user feedback to the dictionary is a strange move from a company that in all other aspects seems connected to the Flash developer community.
My best guess: If ActionScript.com manages to pull together the community to make a good resource, expect to see it picked up by MM at some point. OR, MM might just realize how lacking their own dictionary is today, and make a better resource for the developers.
he, he… Just wrote a similar story:
http://www.flashmagazine.com/html/836
I totally agree with you.
J:-)
FYI,
First of all, kudos to ActionScript.com. They are building a great resource.
Second, we had actually begun a project along these lines with one of the major community sites, but for various reasons it fell through.
Third, we have been transitioning over to this type of documentation on our site. See:
http://livedocs.macromedia.com
Of course, with all of the products that we have, this takes time. Expect to see products / docs listed at the link above.
mike chambers
[email protected]
Hi Mike,
LiveDocs is at least something, but it’s nowhere near the quality or speed that php.net offers… The “gold” at PHP.net is in the comments and how easy it is to find answers, not the docs themselves.
LiveDocs are not searchable at all. Copy any phrase from the docs and try to find it in the MM search and you’ll see that anything but what you need pops up. When a new version of CF arrives, a new set of docs are added instead of merged. Nobody will read that golden comment in the CF5-docs when the CF6.1 docs are available even if the tag never changed. To find anything in LiveDocs, I have to click and click and it’s hard for me to find what I’m looking for.
If I want info on arrays in PHP, I simply type http://www.php.net/array in the adress field of my browser and there it is – all I need. I’m sorry to say so, but LiveDocs cannot compare at all…
When I have a problem, It’s very seldom that I find the answer at Macromedia.com. I usually find what I need somewhere in the FlashCoders archives. They’re hard to search, but full of “gold”.
That said, the technote-system is really good at MM.com (but it does not replace a good documentation)
J