Re: OpenAMF vs Flash MX's internal support for web services.

>
>> enterprise application. I still haven't decided between (1) Flash + 
>> Remoting
>> or (2) Flex / Laszlo,
>
> These aren't incompatible. Flex/Laslo are a way of server side generating
> whatever *.swf lives in the browser. Remoting is just an option to pass 
> data
> back and forth between the *swf (running in the browser) and the server. 
> There
> are several options,  XML, XMLSocket or loadVars, or in Flex/Laslo 
> generating a
> new movie.

O.k, in that case why is Flex such a better way of generating a Flash file 
than the standard way (I assume that there is support within the standard 
macromedia Flash IDE for UI type applications)? Why is it so compelling that 
it warrents such a high price tag?

>> (1) Why would I use the server side Flash Remoting component (or OpenAMF)
>> to talk to a _web service_ when this can be done _directly_ from Flash MX
>> PROFESSIONAL (if I understand correctly)?
>
> I'm a little confused as to your question. Servers don't usually use
> FlashRemoting to talk to each other (though ColdFusion does have this 
> option)
> but if they did, (2) Remoting is a efficent protocol, far quicker than XML 
> as
> it's not as verbose. e.g. here's a person object

I'm not talking about servers using remoting, I'm talking about a server 
running the Flash remoting component. My understand was that remoting was an 
"add-on" to standard Flash and basically consisted of something which ran on 
ther server and talked to all the ressources (Java objects, web services, 
databases, etc) which ran on that server. My question was why would I bother 
buying this when I can (again, this is an assumption) talk to web services 
directly from Flash (professional version).

> <person class="com.blah.person" name="SomeOne" age="23" description="a 
> real
> pain in the arse I've known since high school"/>
>
> if you have 50 people in a request your sending back each of those would 
> be
> identical as the above minus the data changes, meaning you'd have 50
> "description=''". It's really not necessary to send human readible data to
> everything everytime so protocols like Remoting do away with packaging as 
> much
> as possible. Second everything in XML is sent as characters strings which 
> means
> every piece of data has to be converted into an appropriate string value
> (strings are large) and back.

o.k, I'm convinced (and always have been) that binary protocols are more 
efficient than textual ones (i.e. XML). Does anyone else think that XML is 
slightly overused as a technology?

> From the client's perspective of talking to a server with webservice 
> accessible
> (e.g. google) or your server which is consuming the same webserver.
> Performance, mixing results with other data (e.g google results with 
> amazon
> book results) caching, and dross domain issues, the client can't load any 
> data
> from just anywhere.

o.k, so are you saying that if I don't use remoting (AMF) and just stick to 
the standard, built in capability of Flash to communicate with web services 
then I can only communicate with web services which reside on the server 
from where the SWF file was loaded (similar restrictions to applets)?

>> (3) Can I implement method level (or object level) security
>
> yes.  But no I don't think it's built in to the degree you need. There is 
> a xml
> config file which determines what methods are accessible by flash clients. 
> The
> gateway itself is a servlet, with source code available, and can be either
> customized or subclasses to gain session and security handling appropriate 
> to
> your application and that class subclassed to do whatever application 
> logic
> handling you'd like so your not checking session every call.

What I'm looking for is a system which allows me to limit only users who 
have a certain role (e.g. administrator) to access certain methods. Also, I 
don't want to implement logic in each method to check access rights and 
validate credentials.

>> (5) Can I construct a UI using Flash + OpenAMF which looks as 
>> professional
>> and integrates as well with server side components as I could with Flex? 
>> Is
>> the Flash IDE set up for UI design or is it more suited to animations?
>
> OpenAMF has nothing to do with a creation of a UI, just it's data. It's 
> more
> probable in my opinion that Flash IDE is easier to work with to create 
> complex
> user interfaces, but I haven't used Flex before, nor do I really need that
> capability to construct a UI out of whatever XML. None of the applications 
> I
> use change that much, or at least in a fashion that I can't do with 
> appropriate
> architecture design.

Which would make one ask what the compelling reason to invest in Flex is: I 
mean I'm sold on the concept of Flash + remoting for a rich thin client, but 
what's the advantage of Flex @ $12,000?

Dominic.

> =====
> Troy Gardner -"How you live your seconds, is how you live your days, is 
> how you live your life..."
>
> http://www.troygardner.com -my world
> http://www.troyworks.com - building Rich Internet Applications
> http://www.intrio.com -helping bridge the gap between the humans and 
> machines. Home of the FlickeyT
>
>
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