Flash® Professional CS5 Bible

Preface

In 1997, Macromedia acquired a small Web graphics program, FutureSplash, from a company named FutureWave. FutureSplash was a quirky little program with the astounding capability to generate compact, vector-based graphics and animations for delivery over the Web. With Macromedia's embrace, Flash blossomed. In 2005, Adobe Systems, Inc. acquired Macromedia and, in three short years, has successfully integrated Flash into their family of powerhouse graphics, video, and design software. Not only has the Flash platform obtained ubiquity, but Flash content is now more easily created across a wide range of professional software applications. The Flash Player plug-in ships with most major browsers and operating systems. Flash graphics appear not only all over the Web, but also on television and movie screens, on phones, on kiosks, and even in art galleries.

As the Web-surfing public and the development community have continued to demand more of Flash, Adobe has delivered. After Creative Suite 3 was released, Adobe went out into the world and sat with people using its programs to see what they used, what they needed, and how the next generation of Creative Suite tools could support daily workflow and specialize tasks more effectively. The result is a release that promotes expressiveness and enhances efficiency while encouraging best practices in development — a functional and an inspiring combination that has earned rave reviews from visual designers and code-oriented developers at ...