Flex 3 Cookbook

Chapter 23. The Adobe Integrated Runtime API

Included in the Flex SDK are classes that can be used to develop applications for the desktop targeting the Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR). Adobe AIR is a cross-platform runtime that lets developers leverage existing web technologies to bring the Rich Internet Application experience to the desktop. The AIR runtime provides a consistent cross–operating system environment that enables developers to create applications targeting the Adobe AIR platform and eliminates the need to build and deploy separate applications for different operating systems. While the AIR framework affords you the capability to create HTML and Ajax-based desktop applications, the examples in this chapter focus on leveraging the Flex Framework.

To run applications targeting the AIR platform, you first need to install the runtime, which can be found on the Adobe website at http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/air/. Applications that are run within the Adobe AIR runtime can be installed and accessed like any other native desktop application.

Creating AIR applications leveraging the Flex Framework is similar to creating Flex applications targeting the web browser. Included in the Flex 3 SDK are classes that let you interact with the file system, the operating system clipboard, and a local database, to name just a few of the capabilities available from the AIR API. To package AIR applications into an installer file, you need an application SWF file and an application descriptor ...