Adobe Flash API ported to Dart

by cnp • 14 years ago

62 36 14 years ago

noduerme• 14 years ago

This is a nice project, but I think it's a stretch to call it a port of the Flash API. At this point, HaXe+Jeash is a much more complete framework for bringing AS3 code to JS, and makes it pretty easy to port relatively simple projects. The framerate here is impressive and it seems this could be a good alternative to Jeash down the road. Still there's a lot more work to be done here (not least, flash.net.*) and having to rewrite core code in Dart is more labor intensive than porting into HaXe...

gauravk92• 14 years ago

AS3 -> Dart -> JS, a bit much don't you think? I'm not sure who is trying to use a web stack three levels deep and dart based no less. I'm skeptical of how long dart is going to last at google, but this is definitely an impressive piece of work regardless. If it was AS3 -> JS and worked as well as it does now, i feel the web would collectively lose its shit. Unfortunately though this is tied to google, and i don't think many people want to be stuck being supported solely by google anymore.

frenchfries• 14 years ago

agreed. Dart even though it has some awesome features, is still a technology preview, so I also wonder when it will be "stable" (some apis aren't "finished" yet) and it's a Google only thing. On the project's github page, you can read "The problem with JavaScript is that it sucks." ... JavaScript sucks if you don't know how it works, just like another language ... and what's the point of writting this when Dart itself compiles to JavaScript (who the fuck uses Dartium as their primary browser), finally the demo throws 18 errors ... fail.

detst• 14 years ago

> so I also wonder when it will be "stable"

It should be out of technology preview later this year.

> JavaScript sucks if you don't know how it works

It's possible to understand JS and want better. I think the people behind V8 and Dart know how JS works.

> what's the point of writting this when Dart itself compiles to JavaScript

What's the point of writing anything in any language? The Dart VM will be included with Chrome and other browsers are free to include one, too; Dart->JS is for browsers that don't and the goal is that it'll perform similar to hand-written JS.

> who the fuck uses Dartium as their primary browser

Nobody. It's for development until the Dart VM is included with Chrome.

novalis4• 14 years ago

"finally the demo throws 18 errors ... fail."

I just runned it on FireFox and Chrome, and it didn't have a single error, you running the demo on what browser ? Did you even run the demo ?

This is a good start for anyone wanting to learn what Dartium is: http://arstechnica.com/business/2012/02/google-has-released-...

Stay happy.

andrewfelix2• 14 years ago

Agreed. I would be inclined to invest my energy in a new platform that was built for HTML5 from the get go.

This might be useful as stop-gap. But I would hate to bug-test anything built using this method.

mxxx• 14 years ago

think of all the AS3 developers starting to feel left out in the cold now that Adobe's walking away from Flash.

while i'd agree that now's probably the time to jump into JS and HTML5, some people think Dart has a future, and I guess this opens up its potential market.

Jimmie• 14 years ago

>AS3 -> Dart -> JS, a bit much don't you think?

That's not what this is. The API has been ported, they haven't written a AS3 -> Dart compiler.

emillon• 14 years ago

Still, it's an indirection because AS3 primitives are not Dart primitives.

esbwhat2• 14 years ago

I've never used it, but jangaroo seems promising

http://www.jangaroo.net/home/

Example:

http://www.jangaroo.net/files/examples/flash/open-flash-char...

DanielRibeiro• 14 years ago

Easeljs does this pretty well, but in pure js:

http://easeljs.com/

joneil• 14 years ago

Haxe (www.haxe.org) also has ported a decent subset of the API, and can simultaneously target Flash, JS and C++ (native). Not sure about who has better coverage of the full API.

novalis4• 14 years ago

Just to add; and through the Haxe NME framework it compiles to Android and iOS targets.

chipsy• 14 years ago

Haxe itself is pretty solid and is gaining steam almost every day now.

NME is not as easily recommended. It has very high coverage, and it's shipped a few products as demonstrated in the showcase, but the build process still shows immaturity; the Flash target is wonderfully consistent, but other targets remain pretty fragile. The general trend is "better with time" though.

phn• 14 years ago

Haxe is nice, but it is still not as transparent as one could hope. The differences in the way its various targets work make this understandable. Still, it still isn't "code once, run everywhere".

The main problem seems to be flash is really directed to pixel/bitmap manipulation. While on cpp/OpenGL that is extremely slow, and you have to use something like a Vertex Buffer Object.

The end result is that you probably will still have to keep two (at least) separate rendering paths if you want to support all targets.

That being said, the fact that the mobile platforms (android and iOS) are the same target (cpp), together with desktop (osx, linux and windows) makes it a very nice platform for developing a game. IMO the html5 target is the weakest link at this point.

wwweston• 14 years ago

Makes sense; Dart is a closer heir to Flash/AS3 and Java than it is to JavaScript, and there's still a lot of people out there with Flash skills who're experienced building RIAs. It's a fairly natural place for them to go.

bp744• 14 years ago

Thanks for sharing the link! I'm the author of the library and the demos. It's great to see some positive feedback. You can also check out some samples (i like the mask sample most):

Samples: http://www.dartflash.com

Source: https://github.com/bp74/dartflash/tree/master/samples

Some words about the Dart language. It's great to work with this new langauge and much more fun compared to javascript which is a pain when you come from the ActionScript/Java/C# world. In Dart you feel at home right from the start. Google is very much committed to the project and we will see pretty amazing things in the future. Of course the Chrome browser (Desktop and Android) will support the Dart VM in the future. The dart2js compiler allready works great and has improved a lot over the last weeks.

TazeTSchnitzel6• 14 years ago

I'm not a big fan of Dart. From what I've seen, Dart code is far more ugly than JS or AS3, and it produces absolutely massive JS output.

pjmlp• 14 years ago

Agreed, JavaScript can have its quirks, but at least you don't need to read tons of generated code underneath, when trying to debug code.

TazeTSchnitzel6• 14 years ago

Yeah. Thing with Dart is that its goals seem misleading. Google's complaints don't seem to be anything to do with faults of JavaScript, more the fact it isn't like languages they know. They want it to be C or Java, essentially.

JS has flaws, of course, but reacting by trying to make a completely different paradigm language that compiles to it seems a bit of an overreaction.

bp744• 14 years ago

Well, you should see it from another point of view. You write and debug(!) your application in Dart, later you compile it to JavaScript. The dart2js team tries very hard to generate code that runs just like the Dart code does in the VM. Look at the JS-code like the binary code you get from a c++ compiler. There are hardly any people debuging the generated machine code in c++ right?

I have allready written tons of Dart code, and i have to admit there were a few issues with the JS-code regarding cross browser compatibilty (btw. it is easy to read the generated js-code). Those issues were problems in the dart2js compiler because it's a alpha-version right now. The dart2js team fixed all those bugs. As soon as the compiler will finally ship we will rely on the generated output - no need to debug "assembly language".

esbwhat2• 14 years ago

The example game keeps crashing for me after playing a bit in Firefox.

if you want to code html5 flash, I hear another alternative is jangaroo

89a• 14 years ago

Just what we need, a way for Flash developers to be even more lazy.

andrewfelix2• 14 years ago

What's lazy about Flash development?

cnp2• 14 years ago

Yeah, please elaborate?

novalis4• 14 years ago

If only they were all a bit more like you, so productive with your dead on zing commentary. And by "on" I meant "beat". We can only dream.

Adobe Flash API ported to Dart

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