- What is Apollo?
- What type of applications does Apollo target?
- What are some of the features included in the Apollo alpha?
- What are some of the features that are not included in the Apollo alpha?
- What IDE do I use to develop Apollo Applications?
- What HTML and JavaScript Engine is used within Apollo?
- Why did Adobe choose WebKit
- Where can I find more information on WebKit
- Where can I download Adobe's modifications to WebKit?
- Will Apollo Applications be able to communicate directly with databases?
- Can I reuse existing Flex 2 code in an Apollo application?
- Does Apollo provide an Application update mechanism?
What is Apollo?
Apollo is the code name for a cross-operating system runtime being developed by Adobe that allows developers to leverage their existing web development skills (Flash, Flex, HTML, JavaScript, Ajax) to build and deploy rich Internet applications (RIAs) to the desktop.
Apollo是一种集成 (Flash, Flex, HTML, JavaScript, Ajax)来开发的平台(很多Flex不能做到的事,JavaScript可以做)
What type of applications does Apollo target?
Apollo is targeted at allowing web developers to build and deploy web applications to the desktop. (能创建到desktop,兴奋)
What are some of the features included in the Apollo alpha?
Some of the features included in the Apollo alpha include, but are not limited to:
- Full HTML support within Flex- and Flash-based content.
- Full file I/O API (Flex中只有FileReference,并不提供完全路径,有点郁闷,这下好了)
- Multiple window chrome modes (including native and custom/transparent)
- Native windowing API (partially implemented) (希望它支持更多的API)
- ActionScript/JavaScript script bridging (这点是不是说不需要AS到JS的AMF网关了??)
- Flex components (继承下来了)
- Low-level update APIs
- Icon support
What are some of the features that are not included in the Apollo alpha?
Below is a partial list of features planned for Apollo 1.0, which are not implemented yet in the Apollo alpha:
- PDF support
- Online/offline APIs
- Full top-level HTML application support
- Settings/data persistence APIs
- Drag and drop support (这好东西)
- Copy and paste support (好东西)
- Native file picker dialog boxes (兴奋)
- Full native window support (太好了)
- File extension registration
- Launching an application to handle a file type
- Full control of the right-click menu (不错)
- Transparency in HTML
What IDE do I use to develop Apollo Applications?
You can leverage any existing IDE that you already use for Flash / Flex or HTML / JavaScript development (such as Flex Builder, Eclipse, vim, etc...). Apollo does not require a specific IDE.
We will be releasing a set of command line tools for Apollo that will make it easy for developers to do Apollo application packaging and development via their favorite IDE or editor. You can download an alpha version of these tools in the Apollo SDK.
Basically, you can use anything that creates SWFs or HTML files.
What HTML and JavaScript Engine is used within Apollo?
HTML and JavaScript within Apollo are handled by the WebKit HTML / JavaScript engine.
Why did Adobe choose WebKit
We spent a considerable amount of time researching a number of HTML rendering engines for use in Apollo. We had four main criteria, all of which WebKit met:
- Open project that we could contribute to
- Proven technology, that web developers and end users are familiar with
- Minimum effect on Apollo runtime size
- Proven ability to run on mobile devices
While the final decision was difficult, we felt that WebKit is the best match for Apollo at this time.
Where can I find more information on WebKit
You can find more information on WebKit at:
Where can I download Adobe's modifications to WebKit?
You can download Adobe's changes to WebKit for Apollo Alpha 1 here.
Will Apollo Applications be able to communicate directly with databases?
Apollo 1.0 will not have built in support for communicating directly with databases. However, it will be possible to write Database drivers in ActionScript (leveraging binary or XML sockets), which would allow Apollo applications to communicate directly with a database (both local and remote). (期待中~~~)
Can I reuse existing Flex 2 code in an Apollo application?
Yes. In fact, you should not need to re-write any code to have an existing Flex application run within Apollo, although you may need to write additional code to take advantage of Apollo specific APIs. (这个太棒了)
Does Apollo provide an Application update mechanism?
Yes. Apollo will provide a mechanism to make it easy to update applications. This is partially implemented in the Apollo alpha.