Page 1 of 4 In my everyday programming as a Flex and Flash Platform developer, it's up to me to keep tabs on the best tools to enable me to do my work with the greatest ease and with the most efficiency. In other words, call it lazy or efficient, I just want to be able to code with the greatest of ease so I can focus more on building and less on typing.
In this tutorial, we're going to solve the challenging task of getting two of the most impressively featured Flex IDEs, Flex Builder and FDT, to work seamlessly in the same workflow, in the same eclipse installation, and even in the same project. The Flex coding workflow holy grail, one might say. So that when you're coding a Flex project, you have a choice of using the incredible code intelligence features of FDT, or the native features of Flex Builder, in the same project.
Note: this is an advanced tutorial, so you need to be familiar with using Eclipse-based tools.
Look Ma, FDT compilation with Flex Builder design view!
Like most Flex developers, I use Flex Builder — soon to be renamed Flash Builder — as my default tool of choice, simply because it integrates well with an MXML development workflow, and has specific features, such as Design View and the Flex Profiler, that make my job easier than using a third-party editor.
If you are migrating to Flex Builder as a Flash developer, Flex Builder is quite a step up in coding capability: it has context hinting, auto-import additions, file diff, code bookmarking and other features, and being based on Eclipse means an entire community of third-party plugins are available. But if you are coming to Flex Builder from another mature coding IDE, one of the most important things that may strike you as missing is no snippet or live code templating support. Several third-party Eclipse plugins exist, but they either involve programming in a pseudo-language, which to me defeats the purpose of a snippet or template shortcut, or they lack keyboard and/or variable support, which renders the feature useless in my opinion.
For most people, this alone is enough for many Flash and Flex developers to use a third-party editor such as FDT. The entire market focus of Powerflasher FDT resides upon giving ActionScript developers extremely intelligent coding tools, and the list of features is actually quite impressive. Which makes a lot of AS3 coders happy, and many will swear by it and use nothing else. If you've not yet caught the FDT bug, you will soon after using it: the kind of code intelligence this IDE offers is addictive, and soon you will be coding faster, more efficiently, and you can't live without it. I mention this not to promote FDT necessarily, but to illustrate the allure for many developers.
The problem is, until recently, even though FDT uses the Flex SDK for compilation of AS3 projects, it did not have MXML support or many other application-building features we take for granted in Flex Builder. This has been partly solved with the release of FDT 3.2, which has MXML support, but this feature is still in its early stages.
So, to enumerate, FDT has:
Flex Builder 3 has:
And coming later this year, Flash Builder 4 will have:
So FDT is not going to be replacing Flex/Flash Builder any time soon, nor will it likely, and it's doubtful that Flex Builder will ever be a match for FDT's coding enhancement features.
Thus far most Flex developers have had to live with the following dilemma: should I code in FDT and forsake some of the native Flex Builder tools, or code in Flex Builder and forsake some significant coding intelligence?
But what if you could use both IDE feature sets, simultaneously?
Although it can be challenging to set up, it is indeed possible to use both Flex Builder and FDT, in the same workflow, in the same eclipse installation, and even within in the same project.
This tutorial will show you how.
Keywords
eclipse, fdt, flex builder, flash builder, ide, workflow, flex, actionscript, code editing
