If you use AIR Applications under Windows and all of sudden those apps can’t connect to the internet anymore, make sure that your Internet Explorer is not “Working Offline”. You can check in the Menu of Internet Explorer under Tools -> Work Offline. If it has a checkmark, remove it and your apps should be working fine again.

I’m really suprised that the Windows Version of AIR apparently retrieves it’s Network Capabitilies via Internet Explorer and that this behaviour is in no way documented anywhere. Hopefully Adobe will changes this or atleast make sure that people now about this.

I had the fun opportunity to showcase the newest debugging star in town at the latest Swiss Flash User Group Meeting. The name ?  De MonsterDebugger !

De MonsterDebugger is an open source debugger for Adobe Flash, Flex and AIR. De MonsterDebugger is made in Flex and AIR by design studio De Monsters.

It’s awesome feature-set sure help making debugging fun:

• Tree structure, lets you walk through your entire application on code-level
• Live editing, means you can edit properties and instantly see the effects in your application
• Detailed traces, lets you trace Strings, Numbers, XML, Arrays, Objects with great detail
• Method testing, is very easy as you can run most methods and catch the results instantly

Sounds neat doesn’t it! You won’t let go of it once you used it. I’m sure the SFUG audience thought the same. For some impressions of the presentation click here or click the header image above. Do not pay attention to the picture quality, a friend took em with his iPhone ;).

If you want to check out the slides, make sure to view the presentation over at SlideShare.net .

The 23. Open Meeting of the SFUG is at hand. On March 17, 2009 we meet up at the offices of .nemos once again to discuss our favorite topic, the Flash Platform.

This time Flash veterans will get infos on how they can profit from using Flex and what has to be kept in mind when using Flex. I will be holding a talk about DeMonsterDebugger and why it has become my new absolute favorite debugger. There will also be a talk about what you can do when you mixup AIR with the Wii-Controller.

Also, there will be some steaming hot news concerning the SFUG – so make sure not to miss out on it and drop by!

Here the details to the  talks:

Moving from AS3 to Flex – advantages, hazards, traps (Florian Weil, Liip AG)
At first view developing with Flex looks pretty easy and comfortable for Flash developers. But that Impression is misleading since some features of Flex have to be savoured with caution.
Florian delivers in his talk a conceptional view into the Flex Framework und shows up when it makes sense to use Flex and what hurdles there are to master when switching from Flash to Flex.

DeMonsterDebugger – monstrously mighty Flash Debugging (Sandro Ducceschi, Liip AG)
A new Debugger has rised to stardom in the Flash world and has quickly become THE tool for squashing them nasty bugs. Name? DeMonsterDebugger! Sandro shows us just how much horsepower the new Debugger is sporting and how it aided him while developing his recently opensourced Twitter API, Tweetr.

Wii-controlled AIR-Games (Marcel Vogt, .nemos GmbH)
That AIR is not only awesome to develop RIA’s, but also for Game development will be shown by Marcel by presenting a current project of his. He combines Box2D with the WiiFlashServer to develop a Game, in which the Wii Wheel and also the Balance Board are used.

Everyone interested and fascinated by the Flash Platform (Flash, Flex, AIR etc) are warmly weclome to drop by:

When: Tuesday, March 17, 2009 – 19.00 till 21.30
Where: .nemos GmbH, Eichstrasse 25, 8045 Zürich
Cost: none at all!
How to get there: From HB Zürich with the S-Bahn 10 (18.26h) till Station Binz

On Friday we decided to go to Aarau and our bestest of friend Yann (who’s family anyway by now ;) ) came with us. Weather was awesome nice and we had a great day! Also Yann gave me a early Birthday gift. A digital Camcorder! What a crazyhead! I love him! Check out the pictures we took from that day. Isabella sure loved her Balloon.

On other fronts, i am trying to finish Trader v1 for public release to enter the latest MochiAds Contest.

I also have the possiblity to write a couple Tutorials for pv3d.org which i’m also very excited about.

Workwise i’m stuck with javascript/css work and can’t wait to get my hands dirty again with actionscript/flex. As we speak of Actionscript/Flex, the Adobe Air Camp also left me quite inspired to make ample use of AIR in forthcoming projects. More on that topic soon.

Last but absolutely not least, Michel and I will merge our knowledge and deliver it for your reading pleasure over at bytesforbreakfast.com , which will become our technical blog. So make sure to check it out regularly ;)

• CSS Changes
• New Header Rotation Script (Header Image has Title tag to show who’s it from and the name , also is able to show swf’s now
• Couple new Headergraphics (including my alltime favorite, Döner Logo)
• Added Lightbox for Pictures
• Fixed some minor JS Problems

In other news – i have set up a pastebin at http://pastebin.swfjunkie.com . Something new that needs to be made pretty and useable ;).

Last Friday, we had our L//P autumn trip. This time, we went golfing to Schinznach Bad and afterwards walked uphill to the “Hausberg” of Zurich, the Uetliberg, had a very delicious Raclette there and in general a very good time. As a gadget loving company, we had of course many picture taking people with us, so there are tons of images of the day on flickr.