MX 2004 - is it worth the switch? 1

[Bignewbie]

guys,

I have downloaded the trial version of Flash MX 2004. It utilizes the new Flash Player 7. How many users do you think will have this player running?

My graphics guy says he wont switch to the mx 2004. What do you think? Im in the brink here coz i think there is better coding manipulation in mx 2004 and im the script guy! and the interface looks better than mx.

biggie



The Man of Tomorrow is forged by his battles today.

 

[oldnewbie]

I think Wangbar expressed it best in this thread...

thread250-637554 agree, especially about his last statement!

Regards,

 

[wangbar]

I have now switched but due to the pressure of work I'm basically using it as MX with a different interface, pretty much what happened when I switched up from 5.

In general I found that big clients were hard to convince about MX, I'm still doing a lot of Flash 5 work to this day, whereas it was easy to convince them to switch up to 5 from 4 because ActionScript leaped forward so dramatically.

My feel is that nobody's going to touch 2004 for a while commercially, although the CSS support might swing things and get the new version adopted more readily than MX because it opens the abilities of Flash as a rich media client up considerably.

ActionScript 2 rocks though ;-) and it compiles down to MX bytecode so you can write proper classes etc leading to better code structure and reuse without having to force anyone to upgrade their plug-in.

One thing I have found though is that the actions window seems to be very slow to update when you're editing - after two or three hundred lines of code it really grinds, anyone else noticed this?

 

[Bignewbie]

wangbar,

i haven't written over 200 lines of code (fortunately!) and i have just downloaded the trial version of flash mx 2004. needless to say i havent noticed anything like that. You must be a very hardcore coder to come up with 300 lines of code in one flash movie in one setting (frame, button or something else).

I know my boss won't be happy if i recommend a switch. I would really like to though, this new version rocks! Another concern to this is the ie player. how long does it take to download? my boss is real sensitive to this.

biggie

The Man of Tomorrow is forged by his battles today.

 

[wangbar]

The player's big. It's the first time Macromedia have said the download may take 'one or two minutes' - before it was always 'under one minute'

I think the player size may cause some problems with uptake - also on some systems it requires a restart which is a real blow.

Mind you, once you've got it, it is so much faster and smoother.

Tell your boss that you can still get it but publish everything out as MX or 5. It gives you time to get familiar with the program and the new ActionScript and stuff so that when the world catches up you're ready to produce 2004 content (in 2006) ;-)

 

[choCan]

I just upgraded to mx2004 - I am having trouble with the components... changehandler disappeared... don't know where it is... I am actually glad I kept a copy of mx - due to some urgent project - I am back to mx.... if you have time to read all the in/out I would switch.. the interface is much more sophisticated... however, if you don't have time read all the "new" features... I suggest you stay with what you got...

 

[billwatson]

i already made the switch as a client decided that 2004 was what they wanted. they have very large data handling requirements and 2004 i have discovered is light years away from mx in this regard.

personally i would have waited until what macromedia calls emerging issues (bugs) were ironed out but he who pays the piper.

agree with wangbar. programming in as2 is a joy after pluging away with the scripting language that was as1.

its a matter of choice i reckon but upgrading to 2004 pro is something you will have to do eventually.