jun :: realeyes

David and I have been teaching Flex at a local college.  Recently David mentioned to a student that he should use a lighter-weight class for a mask than Canvas.  The student asked why.  This brings up a good point.

When you’re using various Flex framework classes, you need to stop and think.  Do I really need the class I’m using or can I get away with something smaller.  One good example is when you’re creating custom MXML components.  Many times a rookie developer will create an MXML component with a Container as the root component when all they really need to do is to make a UI Control the root component.

In the case of the question, when using a mask, a very lightweight class the Sprite could have been used if the student had not needed the mask to participate in the display list.  Otherwise, they could have used a custom class based on UIComponent, vs using the larger Canvas class.

Just to re-enforce David’s point, I created a little POC where I created three custom classes, one based on Canvas, one based on UIComponent, and one based on Sprite.  I did not create any custom code in these classes, they were simply used so that they’d be easier to call out in the Flex Builder Profiler.  Then I profiled the application and here’s a screenshot of the results.

As you can see, there can be significant memory impact when you use classes that are more robust than you need.

That being said, pay attention to the classes you use in your code, and always stop to think, do I really need to use this class, or can I get away with something that is lighter-weight?

I was approached a couple months ago to do a feature on Flash Builder 4 debugging and profiling.  The key was to illustrate the new features and enhancements and to offer nice concise walkthroughs.  So, without further ado, check it out!

http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/articles/flashbuilder4_debugging_profiling.html?devcon=f7

Thanks to all who stayed till the last session of the last day of MAX 2009 to watch my talk “Tackling Memory and Performance in Flash, Flex, and Adobe AIR“. I hope it was worth your while!

Thanks to Jonathan Campos for working together with me on prepping the session on short notice during MAX and talking at the Tuesday session, it was an honor, and pretty fun too.

Here are some links to the assets:

1. Slides/Resource link PDFs

2. FXPs of the demos I used during the talk

3. Resource links page online

Also, for those that couldn’t make it, here’s a screen cast of the presentation which is embedded below.

Along with a new and improved Object References view in the Flash Builder 4 Profiler, there are new and improved settings in the Eclipse preferences.  So now, you can open Eclipse Preferences and go to Flash Builder –> Profiler –> Object References and see the new settings:

By default “Show all back-reference paths” is unchecked and the maximum back-reference paths that will be found is 10. So, if you’re profiling your app and have a strong suspicion that the picture the profiler is painting for you is incomplete, you might want to play around with these settings.

I’d like to thank everyone that attended my Intro to Flex Debugging and Profiling here at CFUnited this morning.  I’m sure the slides will be made available elsewhere later, but here they are for download now.

http://www.iheartair.com/samples/cfunited/267_Jun_Heider_IntroToFlexDebuggingAndProfiling.pdf

As I sit through my layover here at ATL, I continue to put the finishing touches on the Intro to Debugging and Profiling presentation I was asked to do for the CFUnited crew.

My presentation will be on Thursday, 8/13 @9:45am in Sandtrap.

Not only will I be giving a 100 level introduction to Flex debugging and profiling, but I will also be highlighting the new debugging and profiling features in Flash Builder 4.  As a final added incentive, I will be giving away one copy of the book Professional Adobe Flex 3, which I had the pleasure of co-authoring with an excellent team of Flex experts.

See you at CFUnited!

I’ve uploaded the profiling samples I used to walk through memory profiling and performance profiling with the Flex Builder profiler.  (It’s a Flex Builder project archive)

For those of you that attended, you can use the AIR app that was on the USB key to get to the samples. (Just hit the home button)  For those of you that didn’t feel free to download them and the slides from the following page: http://www.iheartair.com/?page_id=197

As far as my thoughts on 360|Flex Indy, it was a very enjoyable conference.  Kudos to Tom and John because they’re big pimpin’ conference organizers!  I enjoyed seeing familiar faces while I was there in addition to meeting new ones.  Although I didn’t get to see as many sessions as I would have liked, the ones I saw were very good and/or entertaining.  Just to give you an idea of the sessions I enjoyed:

• Michael Labriola: Any Which Array but Loose
• Renaun Erickson: Structured Log Testing
• Adam Flater: Merapi is open! (That’s not the title, but here’s the deets.)
• Rich Tretola: Spy Camera Presentation
• Jeremy Saenz: Shedding Skins: Programmatic Skinning in Flex
• Jeff Tapper: How not to code Flex Applications
• Doug McCune: Cool Shit (Censored)

It’s a wrap…thanks again Tom and John!

It’s amazing when you release free software into the wild with the best of intentions, then realize that you’ll have to spend the rest of your time being “billable”. Kind of a bummer really.

On that note, I’d like to say that I’ve had time to come back to a neglected child of mine and do a couple quick updates.  The first was to fix an issue that was happening with the new user registration system.  The other was to update the app.xml, compile it against AIR 1.5, and get the new binaries activated in the site badge.

Hopefully, I’ll get some more time soon to add more features and fixes, but in the meantime, I’ve got a couple of announcements to make:

ANNOUNCEMENT 1

Another parent of REDbug has had a chance to be productive.  David Hassoun aka Mr. Flash Video, has added a Flash Media Server connection tester module to the tool.  It’s pretty neat from what I’ve seen.

ANNOUNCEMENT 2

We’ve been discussing an integration of REDbug and StructuredLogTesting.  I know that things are very early in the development stages, but it’s definitely something to keep your eye on.

Before I go, I just wanted to say if you haven’t had a chance to try REDbug yet, you can find it here: http://redbugtool.com/

Anyway.  I hope to continue to post about new and exciting things in REDbug on a more frequent basis, but if I don’t feel free to hit me up and see what’s up…I’m sure I just got stuck being “billable”.

I was asked to present a 100 level intro on Flex debugging and profiling at the upcoming CFUnited conference. This session will be geared toward those of you just getting started with Flex development.

If you’re going to attend and are interested in what I’ve said so far, here is my session abstract:

If you are new to Flex development and want to be shown the ropes on how to debug and profile your applications, this is the session for you. During this session all aspects of debugging and profiling your applications using Flex Builder and other useful tools will be covered through both oral presentation and live demonstration. By the end of the session you should have a good understanding of the tools available to you for debugging and profiling your Flex applications.

Also, if you’re thinking of going to the conference, you definitely should, there’s a great lineup of speakers with some very interesting sessions.  Here’s the link to register:

http://register.cfunited.com/

This will be my first time at a CFUnited conference so I’m really looking forward to checking it out.  Lately, I spend so much of my time working with Flex and AIR that it’s hard to keep up on all the fancy new stuff in the ColdFusion world, so the CFUnited conference will be my ticket to get up to speed this year.

The 360|Flex crew is preppin’ to throw down the premiere Adobe Flex conference this May.  360|Flex will take place in Indy. Draft 1 of the speaker schedule has been announced, and I’m pleased to announce two things:

1. The schedule’s tight!  It’s full of many interesting talks and some of the best speakers in the industry.  The other cool thing is that this time around they had the community help decide which 50 sessions would grace the schedule.

2. I’m excited to be speaking on Day 3 right after lunch in the integration track room.

My topic is a 200 level topic titled “Flex Application Profiling by Example”. Here’s the the abstract:

“This session will be light on slides and heavy on demonstration.  The session will start with a brief explanation of the concepts that will be discussed and then kick into high gear with demonstrations and live profiling with the Flex Builder Profiler.  During the session the features of the Flex Builder Profiler will be illustrated and light will be shed on how to analyze the data collected by the Profiler.  The goal of this session will be to arm the attendee with the ability to use the Flex Builder Profiler to help increase the responsiveness and decrease the memory consumed by their applications.”

If you know me, you know I’ve been talking about debugging and profiling for a while now.  This time around I’ve taken a queue from the 360 crew and will be structuring this session in a manner consistent with the feedback requests I’ve received from the community over the years.  That being said, take the abstract above as meaning several things:

1. I have 80 minutes, “light on slides” means that I’m gonna shoot for 20 minutes or so of slides and spend the rest of the time using the Profiler in real life!

2. What I mean by “the session will start with a brief explanation of the concepts that will be discussed and then kick into high gear with demonstrations and live profiling” is that I’m not going to spend too much time explaining memory management or profiling theory, heck, I’m not even going to spend too much time discussing the Profiler itself.  Instead I’m going to SHOW you.  Explaination will occur while we’re in the trenches running the Profiler against the sample applications.

3. The most important piece of the abstract is “arm the attendee with the ability to use the Flex Builder Profiler”.  One of the things that I’ve observed throughout my life as a speaker is that many people either know the theory or know that the tool exists.  However, the missing piece is to apply the theory while using the tool. The other thing specific to the Profiler tool is knowing how to analyze what is displayed.  The goal of the session will be to have the attendees walk out the door when it’s over and be able to use the Flex Builder 3/ Gumbo Profiler effectively.

Anyway…that’s what I’m thinking, feel free to comment if you’re planning to attend and want to see anything special.  Other than that, make sure to get yourselves registered up…don’t be that lamo that tries to register after all the tickets are sold out:

http://360flex.eventbrite.com/

See you all in May!