Category: MAX
Advanced Database Techniques
And then some...
Sitting in the class by Kenneth Fricklas, and learning a bunch of nifty SQL tricks (SELECT FOR UPDATE), record locking, "Dirty reads" (just fun to say) and how to better use Triggers (INSTEAD OF is hawt I tell you... hawt... [and yes, I spelled that right]). This is definitely worth the price of admission, and it looks like I'll be doing some revisions to the DWfaq database and the store to make my life a little easier :). Also learning some good stuff about how to improve performance and just generally make my apps faster and more efficient. Hopefully you're not all too jealous ;).
Flex
I'm currently sitting in the Macromedia Community College getting a sneak peek of Macromedia Flex, a new "presentation tier solution for enterprise rich internet applications." This is a new Presentation Server on top of a J2EE server (Tomcat, JRUN, Webshphere, etc, etc). A .NET version is in the works :).
Basically flex is an XML tag based language for building a Flash based application. So <mx:Label /> will give you a text label in the flash movie. Toss in <mx:TabNavigator /> and get a tab based flash menu system (sexy I tell you...). Using MXML syntax, heck, even I could write a flash movie application...
Hold your breath... style sheets for Flash... now that's just insane... Flex allows you to style the default components by using style sheets. You can also "skin" the components with a built in skinning API. And if that's now enough, you also get Data Grids, and Data Navigators as well...
Now we just have to wait and find out what it costs ;)
MAX 2003
It's just about that time... MAX 2003 starts on Monday, and in order to keep those you not fortunate enough to make it informed, Macromedia has set up MAXBloggers, an aggregator of all things MAX :).
So I'll be posting my MAX news here, and if you want to see what the rest of the huddled masses think, give MAX Bloggers a shot.