My Milieu of Musings

As an Adobe Instructor, I often deal with debugging student code.  Often, mistakes are a result of simple typos.

When I was teaching advanced ActionScript 2.0 curricula, I strongly advocated using SE|PY.  It essentially examined the open file (usually a class file) and implemented IntelliSense based on what was typed previously within the file.  By simply choosing from the dropdown list, attentive students were able to avoid simple typos.

Unfortunately, SE|PY didn't do so well with ActionScript 3, often suggesting method calls that corresponded to ActionScript 2.0 instead of 3.0.

A reference to FlashDevelop came across my RSS feeds.  I marked it for later investigation, and promptly forgot about it.  On a whim, I went and checked it out while students were working on a self-directed lab.  After about 5 minutes, my interest was peaked enough to download it and try it out.  After 10 minutes of using it, I was sold.

Similar to FlexBuilder, it introspects all your class files as well as the build-in classes, automatically finding and registering those core classes.  The IntelliSense actually examines declared function-scoped variables, properties and methods--a different (and probably superior) method than what SE|PY uses.

But probably even better is the ability to convert public properties to privates with implicit getters/setters with a single keystroke.  Now there is no more excuse for lazy programming.  I am finding that my Value Objects now consist exclusively of private properties accessed via getter/setter (or only getter, depending on the case).  I also get no more moans/groans from students when I ask them to create a new VO, complete with getters and setters--the app sets up the class file, they declare the props, and with a few keystrokes, the entire VO is knocked out, typo-free.

The only criticism I have is that it inconsistently imports classes.  Sometimes, when I pull in a singleton class, the class is automatically imported when I select the class name via IntelliSense.  However, when creating event handlers, the Event (or MouseEvent, ResultEvent, etc.) are not imported.  However, for a product that is still in beta, I guess one cannot expect the world.