The Apollo runtime, which was first announced and released as alpha back in March, will let you deploy Flex-enhanced browser pages onto Windows, Macintosh, and eventually, Linux desktops. And as part of the release, Adobe is formally branding Apollo, which was a code name, with the more official Adobe Integrated Runtime, or AIR.
New features in the Adobe AIR beta include will include SQLite, an open source embedded relational database that will be bundled with the framework; the ability to interact with PDFG documents; and some additional integration with Flex. Other new features coming with the beta include transparent HTML windows, drag and drop support, and complete access to Adobe AIR and Flash APIs for Ajax developers.
Adobe’s next beta version of the Flex framework is adding new UI capabilities, enhanced developer productivity, desktop deployment and enterprise testing and performance tools. And with the new Flex beta, Adobe is also unleashing the first beta of its recently announced code-named Apollo cross-platform run time counterpart, and formally branding it the Adobe Integrated runtime (AIR).
Developers building AIR apps can use any Ajax framework. Furthermore, the Adobe Labs developer site is now offering a tool that can deliver Dreamweaver projects as Adobe AIR applications.
Most of AIR are open source, including the Webkit HTML engine, the ActionScript Virtual Machine (Tamarin project) and SQLite local database functionality. Adobe did not disclose if or when it would make the rest of AIR open source.
The new Flex beta, version 3, adds primarily incremental enhancements. The highlight is the ability to import assets form Adobe’s Creative Suite 3, the flagship web design tool that includes the well known Dreamweaver web authoring tool.
Both tools are being released as open source betas this week, and are expected to enter general release in Q4.
