AIR33 Where is it?

[Leo Kanel]

Is it me or AIR33 Beta is delayed? We are a few days before April and there is no beta version yet. It looks like the 1st quarter release is missed.

[fredericb99676169]

I need some clarifications about the further developments. I've been using adobe air through animate CC to create games on android and ios. My questions are:

chris.campbell​ ajwfrost75​

1- Who will continue to support and develop Flash Player and AS encapsulated in AIR for android and ios?

2- What about Animate support? Will Adobe continue to support and develop in collaboration with Harman?

Thank you

[Frédéric C.]

For question 2, it has been confirmed Animate support will be maintained: AIR export from Animate CC in the future

[LPRA]

I'm also interested to know about the futur of animate CC as we use animate to create our apps. After 2020 who will support animate CC to build our apps?

[PedroFernandezEteria]

I understand perfectly the frustration of some of you with the treatment that Adobe has given to AIR.

But what I do not understand is those who are already happy with another technology, that you have the need to come and show your frustration to the forums ... If I were really happy with this new technology, I would care very little what happens with AIR.

I would change the chip, I would focus on my new developments and the rest would be part of the past.

P.D .: Everyone can come freely to express what they want, of course. I'm just saying that I think it's a waste of time on your part.

[Frédéric C.]

Honestly I think that, for some people here, this definitely goes beyond the scope of mere technology stuff...

[fredericb99676169]

I have a suggestion. For those who started a while ago, you probably created 1024 bits certificates on android and finally ended up to still use old Animate 2015 CC because it's packaged with JRE that still support old certs. It would be great if we find a solution to keep using old certs and new certs.

[bobbyb28776221]

Hi Andrew

I've just read your detailed email about the future of AIR with Harman which sets out how you see the immediate and near-term future of AIR development, and it's great in two ways - first to get such a detailed response at all and also that Harman are taking AIR seriously.

One of the biggest problems with Adobe was uncertainty and lack of communication. They always managed to fix absolutely critical issues (that say prevented being able to submit to the App Store), security issues were being addressed and other bugs were gradually being cleaned up but it never felt like they were really backing it - it felt like the AIR dev team were getting things fixed despite Adobe rather than because of them. This environment allowed fud to thrive (and of course the debacle with Flash didn't help much) and when you see review after review of "the top ten cross platform dev tools" where AIR isn't even mentioned ... and frustrating because the same reviews would be waxing lyrical about things I've been able to do for 10 years or more. Uncertainty makes it hard to stay invested and Adobe never did much about it, so devs have gradually drifted away - in my case to Xamarin for most new projects.

Anyway it's great to see that AIR may get some proper support and I really hope you can rebuild the community around it - you seem to be on top of the communication side and that makes a huge difference. Obviously pricing will matter - up to now the AIR SDK has been free (I use it with FlashDevelop which is just brilliant) , Xamarin and Flutter are free, Unity has a free option - so it may not be easy to move to another model.

In your email you asked about feature requests - my vote is for better multi threading options. It can already be done but it's clumsy. Beyond that an integrated 3D engine but I guess that's a bigger deal.

Thanks again!

Bob

[hferreira80]

I don't believe that criticism would be worst for AIR right now because almost no one talk about AIR.

It's a room with just a few guys, period (unfortunately but seems that some dudes don't want to face the reality and remove their head from the sand).

On a very basic search on google for "top mobile frameworks 2019" (I don't even dare to mention top web and that's one of the big issues) and you will find 0 mentions about Adobe AIR.

Not so long (a few years ago) and before AIR enter on maintenance mode, you would find mentions to AIR and on the top 1 or 2.

You will find now Xamarin, Flutter and a lot of JS libraries.

Xamarin is currently, the most stable, reliant, mature and performance almost native.

Flutter is promising however is a alpha product, for now (on my opinion) and there are almost no libraries (it's a fact).

JS libraries on mobile, well, I don't need to mention a lot but it's like a car on a river (just stupid but it's my opinion).

[ASWC]

One can always wonder why the popularity of AIR went down so badly. It's not the tech as there's really nothing wrong with it overall. End of Flash didn't help for sure but personally I think it's mostly due to Adobe itself.

Adobe dropped the ball on Flash (btw still the best tech for the web today even though it's dead next year), Adobe dropped the ball on AIR, Adobe dropped the ball on Coldfusion. That's it, anything that involves a programming language, Adobe will make sure to kill it slowly.

People have seen that Adobe was reducing its investment/resources in AIR, people have seen that there hasn't been any major innovation for years with the tech. And as a result the tech started to be mentioned less in forums and articles and eventually completely disappeared.

If a young developer ask in dev forums today what cross platform tech he should use/try, AIR will not be mentioned. This is what is killing AIR and ending it.

The good news is that Adobe is not handling AIR anymore so suddenly AIR has a chance even if it's only a very small one.

[hferreira80]

I also believe that's now, AIR have a chance (very tiny and very late, but a chance).

Anyway, I will not bet my chips on it and as said somewhere I'm already on the journey of Xamarin (doing right now ) and it's a joy.

No more worries about a dying platform and C# it's such a beautiful and powerfull language (generics, etc, etc ...).

[_flashman_]

Guys, lets stop talking about deaths..AIR is NOT dead, but is "reborn" now that HARMAN will release the AIR 33 next week.

Hopefully now that is not maintained by Adobe, AIR will not only see critical bug fixes, but will see improvements and new development too. Keep it optimistic and wait for that 33 release any moment now

[ASWC]

Stop talking about this, stop talking about that, we've seen a lot of these lately on these forums. But it's not all about AIR, people depend on it, people livelihood depend on it, customers depend on it and so decisions have to be taken whether you are indy developer or a company and those are hard decisions with long term consequences. Optimism or pessimism ultimately won't pay bills, whether you pick the right tech and make the right choice will.

AIR is not dead yet but is not looking good and is on its last leg and if HARMAN goal is to bring back AIR as a relevant cross platform tech then who can argue this is going to be a huge and enormous challenge? Not impossible sure, but personally I don't see how a tech can come back from the state AIR is in. AIR is certainly not reborn yet either.

The purpose of expressing those opinions, yours and mine, is so people can make informed decisions.

- I read those posts and I decide that yes, I feel confident my livelihood can still depend solely on AIR for years to come.

- I read those posts and I decide that no, I can no longer count on AIR solely for my livelihood and need to look for alternative asap.

Whether path anyone take the information was right here and none of it was hidden and this is a good thing.

[mohammede54941144]

MyFlashLabs

update soon

The answer is a big YES, those ANEs will be added in the coming few weeks but we had to release the current set of updates to clear our plate first because we have the Harman AIR SDK 33 beta to play with and the Google deadline is very near. So we need to shift our focus on preparing the ANEs for Android 64-bit and release updates as soon as possible. So you will have enough time to update your apps as required.

[LilGames]

OK so someone tell me where to download Air SDK from now on?

Honestly, I think Harman will be charging for it.

[Flipline]

They don't have a website yet for downloading the SDK, but in the meantime you can email adobe.support@harman.com to let them know you're interested in testing the beta version.  You'll first get a license agreement from them that you'll have to agree to, then you'll later get a custom download link to the beta version by email.

Yes, they've confirmed that they will be charging for it (though there will be a free tier as well depending on your AIR income) when it's officially released after beta.

[_flashman_]

Flipline​ as ajwfrost75​ said, they (HARMAN) are preparing some platform with login and payment system from where the SDK will be purchased and downloaded. I don't think it will be expensive. The price will be one time and will be rather small. Lets just hope it will not have tons of bugs

[chaky]

People we got extension till August 2020:

Android Developers Blog: Get your apps ready for the 64-bit requirement

[Lars Laborious]

Wonderful news, chaky!

[jfw82]

The article is from 15th January 2019 - not sure if these is something new ..

[Frédéric C.]

It's obviously been edited recently, as the original text didn't mention AIR.

jfw82  wrote

The article is from 15th January 2019 - not sure if these is something new ..

[chaky]

The article is from 15th January 2019 - not sure if these is something new ..

The article is updated. Now it says:

• Extensions: Google Play will continue to accept 32-bit only updates to existing games that use the following SDKs:
  • Corona Labs SDK - until August 2020 
  • Adobe Air software and the AIR SDK - until August 2020
  • Unity 5.6.7 or older - until August 2021

[ajwfrost75]

Yes, Google updated that page at the end of last week, we've just sent round an update. It's for existing applications, so new apps published post 1st August will still need to have the 64-bit support. We're obviously still intending to support this and just sent round an update..

[marcanw]

Pfiouh 🙂

Will have the time to make the transition properly...

[marcanw]

I was writing this may 22:

"Before the deadline they will come up with something at least a solution for android q and a grace period from google, if not a 64 bit version."

Re: AIR33 Where is it?

So you can be optimistic and realistic at the same time 😉

[lesw38894521]

How will this be coordinated with the Flex SDK?  Currently, I get my AIR updates at the same time as the Flex updates. All I have to do is run the "Apache Flex SDK Installer" and I get both Flex and AIR updates.  It would be nice if that could continue or if there are instructions on how to download the two separate pieces.