IDE

Integrated Development Environment is the name for an application program that can make codes to use on the internet, to make things like games and websites. Here at college we use the program Adobe Flash to do this, it's probably the most well known IDE and has many advantages.

Probably the best function of flash is actionscript, it enables you to write code that enables player interaction, for example drop and drag options, buttons ect. This is a massively useful tool that enables you to make interesting interactive games to varying degree's of difficulty, fortunately the program has pre-scripted elements that can be added to your coding to save time and make work easier. There are two different actionscripts to choose from, actionScript2 and actionScript3. Actionscript2 is slower but easier to learn at the start while actionScript3 is more difficult to learn but when you grasp the basics you can do some truly amazing things.

Flash comes with the ability to make vector images in the program without the use of programs like Illustrator, vector images are useful as they can be shrunk and expanded without quality loss, you can import vectors if you don't want to draw them in flash as well as uploading bitmap files, but these will pixelate when re-sized and have a larger file size then vector images. Also when you import an image you can store it in the library, it's very useful if you want to use the image more than once, you can edit the file in the library and it will add the edit to all the copies throughout the file, also if you make your image a 'movie clip' (using the F8 short-cut) you can go into the file and add new frames inside the file, making an animation without having to do it on the main time-line. Your animation inside the movie clip can also be controlled by code in the main time-line, which lets you play and stop when you want it to. You can also import movies into flash which is a very useful tool and flash also has a range of handy image adjustment tools and filters like opacity, drop shadow, stroke and so on. This is a quick way to add one small adjustment that immediately makes the image far better. Flash can also show animations through the use of frames, this can be used for such things as collisions, player interaction, button clicks, anything, which adds another dimension to your work and makes it more enjoyable for the people who use it.

Flash also has the ability to use sound, it even has a simple sound editor, sound can really enrich your work and make it stand out, also flash is compatible with loads of external computer hardware so you can use things like cameras, microphones, pressure pads, and many more. There's also a load of pre-set components which can be simply drag and dropped into your file, the components include things like buttons, scroll bars and dialogue boxes, which are very useful for beginners. As you get more experienced with flash you can do a lot more things, for example you can have flash access remote files via URL, which is useful for accessing high scores, also to reduce the program lagging you can have all the information you need on a single frame simply by having your files in the library and pulling them on stage when you need to using coding.

Also since flash is part of the adobe family it's compatible with many of the files you use when saving adobe work, you can even set flash to look more like Photoshop for beginners. Like Photoshop Flash also has layers, which are useful for placing objects on top or underneath each other, as well as folders, which are great if you are working with a lot of layers, you can just put all the related layers in a folder and close it, giving you more room to look at the other frames, it also can use colour code identification to help keeping layers organized.

In conclusion Flash is a very professional program that although horribly confusing at first can be used to make some amazing things once you get the hang of the program.