Is Flex development without FlexBuilder realistic?

Question

Is it realistic to try and learn and code a Flex 3 application without purchasing FlexBuilder? Since the SDK and BlazeDS are open source, it seems technically possible to develop without Flex Builder, but how realistic is it.

I would like to test out Flex but don't want to get into a situation where I am dependent on the purchase of FlexBuilder (at least not until I am confident and competent enough with the technology to recommend purchase to my employer).

I am experimenting right now, so I'm taking a long time and the trial license on my Windows machine has expired. Also Linux is my primary development platform and there is only an alpha available for Linux.

Most of the documentation I've found seem to use Flex Builder.

Maybe I should use Laszlo...

Answer 1

IntelliJ IDEA works as a Flex IDE, if you happen to also be a Java developer. It's free if you contribute to open source projects.

Answer 2

Check out FlashDevelop for Windows. I like it better than Flex Builder.

Answer 3

I've been using Flex since version 2 and Flex3/BlazeDS since it came out of beta. I also have some experience with Lazzlo and the difference is day and night (Flex rocks!). I have not regretted once using Flex. Regarding FlexBuilder, it is worth every penny. While it is completely possible and reasonable to write Flex application without FlexBuilder, the productivity gains of using it will more than recoup the investment. Try the evaluation for 30 days and compare it to some of the other options suggested about (I'm going to try FlashDevelop).

Some things you get with FlexBuilder include:

• Code completion
• Visual editor
• Debugger (it is fantastic!!)
• Profiler (also very good)

Regarding Linux, the alpha version of FlexBuilder does not have a visual editor. Other than that, I understand it is reasonably feature complete, still free, and many of the Adobe employees I've talked with that use Linux are happy with it.

Answer 4

FlashDevelop is really easy to setup with the Flex SDK. Just download FlashDevelop, then download the Flex SDK. In FlashDevelop go to Tools > Program Options > AS3Context (under Plugins) > Set the "Flex SDK Location" to the root of the folder you extracted the SDK to and build away. FlashDevelop even has a basic MXML project that will get you going.

If you use ColdFusion for the backend, having FlexBuilder in Eclipse and CFEclipse can mean one less IDE to have to get familiar with.