Though loaded with java bloat, Eclipse is great. I believe Aptana is based on eclipse, and I know for sure that Flex is. Flex is surely the way to go about writing Air apps, not the Flash IDE. I like some things about Flex but Flash as a development tool is totally brain-dead.

Also, Mark, you are not alone, I do think that the article in question is liable to induce vomiting.

Adobe has strategically inserted Flash into the very space that browser developers wish they had - influence on other browsers without the endless snail-paced negotiations on standards and politics. They are the only company to achieve this and that is an unfortunate fact of life. Unfortunate because monopolies in any walk of life are not useful.

When people refer to ‘more creative ways’ Mark I think you need to think laterally beyond your understanding of JS vs Flash as code. I think when people talk about Flash and ‘creative’ they are talking about the superior visual effects that can be more easily achieved with Flash.than JS. Back to my earlier point, simply supporting video is also ‘creative’ and JS doesn’t really do this. Moving on, despite the plethora of progressing JS libraries out there, why would a person from a graphic design point of view choose JS over the Flash IDE? Really there is no JS IDE and call me a stereotyper but the sort of people (graphic design oriented people) who produce slick ‘creative’ content are not likely to choose a text editor (for JS authoring) when they can use the Flash IDE.

I think you need to stop looking at Flash vs JS as an oranges vs oranges argument Mark. They can both be used to achieve similar ends but they go about it in a massively different way.

If you want to fight the good fight against Flash, I think you’d be better off taking a meta view of the whole scene rather than continually rebounding from bullshit marketing spiels.

Who ever expected marketing spiels to be accurate anyway?

I think that there’s hope in the idea that somehow (I don’t remember or understand the details) a version of JS can be integrated into any browser in the future. Something to do with tamarin or *monkey wasn’t it? I think a person with your influence should focus on that as a solution but even if that is achieved, there is still a lack of an IDE for web apps. Some might say Aptana is approaching that or throw around Eclipse (never used it but people throw around it’s name so often, anyone would start to think it’s a panacea) but I’m not sure about that.

Having said all of the above, I understand if you just felt the need to counteract propaganda and blow off steam

I thin that actually can become “one of the hottest development environments” as the RIA is the future. Me personally with all my hurt and soul with mozilla, but Adobe mostly provides great tools for the development. As today there is no normal tool for the xul development. I think this fact is very important and Mozilla have to do something about that.

Just give us a tool and adobe won’t have a chance!!