AS Editors, which one, if any, do you use?

[samvillian]

I was wondering if you guys use AS editors and if so which one. I am wondering this because i use flashes default and it seems fine for me. The only complaint i have is that it freezes out and i lose the nonsaved crap sometimes, but its rare and i save very often now hehe. well anyway i just wanna know if u use on or not and why and which one.

thanks alot

[ImprisonedPride]

Most people use MTASC, which is [arguably] faster, but you lose the Stage area to edit stuff. (I use the Flash IDE.)

[Squize]

mtasc isn't arguably faster mate, it's a lot lot faster.
And losing the stage as such isn't an issue, you still use Flash to do your layout / create the assets.
Basically you publish your swf with no code in it, just all your assets, and then mtasc injects the byte-code into that swf. So instead of having to wait over 10 seconds + when you've got a big fla with music and sounds in, it publishes in less than a second ( You only need to use Flash when you've updated an asset ).

For as2 I use Eclipse with FDT ( Eclipse is a java based editor designed for multiple languages, and FDT is a plug-in for it for editing as ), which from my experience is becoming an industry standard.
as3 I use FlexBuilder, which is Eclipse again with the Flex bit being the plug-in.

Don't let the fact that Eclipse is developed in Java put you off, I thought it would be a clunky pile of crap like nearly everything else I've ever seen in Java, but it's not, it's silky smooth.

Squize.

[VENGEANCE MX]

I use XCode. It's the only development environment I've ever seen where size 6 fonts are legible.

[Viza]

I use XCode. It's the only development environment I've ever seen where size 6 fonts are legible.

And that's a good thing because?...

Hmm, I think it's time I find a new coding IDE myself, as I'm really getting bugged by the lack of 'extras' in the Flash IDE and I've gotten into the habit of using .as files anyway (and lovin it).

Viza.

[Viza]

WOW. 199 Euros for the FDT plug-in!

It already cost me an arm and a left testicle to get a copy of Flash. Anyone know of any editors that are similar to Eclipse (after researching it, it seems so much better than the Flash IDE), but are friendlier to my wallet?

Viza

[renderhjs]

WOW. 199 Euros for the FDT plug-in!

It already cost me an arm and a left testicle to get a copy of Flash. Anyone know of any editors that are similar to Eclipse (after researching it, it seems so much better than the Flash IDE), but are friendlier to my wallet?

Viza

Flex Beta 3- wich is perfect for AS3 development- wich is free and also based upon eclipse- the standard imo. for AS3 (and the tool designed for flex code- but I dont care about that.)

next to Flash IDE for AS 1/2 compiling I use FlashScite for writing classes and functions to include them later in FLash. It starts as fast as notepad + highlights AS 1 & 2 syntax.

[Viza]

Thanks very much Render for the suggestion, but I don't think that scITE Flash is really that much better than using notepad. It just doesn;t have the functions I'm looking for, though I'm pretty sure I remember you saying in a thread that you enjoy writing code in notepad so I can see why you would like it.

After a bit of hunting it looks like FlashDevelop is my best free option. Though not as nice as the impression I got from Eclipse.

Sorry for hijacking your thread Samvillian.

Viza.

[Squize]

There is a free as plug-in for Eclipse, but the name escapes me atm I'm afraid. It should be on FlashOS or search for FAME.

It's not as good as FDT, but then nothing is really, but you get all the eclipse goodness and it's all free.

Squize.

[happinessSam]

I use sepy, which is pretty decent. It's got most of the features I want - snippets, members, collapsing, autocomplete. I've not tried flashdevelop, so I can't compare but it's definitely better than the ide one and scite.

[renderhjs]

@ Viza & happinessSam:
no flashscite is no serious dev environmentand it´s already outdated (no further development) but it´s
- smal
- fast
- doesnt force me on project files nor any other additional files
- doesn´t require a installation
- reads AS syntax
so the perfect editor for quick and dirty Actionscript- also my favourite XML editor.

For AS3 I gotten found on flex- with a little configuration regarding Adobe´s security crap defaults it´s pretty decent. In the past I got several crahses after many re-copmpilings of my projects in wich Flex would´t free memory- but later on those were the minority.

[VENGEANCE MX]

And that's a good thing because?...

With a size 6 Lucida Grande font, I can legibly read 157 lines of code at once. Flash standard is size 9 Monaco, which only fits 92 lines. Great for working with big files, it was a lifesaver on Commando 3 (10,000+ lines of code, probably more to do with sloppy practices than how big the game was).

[walnoot]

For the sake of giving a good perspective on the topic: (guess people that don't use external editors won't reply quickly in this thread)

I only use flash.
my projects are mostly prototypes, never big in amount of code and written as2 non-OOP-style.
I haven't encounter issues that made me want another editor yet.
I see though that in bigger projects, the editor lacks in support of several features, which could make it a pain.

[newblack]

There is a free as plug-in for Eclipse, but the name escapes me atm I'm afraid.

I think it's called ASDT... yeah not very feature heavy, but fine as far as free goes. FDT has a 30 day free trial, so there's no harm in checking it out. And you can get a copy of the forthcoming enterprise edition of FDT 3 if you can prove your involvement in an open source project (will sell for 600 euro- yikes!). It has some pretty sweet features like swc source browsing... my company is considering switching to FDT from FlexBuilder to standardize across AS2/AS3 development a little better- since we already have a truckload of FlexBuilder licenses, we're having a hard time justifying the cost.

So yeah, I use FDT+Eclipse for AS2 and FlexBuilder for AS3/MXML

[alillm]

I agree with walnoot.

I only use flash because as far as I'm concerned, I have no need for anything else. Sure, external editors may have a massive list of advantages that people can reel off, but I'm not really interested seeing as flash does everything I want it to, and I don't particularly have any desire to add another program to the list of programs I need open when working on a game.

I've never encountered any 'slowness' with the flash IDE, unless people are just talking about compiling, in which case I think I'm patient enough to wait 5 seconds on big projects .

I can appreciate how different people have different needs though, and yea, the flash IDE could be improved for sure, but still, I'm much happier having everything in once place.

Ali

[EvilKris]

I'm an IDE man myself to. Give me a program that can not only compile quicker than the IDE but also wipe my bum for me and I might consider the switch.

[renderhjs]

well the Flash IDE code editor got useless since Flash MX2004 the biggest reason why I hated that releawse so much. Even with Flash 8 or even more with Flash CS3 it didn´t got any better because they still bloated the GUI with glow, rounded corners and other crap FX.

If you are someone who is really fast at coding (not thinking to much but just writing) any extern editor is better simply because it doesn´t lag if you scroll the code or want to search for certain elements. Next to that auotcompletion, class tools and many other things make it defenitly a better coding expierence.

The con I see however is the strong split between code and design wich is something that attracted on Flash so much in the past.

[JerryScript]

I use EditPad and compile with Ming. EditPad because I've been using it for years, and Ming because I prefer to code than work within the IDE.

Ever try to work out complex math based positioning in the IDE? You have to compile each time to check it, and Ming or MTASC are much faster. I prefer Ming because it has wrappers that allow you to create your objects via code instead of in the IDE. It's only drawback I've found is with sounds. I also use PovRay for 3d renderings via code. I guess I'm just a coder at heart.

[iopred]

FlashDevelop with Flex SDK for AS3, FlashDevelop with MTASC for AS2.

The only down that flashdevelop has, is its autocomplete is a little over anxious, but apart from that, its a brilliant IDE.

[nGFX]

FlashDevelop with Flex SDK for AS3, FlashDevelop with MTASC for AS2.

Same here.

but apart from that, its a brilliant IDE.

And it heavily is inpired by visual studio (my second dev environment), when used to the autocomplete and have customized your snippets, I think it well saves 1/3 of typing if not more (and it saves a lot of time, too)

nGFX