1. Thomas Boch Cédric Capoulun
WP8
Usage of Flex in the astronomical frame
Thomas Boch
Cédric Capoulun
T. Boch - Euro-VO 3rd Tech Forum -
Strasbourg March 2009

2. Flex ? RIA (Rich Internet Application) framework developed by Adobe
“Flash programming for programmers”
Development
ActionScript
MXML (for GUI description)
Execution
Relies on Flash Player
T. Boch - Euro-VO 3rd Tech Forum -
Strasbourg March 2009

3. Flex pros
Flash Player everywhere (Flash Player 9 installed on 94% machines)
Fast startup time (wrt. Java applets)
High level of interactivity
Easy learning curve for the developer
T. Boch - Euro-VO 3rd Tech Forum -
Strasbourg March 2009

4. Flex cons Installation (of Flash Player) is compulsory (wrt. AJAX RIA)
Can be painful, especially on Linux systems and/or with non-savvy users
Breaks the browser logics
Back/forward button
Print
T. Boch - Euro-VO 3rd Tech Forum -
Strasbourg March 2009

5. SimPlay (1/2)
SimPlay (Simbad disPlay) : a simple interactive viewer for Simbad objects
Starting point : replace the Simbad clickable map
Example:
T. Boch - Euro-VO 3rd Tech Forum -
Strasbourg March 2009

6. SimPlay (2/2) Feature requirements: Lightweight viewer
From an object name/position: load Simbad objects around this object on top of a DSS image
Display/hide sources according to their object type
Zoom/unzoom
Display info of a selected source
Localization
T. Boch - Euro-VO 3rd Tech Forum -
Strasbourg March 2009

7. SimPlay architecture Browser CGI server Server-side Aladin target
Aladin script
PNG+VOTable
URLs
PNG image + VOTable with x,y source positions
PNG+VOTable
Cache
Browser
CGI server
Server-side Aladin
T. Boch - Euro-VO 3rd Tech Forum -
Strasbourg March 2009

8. SimPlay demo http://cdsweb.u-strasbg.fr/~boch/SimPlay/
T. Boch - Euro-VO 3rd Tech Forum -
Strasbourg March 2009

9. SimPlay offline version
Predefined list of targets
Application packaged with:
Flash Player
Image+VOTable data (corresponding to the predefined targets)
Images chosen from HST and ESO Press Releases
Astrometry retrieved through astrometry.net or manually in Aladin
Aimed at Outreach public (WP5)
T. Boch - Euro-VO 3rd Tech Forum -
Strasbourg March 2009

10. Other development Nomenclature dictionary revamped in Flex:
T. Boch - Euro-VO 3rd Tech Forum -
Strasbourg March 2009