Tag Archives: software eng

Android’s 64-bit requirement puts pressure on Adobe

UPDATE: Enter the Harman – Since writing this post, Samsung subsidiary Harman finally waded in to announce they will take over development of the AIR platform on a commercial basis. This should bring better support and more frequent updates, as a commercial model for AIR makes more sense than as a vanity project for Adobe. Read the community’s feedback here.

And Harman have just released their official AIR SDK version 33 with 64-bit support for Android!

Google recently reiterated that, when Android Q launches, they’ll start enforcing a requirement for all Android apps using native code to provide a 64-bit version as they phase out 32-bit support. As you’d expect, this has far-reaching implications for app developers, depending on the languages and libraries they use – particularly for Unity and Adobe AIR developers. Continue reading Android’s 64-bit requirement puts pressure on Adobe

YouView – Smart TV UI

YouView is a Smart TV service in the UK, which runs on Set Top Boxes and Smart TVs. I worked on the original UI for years and thought I’d share some insights into best practices for building applications on such resource constrained devices.

Continue reading YouView – Smart TV UI

Sneaky tricks for developing on small devices: ‘Bitmap Folding’

One of the most problematic constraints when developing applications for resource constrained devices, such as mobile or Set Top Box is ‘video memory’.

You often will not have control over how much video memory is allocated to your application, or what the fallback behaviour is when your application uses too much. Continue reading Sneaky tricks for developing on small devices: ‘Bitmap Folding’

Loan Shark – fast object pooling utility

LoanShark AS3 Object Pooling UtilityA couple of years ago, I created an object pooling utility for a games project I was building in AS3. Since then, I’ve used it quite a few times, in order to speed up apps and improve resource management, easing the load on the garbage collector by reusing objects instead of recreating them. Continue reading Loan Shark – fast object pooling utility