Stop Coding!

Over the years, I’ve analyzed many customers’ Flex build performance problems. Most of them have very well-organized Flex/Flash Builder workspace. Let me give you an example:

• 1-2 core, “first-tier” libraries
• 8-10 “second-tier” libraries that depend on the core libraries
• a main application and many test applications. They depend on some but not all of the “second-tier” libraries.

If you modify code in one of the core libraries and run a test application to verify the fix, Flash Builder will incrementally compile *all* of the “second-tier” libraries even when your test application depends on 1-2 of them. Of course, it is nice to have all of the “second-tier” libraries updated but that is additional time you do not want to waste.

Meet The FDT 4 Launcher Chain

FDT approaches this problem differently. FDT does not automatically build everything under the Sun when you modify code. It builds only when you want to run/debug and only builds the libraries you specified in the “Launcher Chain“.

This is smart – the folks at Powerflasher did not write the Flex compiler – they use the compiler written by Adobe and use it better than Flash Builder!