Gary Grossman was the primary developer [1] of ActionScript programming language.
He currently works with Robert Tatsumi (creators of Adobe Flash) at Zendesk. [2]
In his previous position as a principal scientist at Adobe Systems, Grossman was a key architect of the Flash Player, which was once the most popular multimedia player on the web. Gary contributed to six major releases of Flash in various capacities, including individual developer, team architect, and engineering manager.
Adobe Flash was, except in China, a multimedia software platform used for production of animations, rich internet applications, desktop applications, mobile apps, mobile games, and embedded web browser video players.
ActionScript is an object-oriented programming language originally developed by Macromedia Inc.. It is influenced by HyperTalk, the scripting language for HyperCard. It is now an implementation of ECMAScript, though it originally arose as a sibling, both being influenced by HyperTalk. ActionScript code is usually converted to byte-code format by a compiler.
SWF is a defunct Adobe Flash file format that was used for multimedia, vector graphics and ActionScript.
Apache Flex, formerly Adobe Flex, is a software development kit (SDK) for the development and deployment of cross-platform rich web applications based on the Adobe Flash platform. Initially developed by Macromedia and then acquired by Adobe Systems, Adobe donated Flex to the Apache Software Foundation in 2011 and it was promoted to a top-level project in December 2012.
Adobe Flash Player is computer software for viewing multimedia content, executing rich Internet applications, and streaming audio and video content created on the Adobe Flash platform. It can run from a web browser as a browser plug-in or independently on supported devices. Originally created by FutureWave under the name FutureSplash Player, it was renamed to Macromedia Flash Player after Macromedia acquired FutureWave in 1996. It was then developed and distributed by Adobe as Flash Player after Adobe acquired Macromedia in 2005. It is currently developed and distributed by Zhongcheng for users in China, and by Harman International for enterprise users outside of China, in collaboration with Adobe.
Adobe Flash Lite was a lightweight version of Adobe Flash Player, a software application published by Adobe Systems for viewing Flash content. Flash Lite operates on devices that Flash Player cannot, such as mobile phones and other portable electronic devices like Wii, Chumby and Iriver.
ECMAScript for XML (E4X) was the standard ISO/IEC 22537:2006 programming language extension that adds native XML support to ECMAScript. The goal was to provide an alternative to DOM interfaces that uses a simpler syntax for accessing XML documents. It also offered a new way of making XML visible. Before the release of E4X, XML was always accessed at an object level. E4X instead treated XML as a primitive. This implied faster access, better support, and acceptance as a building block of a program.
Gnash is a media player for playing SWF files. Gnash is available both as a standalone player for desktop computers and embedded devices, as well as a plugin for the browsers still supporting NPAPI. It is part of the GNU Project and is a free and open-source alternative to Adobe Flash Player. It was developed from the gameswf project.
Adobe Media Server (AMS) is a proprietary data and media server from Adobe Systems. This server works with the Flash Player and HTML5 runtime to create media driven, multiuser RIAs. The server uses ActionScript 1, an ECMAScript based scripting language, for server-side logic. Prior to version 2, it was known as Flash Communication Server. Prior to version 5, it was known as Flash Media Server. In February 2019, Adobe Systems Incorporated granted Veriskope Inc rights to further develop, resell, and extend distribution of the software product.
Adobe AIR is a cross-platform runtime system currently developed by Harman International, in collaboration with Adobe Inc., for building desktop applications and mobile applications, programmed using Adobe Animate, ActionScript, and optionally Apache Flex. It was originally released in 2008. The runtime supports installable applications on Windows, macOS, and mobile operating systems, including Android, iOS, and BlackBerry Tablet OS.
Tamarin is a discontinued free software virtual machine with just-in-time compilation (JIT) support intended to implement the 4th edition of the ECMAScript (ES4) language standard. Tamarin source code originates from ActionScript Virtual Machine 2 (AVM2) developed by Adobe Systems, as introduced within Adobe Flash Player 9, which implements ActionScript 3 scripting language. ActionScript Virtual Machine 2 was donated as open-source to Mozilla Foundation on November 7, 2006, to develop Tamarin as a high-performance virtual machine, with the support from broad Mozilla community, to be used by Mozilla and Adobe Systems in the next generation of their JavaScript and ActionScript engines with the ultimate aim to unify the scripting languages across web browsers and Adobe Flash platform and ease the development of better performing rich web applications.
Jonathan Gay is an American computer programmer and software entrepreneur based in Northern California. Gay co-founded FutureWave Software in 1993. For a decade, he was the main programmer and visionary of Flash, an animation editor for web pages. He founded Software as Art, which was later renamed Greenbox, which made energy management solutions for the home.
Adobe Flash Builder is an integrated development environment (IDE) built on the Eclipse platform that speeds development of rich Internet applications (RIAs) and cross-platform desktop applications, particularly for the Adobe AIR platform. Adobe Flash Builder 4 is available in two editions: Standard and Premium.
SWFObject is an unmaintained open-source JavaScript library used to embed Adobe Flash content onto Web pages and to protect the flash game against piracy, which is supplied as one small JavaScript file. The library can also detect the installed Adobe Flash Player plug-in in all major web browsers, on all major operating systems (OS), and can redirect the visitor to another webpage or show alternate HTML content if the installed plug-in is not suitable.
An SWC file is a package of precompiled Flash symbols and ActionScript code that allows a Flash or Flex developer to distribute classes and assets, or to avoid recompiling symbols and code that will not change. SWC files can be generated by the Adobe Flash Professional authoring tool, and by Flash Builder. They are sometimes referred to as class libraries and cannot be directly executed by the Flash Player.
Away3D is an open-source platform for developing interactive 3D graphics for video games and applications, in Adobe Flash or HTML5. The platform consists of a 3D world editor, a 3D graphics engine, a 3D physics engine and a compressed 3D model file format (AWD).
Modern HTML5 has feature-parity with the now-obsolete Adobe Flash. Both include features for playing audio and video within web pages. Flash was specifically built to integrate vector graphics and light games in a web page, features that HTML5 also supports.
Stage3D is an Adobe Flash Player API for rendering interactive 3D graphics with GPU-acceleration, within Flash games and applications. Flash Player or AIR applications written in ActionScript 3 may use Stage3D to render 3D graphics, and such applications run natively on Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, Apple iOS and Google Android. Stage3D is similar in purpose and design to WebGL.
Adobe Scout is a visual profiler for Adobe Flash content running on desktop or mobile platforms, and works together with Adobe Flash Player and Adobe AIR. Scout enables in-depth profiling of ActionScript 3 code execution, 2D graphics and text rendering, and 3D graphics rendered via the Stage3D application programming interface (API).
Powerflasher FDT is an integrated development environment (IDE) built on the Eclipse platform for development of Adobe Flash-based content.