So I feel confident writing OOP using AS2, AS3 obviously enforces it to a higher degree than ever before and I have been happy as a pig in muck to wallow around building classes left right and center for my applications. Then I read an article from Ted On Flex describing how some hardcore programmers from companies have created jaw dropping flex applications in stupidly swift time scales with NO flex experience at all. This is all down to the ability to construct applications using solid frameworks for creating components which is translated across most programming languages.

Pretty much every day now I am working with Flex and knew it was time to wake up and smell the gravy and take it to the next level. So after a swift kick up the jacksy from me man Stefan we hooked up and checked out an interesting framework for our AS3 and Flex applications! PureMVC is the chosen framework of choice after some deliberation and I am aware that we are going against the grain to certain extent as Cairngorm seems the popular choice, but the frameworks are very similar and I did note that there are some advantages to PureMVC over Cairngorm (in my opinion) and also it seemed a little less of a head spin to kick off with.

The guy behind it all is Cliff Hall who I had the pleasure of having in depth discussions with regarding PureMVC and the documentation and source files on his site provide more than adequate information to getting started. It is still early doors but this is the most positive move I feel I have made in my career as a developer and a move I should have made a long time ago. I have a much clearer insight now when designing the application from the start and am confident that as they grow they are going to be structurally sound and I will no longer dread that app that you have to go back to and add functionality cos it will be as simple as plug and play!

It would be interesting to hear what frameworks developers are using out there and how it has affected them, anyone else used PureMVC? How do you personally architect an RIA?

Check out the Architecture 101 Beta Courseware and give it a go!