adobe, flash, software development, web authoring

Adobe’s Flex Builder to Flash Builder name change does not go far enough

2 Comments

As expected, Adobe is strengthening its “Flash Platform” strategy by renaming the forthcoming Flex Builder 4 (codename Gumbo) to Flash Builder 4:

This change will provide better naming consistency for the Flash family of tools and position Flash Builder as the development tool for the Flash Platform.

This is only a name change, nothing more. Flash Builder will still be based on Eclipse, and the original Flash Professional IDE, also part of Creative Suite, will continue as before.

My question: why doesn’t Adobe go further in clarifying and promoting its Flash brand? The current situation is still confusing:

Flash Builder vs Flash Professional: the names give you no clue about the difference. Why not Flash Developer and Flash Designer?

Adobe AIR (Adobe Integrated Runtime): non-techie people do not realise this has anything to do with Flash. Flash Desktop Runtime would be better, though I guess that would not reflect the option for HTML applications. It would do a lot to promote Flash as more than just a browser plug-in.

Flex SDK: why retain the Flex brand at all? I presume the name was originally a contraction of Flash and XML, but since it is a language that compiles to Flash, this could just be called the Flash SDK.

Name changes themselves are confusing of course, so I’m surprised that Adobe is not being more thorough now rather than risking more piecemeal changes later.

2 thoughts on “Adobe’s Flex Builder to Flash Builder name change does not go far enough”

  1. The Flex framework is still named the Flex Framework and the Flex SDK and Flash Builder will still be used to build Flex framework applications. So renaming the Flex SDK to Flash SDK I don’t think is the way to go.

    Flash Builder -> Flash Developer, is good, except there is already a popular and decent open source development tool called Flash Develop so it could be confusing. How about -> Flash Code? 🙂

  2. I agree. A lot more could be done to distinguish and reinforce the brand. Although I’ve liked the name Flex since I started using it, it really should go away if the emphasis is to be on the Flash platform. I like Flash Designer and Flash Developer too… would be great names for the products and properly distinguish the apps too.

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