Flex best practices – Part 1: Setting up your Flex project

Flex project setup considerations review

You have seen some somewhat basic practices that, when followed, can foster a clean and understandable working environment for your Flex project. Consistency is a crucial element in understanding another developer's work. As applications mature, different developers can be called upon to modify and scale the app. During this time, a project's codebase shifts in an organic, lifelike way. This is due to the hands and minds of the multiple developers that contribute to the growth of the project. If a set of best practices is used from the beginning, there is a template to show the developers how to structure and format their work.

These practices can be applied to all of your Flex applications. Take a moment to review these practices:

Use workspaces to keep your Flex projects organized.

Use a common directory for your Flex workspace in team environments.

Follow common naming conventions for Flex project names.

Determine your target platform.

Use the default "bin-debug" directory.

Put your code in the "src" directory.

Use object-oriented programming practices for Flex projects.

Use a source code control solution.

Reference shared SWC libraries using the Flex Library path.

Use the libs folder to bundle SWC libraries with your Flex project.

Use UpperCamelCasing for MXML file names.

Use UpperCamelCasing for ActionScript Class file names.

Use UpperCamelCasing for ActionScript Interface file names, and begin the file name with a capitalized letter I.

Do not use spaces when naming files!

Do not use special characters when naming files.

Do not use acronyms or abbreviations.

Do not use periods in file names.

Use packages to organize and structure your projects codebase.

Use the following format for package names: com.seantheflexguy.stringUtils