About Elad Elrom

Elad Elrom is a technical writer, technical lead, and senior Flash engineer. As a technical writer, Elad wrote books covering Flash technologies. He maintains an active blog and has spoken at several conferences regarding the Flash platform. He has helped companies follow the XP and Scrum methodologies to implement popular frameworks, optimize and automate built processors and code review, and follow best practices. Elad has consulted a variety of clients in different fields and sizes, from large corporations such as Viacom, NBC Universal, and Weight Watchers to startups such as MotionBox.com and KickApps.com.

Tell us about how you got started with Flash and what attracted you to the language?

When I started my career, I wanted to get a grasp on technology in general. Since taking college courses doesn't give you an idea of how working in technology really is, I wanted to find out what attracted me to this field the most. I spent about two years touching everything.

I was doing freelance work in New York City and got involved with many projects that included editing commercials, database design and management, server side programming such as JAVA and PHP, and Flash animation. I was very fascinated by the possibilities of working with Flash and was lucky enough to work with amazing people and with many companies from small corporations to startups. Back then, Flash projects were done with Flash Professional or FAME (Eclipse with AS 2.0). I didn't want to commit my career to Flash because I found it lacked the OOP structure and didn't feel like “real programming”. Once Flex 1.5 came out I knew that I was ready to devote my time and entire career to Flex, and the rest is history.

You have recently announced a partnership with Universal Mind. Tell about why you chose to work with them and how it is working out.

I have been working as a consultant for the last few years, working with many clients on my own in addition to being a full time consultant for several companies. That split of time allowed me to be involved in projects that I found interesting and to work with companies I select and with the technologies I choose.

I have been in touch with Universal Mind for quite some time. They made me an offer twice in the past; however, it was never the right time. During Max 2009, I spoke to Todd and Matt, and I was very impressed by their relationship with their team and their commitment to the Flash community, as well as the projects they were working on.

I decided to join as a Senior Flash Engineer. So far I have been working on an interesting project and enjoyed working with other members of Universal Mind. I believe that the main challenge is dealing with politics and to ensure clients expectations are met in the time allocated and with constraints. Unlike doing freelance work where you can select the clients you will be working with, when working for a consulting firm you have to work with people that don't necessarily know Flex or Flash very well and with technologies you may not have selected yourself. I believe that this is all a learning experience that will benefit my career and my ability to work in different environments and on different projects.

Many regard you as a community expert, and your list of books you have written is impressive. Tell us about your contributions to the Flash Community and your involvement with Adobe.

That's flattering. I think that it's hard to call yourself an expert unless you have worked with a technology for at least 10 years. Flex hasn't been around the block long enough; however, as an early adopter I believe I have much experience with many aspects of the technology.

I was lucky to get the chance to have co-authored three Flash books so far:

Advanced Flex 3, AdvancED Flash on Devices and Advanced Flex 4 (coming out soon). I am also the main organizer for FlashAndTheCity.

In terms of community, I try to allocate time and share my knowledge. I think it's very gratifying to work with technology and share your knowledge to some extent. I have been involved with the following:

1. I am a member of Adobe Community Professional (ACP) for the category of Flex.
2. I have spoken in Flash events such as FlashCamp Chicago, 360 MAX, FlashCamp Philly, RIAUnleashed, and many others.
3. I have helped by being a technical reviewer as well as a writer for Adobe Developer Connection.
4. I maintain my own blog and write to many publications such as Orielly InsideRIA, Flash Magazine, and Flex and Flash Magazine.
5. I am involved as a contributor for the Flex SDK as well as part of Adobe's pre-release programs. I have helped Adobe by providing feedback and early applications using their latest technologies.
6. I have released many open source codes for others to use in the past few years.
7. I was selected by Adobe for the Developer spotlight in 2009.

You have written several articles on Unit Testing with FlexUnit and are involved in helping the project gain exposure. How do you use Unit Testing in your day to day work and do you have any advice for people getting started?

That's true. I have been supportive of the FlexUnit 4 initiative. I have used TDD and provided many articles to help people get started. In addition, I recently published an article in Flash&Flex Magazine that shows how to create tests first using FlexUnit. This article is very real, and it's not sugar coated like many articles are since I wanted to give people a real project and examples of how they can use the FlexUnit. I have had much success using TDD; however, I believe that TDD shouldn't be used for everything. One example is if you use a micro architecture framework. TDD may be over kill since you will have to put in much work to get it to work with the framework, and creating it for every user gesture may not be necessary in my opinion.

I believe that TDD should be used when building APIs and code that it's important to ensure it works correctly and as expected. Since writing tests first may not take any additional time, maintaining it on every change in the application can consume time that we usually can't afford.

Perhaps the largest project you have on your plate this year is putting on the Flash And The City Conference. We are all excited about the first New York based Flash conference in several years. Tell us how this conference is different from the others and what they can expect in May?

FlashAndTheCity has been part of my life since last year. Over the last few years I noticed that there aren't any large conferences in New York City, and there has been a real void for many professionals in New York City who would like to have a conference that allows them to be part of the Flash community.

FlashAndTheCity's goal is to redefine the way we think about conferences as well as bring together A-list speakers with professionals in New York and other attendees from around the world. Similar to other conferences, attendees get great value in terms of learning. There are two tracks for three days, and you can register for a workshop being held the day before the conference.

Attendees will have a chance to hear presentations from over 50 speakers. These speakers including Ryan Stewart, Peter Elst, Grant Skinner, Lee Brimelow and many others are mind-blowing presenters that have made an impact on technology and are well known in the Flash community.

Attendees will have access to the City Track. The City Track is a completely new conference format, and the extra-curricular activities will include a New York Cruise and Dinner, rock/grunge band 22nd Century, and tours around New York City. The venue, just like the rest of the conference, is unique as well. We will be hosting the conference in an artist's theater called "The 3LD (3-Legged Dog)". 3LD is a Technology Center located in downtown Manhattan and is a thriving catalyst in the New York art scene. By hosting the conference in 3LD we will be supporting the artists.

So far the response has been amazing, and so has the help and support I have received from people of the community, including you. I have to point out that you have done an amazing job helping to promote and organize the conference, and you have been a true friend. We have exceeded the sale of tickets for the early bird rate, and I expect the event to be sold out by time the conference begins on May 13, 2010.

Recently you have been talking about security venerability in the Flash Player. What do you consider the most serious issue with these and do you feel that in 2010 we will see more exploits from the Flash Player?

That's a good question, Jesse. I believe that Flash is becoming mainstream among developers as Flash will be available on many devices thanks to the Open Screen Project. In fact some people estimate that there will be around 2 million Flash developers this year. Just like any mainstream technology, it makes a better target for attackers to try and exploit.

I have two main concerns. I believe that we will see many more applications being attacked and exploited. That's a concern since, so far, I believe Flash developers have lived in their own Island without having to worry about security, and it will add to our todo list. Secondly, I am also afraid that each news of security attacks will make large corporations more reluctant to open their cross domain policies. In addition, Adobe may close the ability to integrate swf from different domains easily as well as make the cross domain policy more restrictive which will decrease the ability to create Mashups and integrate with many public APIs like you can do with all the service side programming languages.

Read more from Jesse Freeman.