daniel bigham.ca

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Getting simple BB10 AIR apps to compile
August 16, 2012

I've created about 30 PlayBook apps over the last year and a half and it has come time to start getting them up and running on BB10, especially since RIM now allows them to be submitted to App World.

Unfortunately, I haven't been able to get even very simple apps to compile, such as:

package
{
    import flash.display.Sprite;
    import qnx.fuse.ui.dialog.AlertDialog;

    [SWF(width="1024", height="600", backgroundColor="#FFFFFF", frameRate="30")]
    public class Example extends Sprite
    {
        public function Example()
        {
            var alert:AlertDialog = new AlertDialog();
            alert.title = "Debug";
            alert.message = "Hello, world!";
            alert.addButton("Ok");
            alert.show();
        }
    }
}

I have attempted to compile this with:

set JAVA_HOME=E:\Program Files (x86)\Java\jre7
set PATH=%PATH%;E:\Program Files\Research In Motion\blackberry-tablet-sdk-3.0.0\bin

cd E:\Users\Daniel\Dropbox\Apps\ExampleBB10\
amxmlc Example.as

But get the errors:

Loading configuration file E:\Program Files\Research In Motion\blackberry-tablet-sdk-3.0.0\frameworks\air-config.xml
E:\Users\Daniel\Dropbox\Apps\ExampleBB10\Example.as(13): col: 14 Error: Type was not found or was not a compile-time constant: AlertDialog.

                        var alert:AlertDialog = new AlertDialog();
                                  ^

E:\Users\Daniel\Dropbox\Apps\ExampleBB10\Example.as(13): col: 32 Error: Call to a possibly undefined method AlertDialog.

                        var alert:AlertDialog = new AlertDialog();
                                                    ^

E:\Users\Daniel\Dropbox\Apps\ExampleBB10\Example.as(14): col: 16 Error: Call to a possibly undefined method AlertDialog.

                        alert = new AlertDialog();
                                    ^

E:\Users\Daniel\Dropbox\Apps\ExampleBB10\Example.as(6): col: 27 Error: Definition qnx.fuse.ui.dialog:AlertDialog could not be found.

        import qnx.fuse.ui.dialog.AlertDialog;

I am basing this on what RIM has provided:

Using the AlertDialog:

https://developer.blackberry.com/air/beta/documentation/create_alert_dialog.html

Compiling with the command line:

https://developer.blackberry.com/air/beta/documentation/create_your_first_application_cmd_ms_2010847_11.html

This is a call to RIM to please provide adequate instructions for how to compile BB10 AIR apps via the command line.

I have searched the forums and found evidence of others having issues. There are some hints on how to get things working, but those hints are mostly with respect to the IDEs that some people use to develop AIR applications.

It's really a sad state of affairs that a person like myself can't even get a simple BB10 AIR app to compile in August 2012!

I've posted to the forums in hope of an answer. Hopefully this will all be clarified soon.

Update: As recommended by someone on the forums, deleting the SDK directory and reinstalling seems to have fixed this issue. (I did notice that the version I re-downloaded was "beta 2", so it's possible that this issue was fixed at some point)

App Idea: Replying to Support Emails
August 8, 2012

When I'm away at the cottage or elsewhere with my PlayBook, it is nearly impossible to reply to support emails since I get so many of them. For example, if I have 50 emails to reply to.

The reason is that on Windows I copy and paste common responses to questions, and doing that on the PlayBook isn't efficient enough.

Here's an app idea: Set up a bunch of pre-baked replies and associate them with short "keyword" snippets, just like I hear you can do with BB phones.

So I might type "bbwin" and it would paste the iTunes Sync help text for connection problems involving a BlackBerry phone and the Windows version of the app.

The text would automatically be copied to the clipboard so it would just be a matter of switching back to the email app and pasting.

This would be very easy to create and would suddenly allow me to reply to support emails. I'm sure there are other professionals that would find pre-baked replies very handy as well.

This use case fits into the whole question of whether a PlayBook is a good laptop replacement for professionals. With tools like this, it opens up new possibilities.

And what a coincidence: An article on the BB feature

Developer Relations at RIM
August 3, 2012

A couple days after I blogged about some of the pain points I have been having with BB10 development, I received an email from Garett at RIM appologizing for the delays I had seen getting good replies on their forums and he offered to chat on the phone about ways they might be able to help.

Wow.

Yesterday I had an hour long conversation with Garett and he took a page full of notes on a range of topics. Some of the things were action items that he could address, others were things that he intends to pass on to people responsible for those areas. As an example, a trouble ticket that I submitted about the IDE hanging after a power outage was escalated the day after I spoke with Garett.

I find this kind of responsiveness rather incredible, and of course it is every developer's dream to have a dev platform company not only responsive but even reading blogs.

It's kind of humorous to contrast this with giant companies like Google. A few months ago I got an email from Google warning that I hadn't filled out the "Business Website" field for my developer account, and that if I didn't do so, they were going to remove all of my apps from the Android store. I followed the instructions in the email exactly, but the screen they referred to didn't have a "Business Website" field. I replied to their email letting them know about this, but didn't get a response. I sent a second reply a few days later, even including screen shots (I think), and again didn't receive a reply. Sure enough, Google did as they promised and removed my app from their store. A few months later, I got an appology email from Google and my app was back for sale, and the "Business Website" field was now where it was supposed to be.

So yes, a bit of a contrast there.

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