Since I use the Adobe products regularly with web development, I’m getting my hands wet with the Adobe AIR functionality. It’s definitely rather appealing I can use my current html/CSS/JS skills to build native desktop apps. Plenty of simply things I could have fun with this.
As a newbie in the realm, I have very little knowledge on how installers work with desktop environments. I never really had to think about it, since I code for browsers.
As I understand it, I need to create an AIR file on my desktop (using the AIR application and Installer Settings I found in Dreamweaver. And after creating the AIR file, which I named myFirstProgram.air, all I had to do was double-click it, and a nice installer appeared and let me complete the installation. Fun!
So here’s my question.
I’m guessing I have something on my desktop that lets me install the myFirstProgram.air, while other desktops (my parents, friends, clients) may not have.
After paying more attention to how I created the AIR file, I see this Information from inside my Dreamweaver (after creating the AIR file):
The operation succeeded. The AIR file has been palced in:
“Z:\Adobe\myFirstProgram.air”.In order to install this application on your machine, you need the
Adobe AIR runtime that can be downloaded from:
http://www.adobe.com/go/air
Ok, I know there’s some serious common sense to all this, but I’m going to ask the newbie questions about this.
If I want to install my fun little program on another Windows or Mac desktop, do I need to ensure it has the Adobe AIR runtime already installed (on their machines) first? (kinda like when a program needs Java installed first, before it can complete installation?)
Also, my limited knowledge of file extensions are coming into play here. myFirstProgram.air seems like it should be a .exe , and for a OSX, a .dmg
Again, I’m very new at this, so I’m reading as much as I can before asking something that may seem common sense.
My only deduction is that the extension doesn’t really matter, as long as there’s another program that understands it, and how to work with it’s guts – related to the operating system.
The Adobe Air runtime is required in order to install Air apps. They don’t use the .exe or .dmg extensions because they are not native installers.