Introduction

The QNX Aviage HMI player for Adobe Flash Lite 3 is a new design solution for embedded products built on the QNX Neutrino RTOS that speeds the creation of graphical user interfaces and promotes designer creativity for a brand new class of animated HMIs.

Built on the strength of the QNX Advanced Graphics framework, the QNX Aviage HMI player allows software designers to implement entire user interfaces in Adobe Flash, dramatically reducing the traditionally lengthy development process for HMI design. It also allows graphical designers to leverage the QNX Neutrino realtime operating system for rich graphical capabilities and exceptional reliability.

Technology highlights

• Support for local and network-capable Flash content as well as Flash Player compatible video playback (FLV)
  
• Support for mixed-mode graphical environments – simultaneously render both Flash-based and native 2D and 3D graphics
  
• Optimized for low system overhead and optimal memory usage
  
• Support for touch screens, mice, keypads, and other input models as well as local font rendering for fast display generation
  
• Certified with the Adobe Acceptance Test Suite (ATS) and supported directly by QNX Software Systems
  
• Support for a wide range of embedded silicon platforms, including ARM, PowerPC, SH-4, and x86 architectures
  

Business benefits

Speed time to market

The QNX Aviage HMI player for Adobe Flash Lite 3 allows developers to leap directly from graphical prototype to final product without the need for HMI re-coding. It allows them to test entire HMIs on their desktops and then run the exact same content on embedded targets without any re-engineering. And because the QNX Flash player behaves properly in a realtime and memory constrained environment, it gives developers the power of Adobe Flash without any sacrifice to system reliability.

Leverage large base of existing Flash developers and content

Millions of developers know Flash development – from screen design to ActionScript programming. The QNX Aviage HMI player for Adobe Flash Lite 3 lets companies capitalize on this talent along with the thousands of Flash components and source examples available for use in production HMIs.

Specifications

The QNX Aviage HMI player for Adobe Flash Lite 3 is a certifiable Adobe Flash Lite 3 standalone Flash player supporting local and streaming content including audio and FLV video.

Supported features

• Programming features support
  
  • Flash 8 or earlier content
    
  • ActionScript version 1.0, 2.0
    
  • Interruptible/re-entrant player
    
  • Dynamic loading of SWF data
    
  • XML sockets
    
  • XML parsing, string/array/XML-to-native-objects conversion
    
  • ActionScript strict mode
    
  • Set/clear interval
    
  • Shape-drawing API
    
  • Data storage
    
• Sound support
  
  • PCM and ADPCM
    
  • MP3 (supported when SWF content has embedded MP3 content, no support for MP3 live broadcasts)
    
• Image and video support
  
  • PNG, JPEG, GIF, BMP, SGI, TGA, animated GIF (during authoring)
    
  • Flash video (FLV) using On2 codec in addition to Sorenson codec
    
• Multimedia support
  
  • Dynamic loading of multimedia files using external codec support (e.g. JPEG)
    
• Text support
  
  • UTF-8 character set
    
  • Latin1, Latin2, Latin4, Cyrillic, Greek, Turkish, Big5 (Chinese), GBK (Chinese), ShiftJIS (Japanese), KoreanUHC
    
  • Dynamic text
    
  • Device-specific vector fonts
    
  • Improved small text readability, text measurement, text wrap
    
  • Inline text input, English only. Other languages supported through external input engines
    
• Interactivity
  
  • Keyboard events
    
  • Key-based navigation
    
  • Mouse/stylus events
    
• Flash Lite features
  
  • Access to device-specific features (such as volume, backlight) through private messaging services
    
  • Reduced runtime memory consumption
    
  • Graceful handling of out-of-memory conditions
    
  • Runaway script limit
    
  • ActionScript slicing
    
• Other features
  
  • Dynamic memory handling
    
  • Device-specific capabilities: Ability to query information about current environment. Extendable model: Contact QNX for details
    
  • Metadata support: Flash metadata
    
  • Background transparency
    
  • Object model (for components)
    
  • Improved event model
    
  • Scriptable masks
    
  • SWF file compression
    
  • Dynamic discovery of device features
    
  • ActionScript exception handling
    
  • Web services and SOAP API
    
  • New preloader API, progressive download
    
  • Enhanced local file security
    
  • Persistent storage
    

System requirements

• Typical FlashPlayer size (core player + renderer DLL): 800K code
  
• Recommended minimum RAM: 2MB for standalone content, more for video
  
• Content size-to-heap ratio: 1 to 15. e.g. recommended heap for 10K SWF file is 150K
  
• Supported graphics chip with color depth of one of the following:
  
  • ARGB8888, RGB565, ARGB1555
    

Certification

• FlashPlayer binary is certifiable via ‘open’ certification or ‘closed’ certification:
  
  • Open = FlashPlayer certified for any content, regardless of content origin
    
  • Closed = FlashPlayer certified for known, trusted content only
    
• Certification level must be chosen and processes completed before start of production
  

When to use the QNX Aviage HMI player for Adobe Flash Lite 3

• Chose a Flash solution when system requirements involve:
  
  • High-end, powerful and popular graphic tools (Adobe™ Creative Suite®)
    
  • Complex screens with alpha-blends, transitions, morphing
    
  • Integrated audio with graphics, including videos (FLV)
    
  • Fast CPU: We recommend a maximum of 640x480 for embedded CPUs of 400MHz or less
    
• Chose a QNX Photon microGUI solution when system requirements involve:
  
  • Large screens
    
  • More traditional graphics (and possibly a windowing environment) using widget model and C/C++ callback routines
    
  • Screen builder tools using widget drag and drop
    
  • Remote graphical connections (e.g. Phindows)
    
• Chose a stand-alone QNX Advanced Graphics TDK solution when system requirements involve:
  
  • 2D/3D (OpenGL ES) APIs without the need for screen builder tools
    
  • Third party graphical products built on the QNX Advanced Graphics TDK
    

QNX Software Systems supports Adobe® Flash Lite™ technology. For further information on developing content using Adobe Flash technology, see: http://www.adobe.com/devnet/device