Each time I tell that Flex 3 is open source, during my Flex 3 courses and sessions, people don't believe it.  So I copy the entire Flex 3 SDK libraries into a new Flex 3 project and show them the actionscript classes fo the SDK. Then I go ahead and tell that not only the standard Flex 3 SDK is open source, but also the charting controls, the AdvancedDataGrid classes and all the stuff that come with the Professional version of Flex Builder 3 are open source.

In order to open the data visualization source code  we must have these two requirements :

1. a Flex Builder Professional license key,
2. then you can extract the data visualization source code (the charting controls, the AdvancedDataGrid classes, the OLAP classes, and the automation classes)

The approach is very simple because all you have to do is to use the  DMV-source.jar in the Flex Builder 3\sdks\3.0.0\lib  folder and extract it.
Today I found this clear and cool post on the Flex Doc Team's blog that illustrates the required steps to
exctract the data visualization source code :

The syntax to extract the data visualization source code is as follows:

> java -jar DMV-source.jar {license-file-location} {output-location}

Once again kudos to the Flex Doc  Team ! Go, read it and use the Flex 3 SDK as the first step for learning a better way to develop in Flex 3 !

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Marco Casario is one of the most dynamic developers in the Adobe (formerly Macromedia) world. Flex and FlashLite certified Instructor, Flash and Dreamweaver certified, he intensively collaborates with Adobe Italy as a speaker and promoter of several events and roadshows. Marco has recently founded Comtaste S.r.l., a company dedicated to explore new frontiers in the Web 2.0 field, where the themes of accessibility and usability have added further importance to the PDF format and the relevant Acrobat application tools.

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