Creating Adobe AIR Job Search Applications


Posted By: Thomas Shaw, 6:30pm Sunday 22 November 2009

Unlike traditional applications, Adobe AIR isn’t a desktop application like Photoshop or Excel. It isn’t a web application either like Google Docs. It’s a hybrid that allows it to operate somewhere in between desktop applications and browser based applications.

Adobe AIR which stands for Adobe Integrated Runtime was released in 2008. The technology allows developers to create rich internet applications (RIA’s) that will work the same way across all operating systems (Windows, Mac, Linux, Mobile).

You may be already familiar with using Adobe AIR, applications such as TweetDeck (used to manage Twitter or Facebook accounts) are built on this platform.

As you can see with this example, IPA Personnel have used this technology to create a latest jobs application.

Adobe AIR Applications can be built by developers using existing technologies such as XHTML, CSS, JavaScript, Flash, Flex etc. It's quite easy to learn how to create an application to display an RSS feed or display a HTML page

But should you create a desktop application? It depends on what type of demographics you are trying to attract.

Since it is just another marketing medium we are using to display jobs, potential candidates may only download it and use it once...then forget about it.

In order for the end user to use the application they will first have to download Adobe AIR onto their computers.

Candidates may be reluctant to download and install any 3rd party applications to a work computer because the application is not browser based, it can interact with the users files and data from their computer.

Adobe AIR applications need to be digitally signed, to assist the end-user in determining whether to trust the application's author. However, the certificates can be self-signed, and many users will ignore the trust warnings and run even those applications that come from untrusted sources.

Adobe AIR has prepared a document titled Introduction to AIR Security as well as AIR:HTML Security FAQ.