While I was vaguely aware of the Adobe Exchange, I hadn't really checked it out until a recent purchaser of our Spelling Plus Library mentioned that he had been unable to find our component on it. While the Exchange is still in beta, and has some rough edges, it's looking pretty good overall. I was able to submit SPL, and have it moderated and listed in under 48 hours.

I think one of the major weaknesses of the Flash platform is the lack of a strong component and source code ecosystem. The Exchange provides one of the key elements needed to grow this ecosystem: Providing a central location for finding and rating third party components.

The main issues I encountered while submitting our spell checking component were:


  1. Some of the submission UI needs tweaking (ex. the technical requirement lists are way too small and unorganized).

  2. You can only submit an item in one primary exchange. Our spell checker works in Flash, Flex and AIR, so it would be nice to have it in all three exchanges.

  3. You can't have carriage returns or html in your description, which makes it difficult to provide detailed information in a readable format.

  4. The download button on product pages opens in a chromeless JS window, which is a pain in the butt.

  5. I still have not been able to figure out how to associate a thumbnail with my entry – it's obviously possible, as most items have one, but I cannot find any way to do it (if anyone knows, let me know).

Anyway, I'd definitely recommend having a look at the Exchange, and tossing it into your bookmarks. There's a lot of great content there already, and more is being added daily. It might save you having to reinvent the wheel on a future project.