There are a number of different collections of software that are related to flash. These are all tied together with ActionScript. Now in version 3.0, ActionScript is the underlying language that you use to program anything in flash. It's based on the ECMAScript standard that's also used by JavaScript, so if you're familiar with the style of JavaScript then you should adapt a little easier to AS. Version 3 has also had a drastic overhaul from v2. Now AS3 is much more of an Object Oriented language, though you can still do procedural programming.

Great, so we know we can program our animations/games/application in ActionScript. But where do we actually type our code, how do we *make* a game?

You need an *Environment* to *Develop* in. A few programs that you can use in conjunction with one another to help you build your game. Like a text editor, a graphic editor, etc. It's also helpful if these programs play nice with each other, and if they're *Integrated*. Hence and IDE (Integrated Developing Environment). Adobe gives you a few options here

• Flash CS4 - this is the typical starting point for most who work with flash. Especially animators and designers. It is pretty expensive, but just do what I do and use your school's licensed copy at the computer lab.
• Flex Builder - those leaning more towards the programming side of things can use this Adobe product which is built atop the popular Eclipse IDE (on a side note, eclipse itself is free, and you can use it to develop in all sorts of languages)

Both of those options cost money. Quite a bit of money actually, but in order to promote growth Adobe has provided the underlying technology for free in the form of the Flex SDK (Software Development Kit). Right out of the box it's a little difficult to use unless you really know what you're doing. Luckily there's a third party free IDE called Flash Develop that provides an easier way of developing with the Flex SDK. It's not for the faint of heart, but much better than using the Flex compiler from the command line, and luckily there is some documentation, and they have a good forum.

There are also a couple of offshoot products related to Flash development. Most recently Adobe Air is a platform that let's people use the Flash framework to create stand-alone desktop applications that are, get this, cross platform. Supposedly an application you write in Air can work on Windows, Linux, and Mac. You still program in ActionScript, and you can still develop in any of the above mentioned IDE's, but you need to have the free Air SDK installed.

And finally, there's FlashLite. This is Flash's little brother, made to run on mobile platforms. Again, you can use any of the IDE's to develop FlashLite apps, as of the version 2+ branch, AS3 is not supported, you have to use ActionScript 2.0.

So I hope that clears up some things about flash development. Personally, I want to start using FlashDevelop for development, but I'm not quite there yet, so for Leap of Faith I've decided to stick to the original Flash IDE until I get a little more comfortable with the whole Flash world.