Copy and Paste: The future of Adobe application interaction?

So I wasn't able to make it to MAX 2009 due to another project I was working on ( which I'll try to be better at posting and talk about more that later), so I've been hitting all of the Adobe related blogs and aggregators for any tidbit of information I can get my hands on. I was perusing JD's twitter feed and I saw a mention of "Smart Paste" in Dreamweaver that intrigued me. He links to the Smart Pastevideo posted on YouTube.

The idea is interesting, intercept the pasting of content and insert some other content that can then manipulate the pasted content. In the video, they show a vector graphic of a chart copied from Illustrator and pasted into Dreamweaver. What gets inserted is a dynamic CANVAS tag that has its content drawn from a FXG file. They then link up the chart to some data and when viewed in a browser, the chart renders the chart with the data from an XML file. They then show a copying of an animation from Flash and pasted into Dreamweaver. Again a CANVAS tag is dynamically manipulated to display the animation.

As someone that makes his living building Dreamweaver extensions, I'm pretty impressed in how they were able to bend Dreamweaver to their will. I know that pasting Fireworks HTML is processed via teh Dreamweaver extensibility layer, so I'll be sure to investigate how something like this can be done within Dreamweaver. As with all Sneak Peaks, there's the devilish caveat that some things may not make it into any coming release, but it serves well to open the eyes to what the possibilities are with Dreamweaver.

MAXin' and likely not relaxin'

Registration for Adobe MAX North America has been opened and they have posted a bit of information about the tracks and pre-event labs. From folks that I've talked to it seems as this event is going to be quite big, bigger than previous years, where it was damn big. Check out the latest information about the San Francisco event: http://max.adobe.com/na/

I've not been able to make MAX for a few years now, not even when it was in my backyard so to speak last year when it was in Chicago, but I did enjoy the 2005 event in Anaheim (check out video #5, that's me, boy is it painful watching yourself speak, I hope I don't use that many ums and ahs all the time!). I gave a low level view of getting started with Dreamweaver extensions. It is a large event so it can be tough making sure you're able to attend all the sessions and speak with all of the presenters that you'd like to, but it's quite the experience.