my Tool Kit
Here are some tools I think can really enhance your development experience.
The Eclipse IDE-
a great environment for managing classes & resources. Open-source and under constant improvement.
FDT - Development Tool for Flash
An Eclipse plugin that makes coding with Actionscript a much more comfortable experience
Subclipse -
Keep your versions under control. A great plugin for Eclipse that keeps potentially runaway code in check.
Eclipse - IDE
Yes, it's that great of a tool I keep it posted on each page in this site. It's a coding environment used a lot in the Java community but it's great for whatever code you happen to be writing (PHP, C+, Actionscript, etc.) I'm hoping it's gets adopted by the entire Flash community as it makes a great standard for managing projects.
FDT - Development Tool for Flash
A big help for keeping you in line as you're coding Actionscript. Though it's not open-source, it will continue to be supported for Actionscirpt 3. Previously I was using ASDT, but switched after trying the FDT demo for a few days. Well worth the price.
Subclipse - Subversion for Eclipse
The next step in version control. I guess it's like leaving bread crumbs behind you as you code- you can follow them back to any previous point in case you code yourself into a corner (not that I'VE ever done such a thing :-) You can set up a local repository for your own work, or link to remote repositories to contribute to other projects.
OsFlash - the Open-Source Flash Community
You could spend days digging through all the great bits of code and projects that the community is working on. Here's a short list of some of my favorites:
ASAP Framework
Ever have trouble with event handling in bigger apps? Here's a set of reusable, pattern-based solutions that can really help get things started.AMFPHP
Call PHP Class functions from inside of Flash. The easy way to connect Flash apps to server-side data.Fuse
A must-have if you're trying to do anything that involves animation and code. Combines lots of different motion, scaling and easing functions into very intuitive and easy-to-use classes.
lynda.com
A great tutorial resource for all things digital media. Find great, easy-to-follow tutorials on software by Adobe, Microsoft, Apple as well as language primers for PHP, Actionscript, javascript and a host of others
actionscript.org
Dial into the Flash community. This is a great resource for Flash & Flex specific help. Source code, sample apps and tutorials abound. Also posts the latest in Flash news as well as a bulletin board for Flash-related jobs.