As such I wrote a simple script that allows you to load the Microsoft Advanced Firewall as a COM object and edit it's rules.
With 'editing' I mean allowing or blocking a certain port / process rule or enabling / disabling a rule completely.
Simply said this script allows you to alter existing rules but not to edit or add ports.

You can give the script a set of ports that it has to list, or you can switch a config boolean and list all configurable ports.
If it is a remote server I advice you not to list port 80
You can leave out the the authentication block if you like, because most of the time people have setup htaccess themselves.

Code preview below image

or DOWNLOAD here: source code firewall demo

*****
PHP:
*****

session_start();
header("Cache-Control: no-cache, must-revalidate");
header("Expires: Mon, 26 Jul 1997 05:00:00 GMT");
header("Content-Type: text/html; charset=ansi");

/**
* Windows Firewall with Advanced Security browser editor: enable / disable or block / allow existing rules.
* @license Use, modify, destroy, improve and glue any license on this as long as I can keep using it myself
* @author Stijn De Ryck
*/

/******* ************* ********/
/******* USER SETTINGS ********/
/******* ************* ********/

//WWW-Auth
const USERNAME = 'admin';
const PASSWORD = 'password';
//CHANGE this to ANY STRING of choice!
const HASH_SECRET = "VPS_LATCHO_SECRET";
//if MANAGE_ALL_PORTS is set to TRUE then the application wil ignore the compacted lists:
// ( MANAGE_EXISTING_INBOUND_PORTS and MANAGE_EXISTING_OUTBOUND_PORTS ) and manage all ports that are found in existing rules
const MANAGE_ALL_PORTS = FALSE;
//The in the firewall existing predefined rules whereof you want to display the following INBOUND ports, "*" is also a valid option
static $MANAGE_EXISTING_INBOUND_PORTS = array(80,21,23,3306,110,25,443,465,993,3389,6900,6800,8080,4389,81,9696);
//The in the firewall existing predefined rules whereof you want to display the following OUTBOUND ports, "*" is also a valid option
static $MANAGE_EXISTING_OUTBOUND_PORTS = array(110,25,443,465,993,3389,6900,8080,23,80,"*");

/******* **** ********/
/******* AUTH ********/
/******* **** ********/
//improvable.... TODO post ?logout ?login with href

$authorized = false;
if(isset($_GET['logout']) && ($_SESSION['auth'])) {
$_SESSION['auth'] = null;
session_destroy();
}
if(isset($_SERVER['PHP_AUTH_USER']) && isset($_SERVER['PHP_AUTH_PW'])) {
$authuser = strtolower($_SERVER['PHP_AUTH_USER']);
if ( (strtolower(USERNAME) == $authuser)
&& (strtolower(PASSWORD) == strtolower($_SERVER['PHP_AUTH_PW']))
&& (!empty($_SESSION['auth']))
){ $authorized = true; }
}
if ( ! $authorized ) {
if (!isset($_GET['logout']))
{
header('WWW-Authenticate: Basic Realm="Login please"');
header('HTTP/1.0 401 Unauthorized');
$_SESSION['auth'] = true;
}
exit;
return;
}

/******* ********* ********/
/******* FW CONSTS ********/
/******* ********* ********/

//Domain
const NET_FW_PROFILE2_DOMAIN = 1;
const NET_FW_PROFILE2_PRIVATE = 2;
const NET_FW_PROFILE2_PUBLIC = 4;
//Enabled rule
const NET_FW_RULE_ENABLED = TRUE;
const NET_FW_RULE_DISABLED = FALSE;
//Direction
const NET_FW_RULE_DIR_IN = 1;
const NET_FW_RULE_DIR_OUT = 2;
//Action
const NET_FW_ACTION_ALLOW = 1;
const NET_FW_ACTION_BLOCK = 0;
//Protocol
const NET_FW_IP_PROTOCOL_TCP = 6;
const NET_FW_IP_PROTOCOL_UDP = 17;
const NET_FW_IP_PROTOCOL_ICMPv4 = 1;
const NET_FW_IP_PROTOCOL_ICMPv6 = 58;
//human readable protocols
$protoLabels = array(NET_FW_IP_PROTOCOL_TCP => 'TCP', NET_FW_IP_PROTOCOL_UDP => 'UDP', NET_FW_IP_PROTOCOL_ICMPv4=>'ICMPv4',NET_FW_IP_PROTOCOL_ICMPv6=>'ICMPv6' );
//human readable profiles ( public, private,...)
$profileLabels = array(1=> 'Domain',2=>'Private',4=>'Public',3=>'Dom+Priv',5=>'Dom+Pub',6=>'Priv+Pub',7=>'Dom+Priv+Pub',2147483647=>'All Profiles');

Enjoy!

It's reaonably easy to inject javascript into any loaded document.

The function I came up with is adapted from another example that I found online, but it is improved so that it takes care of duplicate id's if any are found.

So here al little piece of JavaScript that will get you the xpath of a node in an html doument and a little helder function to check the validity of the generated xpath.

function createXPathFromElement(elm) {
    var allNodes = document.getElementsByTagName('*');
    for (segs = []; elm && elm.nodeType == 1; elm = elm.parentNode)
    {
        if (elm.hasAttribute('id')) {
                var uniqueIdCount = 0;
                for (var n=0;n < allNodes.length;n++) {
                    if (allNodes[n].hasAttribute('id') && allNodes[n].id == elm.id) uniqueIdCount++;
                    if (uniqueIdCount > 1) break;
                };
                if ( uniqueIdCount == 1) {
                    segs.unshift('id("' + elm.getAttribute('id') + '")');
                    return segs.join('/');
                } else {
                    segs.unshift(elm.localName.toLowerCase() + '[@id="' + elm.getAttribute('id') + '"]');
                }
        } else if (elm.hasAttribute('class')) {
            segs.unshift(elm.localName.toLowerCase() + '[@class="' + elm.getAttribute('class') + '"]');
        } else {
            for (i = 1, sib = elm.previousSibling; sib; sib = sib.previousSibling) {
                if (sib.localName == elm.localName)  i++; };
                segs.unshift(elm.localName.toLowerCase() + '[' + i + ']');
        };
    };
    return segs.length ? '/' + segs.join('/') : null;
}; 

function lookupElementByXPath(path) {
    var evaluator = new XPathEvaluator();
    var result = evaluator.evaluate(path, document.documentElement, null,XPathResult.FIRST_ORDERED_NODE_TYPE, null);
    return  result.singleNodeValue;
} 

in Air's htmlcomponent I wnated to have the javascript in the code without having to load an exteral js file (not tested) and maybe risking security sandbox errors.
So In the onComplete handler of the htmlComponent I did this to inject the extra javascript in the document: (Make sure to carefully escape double quotes \" and \>\< signs !)
Again the same code, but now inline:
handling the htmlComponent listener: this.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, onComplete);

private function onComplete(e:Event):void
{
	var container:Object = this.window.document.createElement('div');
	this.window.onunload = cleanup;
	container.id = 'scriptContainer';
	this.window.document.body.appendChild(container);
	var script:Object = this.window.document.createElement("script");
	script.type = 'text/javascript';

	script.innerHTML = 	" function createXPathFromElement(elm) { \n"
		+"		var allNodes = document.getElementsByTagName('\*'); \n"
		+"		for (segs = []; elm && elm.nodeType == 1; elm = elm.parentNode) \n"
		+"		{ \n"
		+"			if (elm.hasAttribute('id')) { \n"
		+"					var uniqueIdCount = 0; \n"
		+"					for (var n=0;n \< allNodes.length;n++) { \n"
		+"						if (allNodes[n].hasAttribute('id') && allNodes[n].id == elm.id) uniqueIdCount++; \n"
		+"						if (uniqueIdCount \> 1) break; \n"
		+"					}; \n"
		+"					if ( uniqueIdCount == 1) { \n"
		+"						segs.unshift('id(\"' + elm.getAttribute('id') + '\")'); \n"
		+"						return segs.join('/'); \n"
		+"					} else { \n"
		+"						segs.unshift(elm.localName.toLowerCase() + '[@id=\"' + elm.getAttribute('id') + '\"]'); \n"
		+"					} \n"
		+"			} else if (elm.hasAttribute('class')) { \n"
		+"				segs.unshift(elm.localName.toLowerCase() + '[@class=\"' + elm.getAttribute('class') + '\"]'); \n"
		+"			} else { \n"
		+"				for (i = 1, sib = elm.previousSibling; sib; sib = sib.previousSibling) { \n"
		+"					if (sib.localName == elm.localName)  i++; }; \n"
		+"					segs.unshift(elm.localName.toLowerCase() + '[' + i + ']'); \n"
		+"			}; \n"
		+"		}; \n"
		+"		return segs.length ? '/' + segs.join('/') : null; \n"
		+"	}; \n"
		+"	\n"
		+"	function lookupElementByXPath(path) { \n"
		+"		var evaluator = new XPathEvaluator(); \n"
		+"		var result = evaluator.evaluate(path, document.documentElement, null,XPathResult.FIRST_ORDERED_NODE_TYPE, null); \n"
		+"		return  result.singleNodeValue; \n"
						+"	} \n";

	container.appendChild(script);
}

Within the htmlComponent (AS3) you can add code to listen for javascript mouse events and trace / store the xpath like this:

public function onClick(el:Object):String
{
    var targ:Object = el.srcElement || el.target;
    return this.window.createXPathFromElement(targ);
}

1) BitmapData has size limitations
2) the HtmlComponent's horizontal or vertical size can't be larger then 2880 or 4096 px depending on the Air version so we can't grab the content in one time, and even if we could we still had problem 1)
3) if we scroll the content of the html component to capture the content in multiple blocks then we hit upon a display invalidate / update problem; The scrolled display isn't updated yet when we draw it to BitmapData. If we would succeed in the capturing of multiple blocks, still we would have a problem tocombine them into 1)

My workaround is to scroll the content and grab it in multiple blocks.
Every scroll I implemented a little timeout.
To tackle the maximum BitmapData size problem of 1) without going into special compiler / expanded memory / C++ tricks, was to write the BitmapData of all blocks at once into a PNG. This way we prevent  that we have to combine them first into a (possible too) large BitmapData object.
Therefore I took the adobe PngEncoder class and altered it so that instead of providing it with 1 BitmapData object, you can feed it a Vector-array of multiple BitmapData blocks and tell it how to write them away ( stacked vertically or horizontally). And so PngStackEncoder was born next to HtmlToPng.
I chose to go with PNG, because it encodes faster then jpg.

Source files for grab here:  htmlToPng Source and Demo zip

HtmlToPng result in an easy workable interface:

The HtmlToPng class uses the altered PngEncoder: PngStackEncoder, used like this:

Above Demo html to png example will produce this images: (scalled down to 20% for this post).

where the black blocks are actually transparent or any other color you can provide with th the PngStackEncoder.encode fuction.

New download for Flashdevelop 4 because the color scheme installer of FD3 didn't seemd to do the trick.

Download here for >FD4:

Flashdevelop4_Dark_Theme_Latcho_v2.fdz

I updated my dark theme a bit to be even lighter on the eyes. Minor changes.

The method description block's green color has now less contrast with the background.

The brown color for class / function names is now a bit altered.

Download the modified theme here (<=FD3): Flashdevelop_Dark_Theme_Latcho_v2.fdz

updated Style:

The font used before was inconsolata, but that doesn't renders nice in FD3 anymore so I now advice to use Consolas from M$.

You can download the Consolas font pack here for free: Consolas Download

Cheers,

Latcho

Note: This is not true data security. Nothing is securable in actionscript, but you CAN make it hard(er) to get to.

So to describe my last attempt to hide some game xml data that I embedded in an second swf i went ahead like this to embed that swf as a hex string in my main project like this:

Trace Output: 4357530a2a60000078dad55c4d6cdbd87626f547cbffae6399444f9274a3d4a642b4e9cc4719eedb.........

The only easy way to get to ALL the data of the embedded-hex-swf is (including bitmaps) is
making an swf file from it; Now be my guest and write me a short (AIR?) tutorial please :).

This procedure is not super secure but discourages our fast'n easy decompiler friends.
Still better then posting the data over http.
If the process is not clear by now, please let me know, so I can improve above instructions.

Here you can see the transformation class that contains the two static functions binToHex() and hexToBin();

And here you can see BinHex.as:

Download BinHex.as

Ciao !

See this post as raw text

ScintillaCommand|SelectionDuplicate

Label: &BlockDupe
Shortcut: Alt+DOWN (my own choice)

Dupe'm
Cheers to Joel Stransky

See for UPDATE (oktober 2011) and flashdevelop 4 compatible installert his post:

http://greencollective.nl/blog/?p=31
----

Back in time I used Sepy as a texteditor as an alternative to the Flash IDE Non-Code-Editor.
Now my snappy editor of choice is FlashDevelop, totally tailored towards Flex SDK publishing.

In Sepy I had a nice dark background theme, but since the switch to FD I never took the time to configure colors in FD.
It really can make a difference for your eyes, a darker background; Less radiation or flickerHz effects I 'd say.

For everybody who wants to get AS3 coding  'darker', here is my theme for you to grab. It's a flash develop zip file, and should install by just running it after download and answer the dialog with..YES! . (  A restart of FD might be necessary ? )
If you're not sure yet, backup your current brightwhite scheme first.
Grab here: SyntaxColorAS3_FD_Latcho.fdz

[[ UPDATE: there is a minor update on this the with minimal changes available here: http://greencollective.nl/blog/?p=31  ]]

You can alter and save your settings by opening the menu Tools>Syntax Coloring:AS3.

The font I just started using is named 'Inconsolata'  (as seen in the screenshot);
Seems to be  a 1st choice of a bunch-a-folks. Looks peacefull to me on first sight.
The original Inconsolata Open Type font wasn't received by FD's font enumerator, but I found a ported TTF that does well.
Grab here:  Inconsolata.ttf

Enjoy.

Why wouldn't I be a

Reminder for myself:

http://installingcats.com/2007/12/07/how-to-use-command-line-debugger-fdb-to-debug-flex-flash-on-mac-os-x/

Got into it for a moment ----> this will be a messy post

found some extra info / commands within fdb now:

New to fdb? Do 'tutorial' for basic info.
List of fdb commands:
bt (bt)             Print backtrace of all stack frames
break (b)           Set breakpoint at specified line or function
cf (cf)             Display the name and number of the current file
clear (cl)          Clear breakpoint at specified line or function
condition (cond)    Apply/remove conditional expression to a breakpoint
continue (c)        Continue execution after stopping at breakpoint
commands (com)      Sets commands to execute when breakpoint hit
delete (d)          Delete breakpoints or auto-display expressions
directory (dir)     Add a directory to the search path for source files
disable (disab)     Disable breakpoints or auto-display expressions
disassemble (disas) Disassemble source lines or functions
display (disp)      Add an auto-display expressions
enable (e)          Enable breakpoints or auto-display expressions
file (fil)          Specify application to be debugged.
finish (f)          Execute until current function returns
handle (han)        Specify how to handle a fault
help (h)            Display help on fdb commands
home (ho)           Set listing location to where execution is halted
info (i)            Display information about the program being debugged
kill (k)            Kill execution of program being debugged
list (l)            List specified function or line
next (n)            Step program
print (p)           Print value of variable EXP
pwd (pw)            Print working directory
quit (q)            Exit fdb
run (r)             Start debugged program
set (se)            Set the value of a variable
source (so)         Read fdb commands from a file
step (s)            Step program until it reaches a different source line
tutorial (t)        Display a tutorial on how to use fdb
undisplay (u)       Remove an auto-display expression
viewswf (v)         Set or clear filter for file listing based on swf
what (wh)           Displays the context of a variable
where (w)           Same as bt
Type 'help' followed by command name for full documentation.
(fdb)

Start an application with 'run'.
View file names with 'info sources'.
List a file with 'list'.
Set breakpoints with 'break'.
Execute program with 'continue' until a breakpoint is hit.
Examine state of program with 'where', 'print', 'info locals'.
Execute individual statements with 'next', 'step', and 'finish'.
Resume execution with 'continue'.
Quit fdb with 'quit'.

It boils down to launching FDB.EXE in your flexsdk's 'bin' dir.
- Typing run:
(fdb) run

- Open a debug-enabled swf (preferably on http in your browser since that ads-in network access if you don't have security configured for that local swf path)
- set a breakpoint via a functionname (even if it is in another file, the name will match when fdb hits it), so for example type:
(fdb) b registerModule<enter>
You have now set a breakpoint for that function name that will be resolved later, linenumbers / filenames must be possible too.
And then type continue + <enter> ( add more breakpoints if you like) and again continue + <enter>
The swf will now run until it hits the breakpoint marked functionname 'registerModule':
Resolved breakpoint 1 to registerModule() at ModuleManager.as:23
(fdb) continue + <enter>
Breakpoint 1, registerModule() at ModuleManager.as:23   (yeahaa!)
23             public function registerModule(modRegName:String,instance:IModule):void {
now by command p we want to know what the variable  'instance' holds
( note (!) if you end the variable name with  a dot (.) you get more info) !:
(fdb) p instance.

outputs:
$7 = instance = [Object 758409729, class='nl.greenberry.gogeo.app::App']
_appController = [Object 757300145, class='nl.greenberry.gogeo.app::AppController']
_appDisplayModel = null
_appEventModel = null
_appModuleManager = null
_appSoundModel = null
_eventModel = [Object 758625729, class='nl.greenberry.gogeo.app::EventModel']
_modelLocator = [Object 758703937, class='nl.greenberry.gogeo.app::ModelLocator']
_moduleManager = [Object 760443361, class='nl.greenberry.gogeo.app::ModuleManager']
_moduleName = null
_stage = [Object 756722513, class='flash.display::Stage']
displayModel = [Object 757301009, class='nl.greenberry.gogeo.app::DisplayModel']
eventModel = [Object 758625729, class='nl.greenberry.gogeo.app::EventModel']
moduleManager = [Object 760443361, class='nl.greenberry.gogeo.app::ModuleManager']
moduleName = null
NAME = "Go-Geo"
soundModel = [Object 758409793, class='nl.greenberry.gogeo.app::SoundModel']
stage = [Object 756722513, class='flash.display::Stage']
VERSION = "0.0.1"

and the rest you will find out !

by the way you can alter variables realtime, and it displays your traces too:
[trace] sayHello

cheers !
Flashdevelop now complete for me

Code examples from his site:

ADDING COMPILETIME VARS:

mxmlc MyConfigClass.as -define+=CONFIG::someSetting,true
or
...-define+=CONFIG::myString,"'Hello!'" -define+=CONFIG::myNumber,"7"

for someSetting the AS3 class would be:

package {
public class MyConfigClass
{
   public static const SOME_SETTING:Boolean=CONFIG::someSetting;  // Actual AS3 this time

   public function doSomething():void
   {
      if (SOME_SETTING)
      {
          // Do it!
      }
   }
}
}

CONDITIONAL FUNCTION SWITCH:

mxmlc MyClass.as -define+=CONFIG::isDebug,true  -define+=CONFIG::isRelease,false

//AS3
package
{
public class MyClass
{
    CONFIG::isDebug
    public function doSomething():void
    {
        trace("This is a debug build!");
    }

    CONFIG::isRelease
    public function doSomething():void
    {
        trace("This is a release build!");
    }
}
}

Another from usefull tip-set from awen on adding resources and css files at compiletime by abusing some flex buildin hacks:

http://code.awenmedia.com/node/33

To obtain focus on a textfield with a custom textformat on it can give you headaches:
From wrong caret color to disapaering textcontent when you use tab button to unselectable text content.
You just keep fumbling around with _Textfield.stage.focus = _Textfield without joy.
I lost several hours to get the caret blinking where I wanted it.

It is so simple if you just had known that you NEED TO SET THE
Textfield.defaultTextFormat = myFormat wright before you had the line textfield.setTextformat(myFormat).

It seems that focussing or unfocussing or tabbbing resets your textformat with the default textformat,
and since that didn't exist... flash defaults to a STATIC textfield. YipiYoYO....
Figure that, especially after the tab first killed your textcontent and then makes your field unselectable.

But hey when you apply the defaulTextformat wright before you start playing,
suddenly the focussing and caret'ing works like a charm.
Hope you are happy to find this post ! I would have been
Here a little helper boyie class :

use it like this after import CaretFocus;
CaretFocus.atBegin(TField)
CaretFocus.atEnd(TField)
CaretFocus.atIndex(TField,5)
CaretFocus.unfocus(TField)
CaretFocus.focus(TField)