WYSIWYG Flash Programming Sprouts Up

January 29, 2008

This looks to have "super-cool" written all over it. Sprout is a new web-based application which serves as a WYSIWYG editor for Flash applets. It was released today Tuesday at DEMO.

From the website:

Building a sprout is easy. Choose from dozens of pre-built templates or start from scratch. Drag-and-drop shapes, text, images, video, and more. Then add components such as slideshows, jukeboxes, and countdown clocks, as well as interactive services such as chat (Meebo), phone (Ribbit), fundraising (ChipIn), and more. Once you’ve got your content in place, use advanced editing and navigation tools to perfect your sprout.

Sprout is getting around the usual need to use programming for more advanced functions in Flash. They are integrating with third-party services to provide powerful mashup capability. It is reported that they should be releasing an SDK in the next month or so to allow others to add their own components to the Sprout library.

Sprout is currently in private beta, but you can put yourself onto the notification list to find out more when it becomes available to the public.