What is it with all these new Macromedia MX products being released? Well I had to go and find out for myself, so I fought Steve off and sat down to take a good look at one of my favourite multimedia authoring tools, Director.

What Macromedia has done is to incorporate Director into its new MX family of products which include other old favourites like Flash and UltraDev, giving the product a new interface and tight integration with other MX products to ensure that developers can create effective rich content and applications. Some of today's happy Director customers include Disney, McDonalds, BMW and Toys R Us. Why? Because Director enables businesses to use multiple media types to communicate messages effectively. It's just that simple. Lets look a little more closely at some of the new features of this powerful product.

NEW FEATURES

Flash Integration

With Director MX, developers can now import Macromedia Flash MX files and then edit them quickly and efficiently with the new Flash launch and edit functionality. Additionally, Director developers can now access and control elements in a Flash movie from directly within the Director application, using Lingo control over Flash objects. As a lingo person myself who had trouble with the Flash scripting language I for one breathed a sigh of relief at this great new feature.

Enhance your productivity. Work faster with a highly customizable workspace that is shared among Dreamweaver MX, Fireworks MX and, as already stated, Flash MX.

A major enhancement and time saver for director developers. I know I keep repeating myself here but I honestly love this new feature.

Internet Protocol Support

You can import HTML text into Director MX while maintaining full control of all link references. This will help you to create web-based e-commerce applications with secure transactions (HTTPS) inside Shockwave. Integrate two-way communication (CGI Post). Leverage standard data exchange with XML parsing. Way cool news for dynamic content web developers.

QuickTime 6 support

Author content that uses streaming MPEG4 video. Also, add QuickTime video interaction through Lingo control over QuickTime wired sprites.

New Object Inspector

The Object Inspector lets you easily view all properties of your script instances, as well as all elements inside of your 3D and Macromedia Flash MX content. Examine and modify all of an object's properties without any scripting.

Of course there are many new features in Director MX and I have only highlighted a few of them but now that I can take advantage of these new features and create terrific Director applications why would I look elsewhere for a multimedia authoring tool? As orgasmic as ever, the amazing Director MX.