JavaScript is pretty much everywhere you look these days, reaching far beyond your desktop browser. Adobe AIR lets you use JavaScript to create desktop installed HTML and Ajax apps. Apple uses it in its gadgets and in the iPhone's browser. And Nokia recently announced support for installed, local JavaScript apps on its phones with APIs to the camera, GPS, etc... (Anyone spotting a WebKit trend here?) You can even use JavaScript to create extensions for Aptana Studio and Dreamweaver too! Anyways, with all this JavaScript out there powering so many things we use every day, having great JavaScript debugging capabilities is paramount to development.

That's why today we're pleased to announce a huge step forward in the ease of creating Ajax and HTML apps for Adobe AIR: Today's release of the Adobe AIR Development Plug-in for Aptana Studio (beta) features, you guessed it — JavaScript debugging for Adobe AIR apps along with support for Adobe AIR 1.5 which Adobe announced earlier this week.

We previewed the JavaScript debugger for Adobe AIR apps yesterday to a group at Adobe MAX in San Francisco and got applauded for providing this critical utility to the AIR community. Like with other debugging environments you’re familiar with, just click to set a break point in the gutter, then step through, into and out of lines of code while viewing variables and introspecting objects. We think you'll find it quite useful. Did I mention it was free too?

   Check out this short screencast for a preview.

Or, if you can't wait here's how to get your hands on it now:

1. Get Aptana Studio 1.2.0
• New to Aptana Studio? Download and install Aptana Studio 1.2.0.
• Already have Aptana Studio? Open it and select Help > Check for Aptana Updates Now...
2. With Studio 1.2.0 and open, select Window > Preferences, then > Install / Update.
3. Set the Policy URL field to: http://update.aptana.com/update/studio/1.2.1beta/3.2/policy.xml
4. Apply the changes and Close the preferences screen.
5. Next, select Help > Check for Aptana Updates Now...
6. Download and install Aptana Studio 1.2.1 Beta, and restart Studio.
7. Select Help > My Aptana and click on the Plug-ins area.
8. Select the Adobe AIR Development Plug-in from the list and follow the steps.

As I mentioned it's a beta, so we're eager to get feedback now so that we can make final changes as well as start to add enhancement requests for future functionality.

Visit www.aptana.com/air for more info, links to forums, bug reporting, enhancement requests, docs and more resources.