The Gradual Disappearance Of Flash Websites
If you want to “go big” visually with a website, delivering complex interaction and a rich experience across a wide range of browsers, Flash is the only way to go. Right? Nope. Given the widespread adoption and advancements of modern browsers and JavaScript libraries, using Flash makes little sense. But it does have its place on the Web, considering the need for progressive enhancement.
In the current landscape of technology and accessing the Internet through devices such as picture frames, netbooks, cell phones and televisions, the benefits of Web standards outweigh those of Flash, especially when delivering content to a broad audience on various devices.
Flash is a proprietary product that sits on top of the browser to extend functionality. While Flash may have provided missing functionality for some time, it brings little value to modern browsers. As more and more designers and developers realize the benefits of Web standards and start using some of the features of HTML5 and CSS3, we’ll see fewer Flash-driven websites.
The Great Flash vs. Web Standards Debate
Advocates have evangelized Web standards for over 10 years. The debate among developers and designers often gets as heated as the discussion on same-sex marriage, causing uncomfortable divisions among some of the smartest people in the field.
With the recent announcement of iPad’s lack of Flash support and the continued lack of it on the iPhone, the debate has reached beyond the development community to include Adobe and Apple themselves. With Apple’s anti-Flash stance, it has become too hard to argue for a completely Flash-based website when it would leave out a potentially large audience.
Eventually, Flash will make it to mobile devices (250 million devices are expected to have full support by the end of 2012), but that’s really only a small part of the debate and one of the better arguments that Web standards advocates have.
At the heart of the matter is how to deliver a great experience to users no matter the technology or platform.
“HTML5 vs. Flash” is the wrong discussion. “Accessible rich media” is the right one.
— Jeffrey Zeldman (via Twitter)
In the end, we’re all just trying to create websites that can be accessed and used, regardless of the tools we use to deliver them.
Healthy Competition
In the early days of the Web, Flash was pretty much the only way to deliver a rich experience across different browsers and platforms. CSS and JavaScript were inconsistently supported across browsers, and relying on them was hardly worth the trouble.
(Image: Erik Charlton)
Flash saw great success early on and pushed forward quickly. The small app that once mainly made animations quickly became a worthy development environment in its own right. Developers and designers alike chose to concentrate their efforts in that area, often segregating themselves from the open Web and backing the proprietary technology. Flash websites took over the Web, and Web standards didn’t allow developers to create the experiences that users were starting to expect.
Web standards may have fallen behind once, but they continued to be pushed forward by practitioners and those willing to embrace the idea of an open Web.
Web Standards: Benefits And Reasons For Adoption
Users expect rich experiences, and in many cases these great experiences are now being delivered with HTML, CSS and JavaScript, which are the basics of Web standards.
(Image: The US Army)
The line between websites developed with Flash and Web standards has become blurred. At first glance, even the savviest developer would have a hard time discerning which technology was used for a website without peeking at the source.
The list of websites that are ditching Flash in favor of Web standards is growing every day. Even if these decisions are driven by the iPad and iPhone’s lack of Flash, they’ll soon reap the other benefits that Web standards bring.
Current Trends
What once could be done almost exclusively in Flash is now easily accomplished with JavaScript and a bit of ingenuity. Lightboxing, scrolling news stories, rich navigation and image slideshows were once solely the domain of Flash. Widespread adoption of standards is easily attributable to the ease of using JavaScript libraries for enhanced interaction and current support of CSS among browsers.
Video has been an important step in moving Web standards forward. Video is one of the few things that could once only be delivered in Flash. The biggest leap so far has been YouTube‘s adoption of the HTML5 video element (albeit in beta), allowing modern browsers to bypass the Flash plug-in and use video native to the browser’s player.
HTML5 video has encountered controversy (thanks to the current codec debacle) and reports of unimpressive performance, but these issues will be worked out. Website developers will implement HTML5 video and choose an appropriate codec. When the biggest websites make this decision, we’ll end up with a de facto standard that gives browsers improved performance.
Modern Browser Adoption
HTML5 and CSS3 represent a great effort to advance native browser performance, and many browser providers are already implementing their specifications, even through they haven’t been set in stone. We have a lot to look forward to with CSS animation, canvas, local storage, geo-location and other specifications that will bring Web standards into a new era.
Although it will be many years before we see 100% of the emerging specifications implemented in browsers and see a large majority of users upgrade to those browsers, if we embrace the progressive enhancement of content, we’re well on our way to pushing adoption among developers.
Progressive Enhancement
Learning to produce progressively enhanced content, giving up pixel-perfect rendering in every browser, and embracing graceful degradation in older browsers can free up time to concentrate on other areas of development, such as accessibility and platform-delivery agnosticism.
(Image: Unobtrusify.com)
If users of your website don’t have JavaScript or CSS enabled, they can still access and enjoy your content in a more limited way, unlike Flash websites, which typically don’t deliver content in the absence of Flash or JavaScript.
Designing with progressive enhancement in mind and building from the ground up require designers and developers to think more about the infrastructure of a website, and this typically exposes the kinds of issues that arise when working from the top down (i.e. designing a website and then considering the fall-back).
Smart Phone Browsers and Context Delivery
The mobile Web is still in its infancy and usually an afterthought in the design process, but standard-based designs can degrade as nicely on phones as they do on older desktop browsers. In the absence of the Flash plug-in, a website can still deliver an exceptional experience without much extra effort (which would be cumbersome with a Flash website).
Mobile Web browsing is increasing exponentially, and ignoring these users is unwise. Web standards are the only option to deliver richer interactions in mobile browsers.
Content Management
Giving website owners and editors the ability to edit interactive content inside a content management system means not having to coordinate with Flash developers to create and maintain content outside of the system. Many agencies have ditched Flash for WordPress-powered websites that use JavaScript to enhance the experience, allowing for quick and easy updates to portfolios and content.
Openness
Web standards being what they are (i.e. standard agreement on the way code is constructed and served), user agents and scripts from outside a website can be written to access data directly from the HTML. Search engines, microformats, feeds, translation and bookmarklets all work because of the open nature and consistency between the data.
(Image: Monica’s Dad)
If we want the Web to be truly scalable and interconnected, then microformats and microdata and APIs for content might be just the answer. Otherwise, we’ll remain in the same position we were years ago when websites erected walls around their content.
Freedom
Many people believe that the technology behind the Internet should be open and not competitive as it has been in the past. People should be free to consume and create information, without being tied down to the kind licensing restrictions and legalities seen with the likes of Flash, Silverlight and other corporately owned technologies.
Creating and delivering content with Web standards not only is the best technological solution but supports the freedom of an open Web.
Flash Does, And Will Continue To Do, Many Things Well
Just because Flash-driven websites are gradually disappearing doesn’t mean that Flash will disappear altogether. Too much content and infrastructure have been set up to magically vanish. Without vast restructuring or realigning of organizations and processes, plenty of Flash developers will continue to be employed, and plenty of Flash advertising will be directed at those ready to ignore it.
We owe a lot to Flash for making the Web what it is today, and it deserves that credit. Even though it showed less potential compared to the other plug-in technologies, such as Java applets, that emerged early on, it had a nice balance between seamless delivery to users and ease of development and deployment. Many other Web technologies, such as VRML and SVG, have tried to overcome Flash’s hold on the Web but have continually fallen short.
Where would the Internet be without Flash and the innovations it brought?
Ease of Use
Out of the gate, Flash was intuitive and easy-to-use application for both designers and developers, delivering the simplest of animations, yet able to scale to serve complex applications.
(Image: *ejk*)
Because of its ease of use, Flash posed a lower barrier to entry for budding designers and developers. And combined with the suite of applications from Adobe, Flash fits well in the designer’s workflow.
Consistency
You can’t argue with the fact that for many years Flash has been the only way to deliver rich interaction in a consistent way across a wide range of platforms and browsers. It’s still the only way to deliver video and audio to older browsers, and it will retain its throne for several more years.
If you’re a stickler for fonts and demand special ones for your website, then you’ll be saddened by the current state of font support in the browser. This shortcoming will have to be compensated by Flash and swfObject until @font-face and various font formats become more widely supported.
Standards Not Quite There
As much as Web standards have advanced, we’re often stuck having to support older browsers in which Flash may be the only way to deliver audio, video and complex data-heavy interfaces. Thanks to early adopting Web browser providers, we can start using the HTML5 audio and video tag today. But we still have to plan for a Flash fall-back to deliver media in older browsers.
The same could be said for the canvas element for delivering complex visualization, 3-D animation and games. If a browser like IE6 needs to be supported, providing a decent fall-back for the canvas element can be complicated. Flash might just be the best choice for development in such cases. As always, your current and potential audience should determine your direction.
Progressively Enhanced Flash and Flash Injection
The best Flash developers take the same approach as the Web standards crowd, using Flash as a layer to enhance their websites and applications. If that continues, Flash will continue to have a place in delivering a great experience, serving mobile devices and reaching search engines and other user agent technologies. The Flash injection technique is the easiest way to meld the best of both worlds.
The Future of Flash
Adobe has never been the type of company to let a product stagnate. You can be sure it will keep pushing to get Flash on as many mobile devices as possible.
(Image: Robert Weißenberg)
With Creative Suite 5, developers will be able to output Flash projects as native iPhone applications using the iPhone Packager. And Flash could soon evolve from its early roots as an animation application to a full-fledged desktop and mobile application development environment with the help of AIR and related advancements (AIR might reach the mobile space pretty quickly).
Flash developers will likely be in even greater demand, as the demand to deliver applications consistently between desktop and mobile devices increase—even if they aren’t asked to create run-of-the-mill websites.
Flash, HTML, CSS And JavaScript Are Just Tools
Web standards and Flash (and other plug-in technologies) are simply tools to create content for the Web. Even if Flash is on the decline for websites, Flash developers have no reason to worry about becoming obsolete.
Everything that is true for creating rich Internet applications holds true for whatever other tool you use, and transitioning to Web standards development may be easier than you think.
(Image: kansas_city_royalty)
Flash and Web standards developers have more in common than they don’t. Interface and interaction design, typography, layout, graphic design and object-oriented programming are all still valid and important for both technologies.
Developers on both sides of the spectrum struggle with many of the same issues. They both set out to create a great user experience, to design intuitive interactions and to make websites easy for users. All of this is done not by the technology itself but by the people behind it.
Standards-Based Websites That Shine
Here are some examples of websites that have embraced Web standards and offer rich interaction. If you want to keep up with current trends, many great standards-based websites are featured on showcase websites such as NotCoffee and jQuery Style.
Pigeon and Pigeonette
This website has a single page that transitions during navigation. Other than being informational, it offers a couple of Flash games.
Good Works Media
An agency website with an accordion home page and lightbox for the portfolio.
Made by Elephant
A minimalist portfolio website with a horizontal accordion.
Euna (English translation)
A single-page website with very “elastic” transitions.
Artopod (English translation)
A retro design with a fixed-height “window” onto the content.
DreamerLines
Bold, colorful, full-screen imagery on a single page, with a lightbox portfolio.
Serial Cut
Mainly full-screen imagery for a portfolio that includes 3-D, graphic design and photography.
Alfa-Bank: U2 (English translation)
The main layout and background imagery changes during navigation.
Kobe
A more traditional website but with subtle navigation effects and transitions for imagery and content.
Unowhy (English translation)
Another accordion website, with smooth content transitions and a lot of “hover” effects.
Creative People
Very creative imagery, heavy on the AJAX, with many examples of the studio’s work.
World of Merix
A full-screen draggable map of the agency’s clients, with a smooth lightbox for the content.
The Sixty One
Very much an application, this streaming music service lets you browse artists and related info. As you listen, information pops up on the band.
Banadies Architech
A website highlighting the work of an architecture firm. With each click on the navigation, the page elegantly shifts around.
Paul J. Noble
A dark portfolio website, with an interesting approach to navigation.
Adult Swim Shows
A recent relaunch, with full-screen images for navigation.
Glyde
A marketplace website with a simple interface, carousel navigation for products and lightboxes for detailed descriptions.
Alex Arts
Personal portfolio of Alex Abramov, with full-screen imagery and pop-up content.
Rix
Personal portfolio of Adam Rix. Full-screen imagery and subtle navigation.
Eric Johansson
A personal portfolio, with a fun design and scrollable interface.
Websites From The (Near) Future
Here are some “experimental” websites that demonstrate what’s becoming possible with Web standards. Be warned: these might work only in the most modern of browsers. To keep up with emerging standards-based websites, check out CanvasDemos and Chrome Experiments.
Bespin
An online code editor from Mozilla.
Sketchpad
A simple painting program.
JavaScript Wolfenstein 3D, from Nihilogic
The classic game created with Web standards.
Leaf Transform, from Disegno Cetell
A simple falling leaf using the canvas element.
Canvas Animation Demo
A cartoon animation using the canvas element
Canvas Experiment, from 9elements
An audio visualization that reacts to your mouse.
Ball Pool
A physics-based demo that lets you drag and push around multi-colored circles.
Dynamic Content Injection, from Paul Rouget of Mozilla
An “almost” augmented reality demo that inject images into a video.
Canopy Animation
A visualization of a tree that mutates and blooms.
Bean
Images falling on the screen.
3-D Cube Demo
A draggable, zoomable 3-D cube of colors.
JavaScript Bike
A game in which you navigate your motorcycle across a terrain.
Comments Visualization
A visualization of comments over time by Matt Ryall using Processing.js.
HTML vs. Flash Resources
Here are a few fairly recent articles. Make sure to check out their comments.
- Flash, iPad, Standards, Ahem, by Jeffrey Zeldman
- HTML vs. Flash: Can a Turf War Be Avoided?, by CNet
- HTML5 vs. Flash, HTML5 Spells Death to Flash?, by Remy Sharp
- Flash Is Dead! Long Live Flash!, by Jeff Lamarche
- Flash Corporate Websites Are Dead… Oh, and Intros, Too, by Xiik
- Is the Flash-Powered Agency Site Obsolete?, by AdFreak
- HTML5 and the Future of Flash, by Gartner
- Flash and Standards: The Cold War of the Web, by Dan Mill of A List Apart
- Mozilla Warns of Flash and Silverlight “Agenda”, by ZDNet
(al)
Bruno
April 12th, 2010 3:08 pmFunny, the advertisements on this pages are made in Flash.
Chris
April 12th, 2010 3:17 pmI have to agree that this post is ridiculous. Following trends with any type of creative field is a no no. It is about breaking boundaries and doing something creative that makes a creative individual shine. No doubt it’s very difficult to do but it is important to go through the process.
You don’t need a college degree to create a flash site. I used flash in my undergrad program but never did they teach me actionscripting. I taught myself from scratch and here I am creating full blown 100% flash sites for the entertainment industry.
Flash does the job in many ways HTML5 will never do. Even the article headline sounds retarded because there hasn’t been a gradual disappearance of flash websites. As flash sites disappear, new flash sites are being created. I created 6 different flash sites in the past year alone, so no, the littlest addition to the internet counts.
Smashing Magazine is a great site for resources but I disagree with certain articles such as these. This website focuses too much on typical standards and web 2.0 stylization. I hate the term ‘web 2.0 design’ because now every website with a blog looks the same. Ok sorry went off on a tangeant.
AL
April 12th, 2010 3:59 pmDon’t mean to get mean looks directed my way, but DHTML (the blending of html+css+javascript), as I still call it, still can’t really live up to Flash. Forgetting that you can program functionality in interactive components of a Flash movie with a fourth of the code and complexity as needed with javascript, you can just do so much more even without coding. The timeframe approach of making it like a movie makes so much possible, and so much possible to designers who aren’t coders. And with the advent of Flash’s ability to work with the back button/SEO/bookmarking, if anything Flash is just as useful as it has ever been. Granted, a lot of stuff I’ve mentioned about Flash’s relevance doesn’t exclusively apply to making websites. Websites are one thing…widgets, players, tools, cartoon animations, and so on are entirely different. All in all, DHTML lovers have been hating on Flash for years. But this new, widespread vision of its pending demise are really more attributed to Apple’s refusal to work with Adobe. Don’t let Apple dictate where the web goes.
Chris
April 12th, 2010 4:06 pmI agree. I am unhappy with Apple right now. I think they are getting a bit too cocky. Apple is forgetting that they are just hardware. Apple needs to realize that Adobe is what makes the web look excellent.
Sam
April 14th, 2010 11:05 amChris, your stupidity shows in this statement. What a Flash Developer
wackzingo
April 12th, 2010 4:34 pmI don’t like that the author equates HTML5 as being synonymous with ‘Web Standards’ and Flash with ‘Anti-Web Standards’. Web Standards has nothing to do with the technology that is used as much as “how” it’s used. The decision to use Flash has nothing to do with ‘web standards’ but is really about using it in it’s proper place.
Chris D
April 15th, 2010 9:36 amI agree. Accessibility (n.) and accessible (adj.) are such slippery terms. Web browsers & web technologies make web content accessible to users; designers design for accessibiliy.
butters
April 12th, 2010 4:39 pmI bet a lot of the flash haters just can’t design flash sites which is where their hatred stems from. I use to be one of them. My ignorance to flash made me hate it until I actually sat down and learned it. Now it’s the greatest thing since online porn!
It would be nice to get an un-biased article from SM once in a while.
dev
April 12th, 2010 5:17 pmHmmm – looks like about ZERO people agree with this article.
If smashing wants to pander to the majority – time to get over apple and get back on the flash bandwagon…….
I was wondering – can html5 process c libraries using Alchemy ?
Does it have support for seeing peer to peer networking such as Stratus ?
Native sockets ?
Bytecode loading and processing ?
Hmm – can it implement effects libraries like PixelBender ?
What is the micophone access like ?
What is the sound manipulation like ?
For that matter what are the image processing effects, filters like ?
Hmm – what are the non-system font handling capabilities ?
In fact this list can go on for about ten pages – why dont you get a remote, tiny, fraction of an understanding of what on earth it is you are commenting on – and if you do – then how about SOME DEGREE of honesty and fairness in your comparison – because this is just pure bullshit !
Grow up.
Chris Howard
April 12th, 2010 6:03 pmKeep the internet proprietary free.
Chris Howard
April 12th, 2010 6:18 pmCan you modify/update Flash websites/content without owning Flash?
Is it limited to those who own it?
Chris
April 12th, 2010 6:25 pmActually you can edit/modify/update through either XML or CMS. If you are talking about changing the design and graphics and color of a website, you can say the same thing about HTML/CSS based sites. You can’t change graphics using CSS or HTML. You can’t change the actual design of the header without loading up Photoshop.
Steve
April 12th, 2010 6:59 pmYes you can do it with a style sheet, xml, or cms.
Gidon
April 14th, 2010 4:25 amYes , Flash websites can be modified and hooked up to a Content Management System.
It does involve knowledge of php/asp mysql/mssql/access and Xml. Not simple, but I’ve successfully done a couple.
Jose
April 15th, 2010 7:15 amYes.
Darryl Jonckheere
April 12th, 2010 6:47 pmExactly what does the image of the soldier brandishing the machine gun while displaying a big thumbs up supposed to represent? -the debate is over? -diplomacy has failed and it is now time for brute military force -destroy Flash and all other plug-in Web technologies?
This post is absolutely ridiculous.
My full rebuttal is too long to post here.
http://www.darryljonckheere.com/blog/?p=1091
danger-pixel
April 13th, 2010 8:35 amNice plug.
dev
April 12th, 2010 7:36 pmYou don’t need flash to create flash – except to compile (and even then there are alternatives).
I do not use flash for anything except compiling and create some of the most compelling, dynamic, creative sites there are.
Almost all flash users use html, css, and javascript – they are therefore in a great position to comment on the merits of both. It is a shame that those who never use flash, barely understand it and are limited in the experience feel so knowledgeable about something they are really clueless about.
HTML5 is, at the very, very best a poor version of flash 5 PLUS a very, very simple video. Its ridiculous to eve try and compare them – and when you consider that HYTML5 is years away this notion is compounded.
Anyone, ANYONE who compares them, are claims HTML5 is a flash killer is proving one thing – their own absolute ignorance.
Emerson Alencar Junior
April 12th, 2010 8:52 pmAll the discussion about Flash and Web-Standards is relevant, very interesting. But what we’re discussing? Apple vs Adobe or the future of the webdesign? I think we’re stepping on a grey area here.
No doubt Adobe Flash is still very powerful. With some coding, you can create both complex and aestheticaly pleasant (and sometimes just awesome) projects with it. But Jobs is right on a certain level. Adobe got lazy because of it’s own market position. It is really charging high for it’s own solution: The Flash Editor. It not only fails to manage already-published-on-the-web projects by itself but also utterly fails to easily create an SEO-friendly, searchable-content projects. And does someone remember when it was last updated? Apple people are pissed off by the lack of quality Flash support (me included).
To make things worse for Flash, the software market got flooded with all sort of insanely cheap flash easy/quick banner/slider/whatever crap solutions for non-designers (or design-challenged people with greedy pockets). Of course there are shining pearls among the mud, some of them could rivalize to a point with Adobe Flash own editor itself ! But let’s face it: most of them just helped to throw Flash’s reputation as a premiere webdesign tool it deserved to be into shameful doubt. Each subproduct those cheap bargains throw to the web just make most people think designers are a luxury, not a TRUE necessity.
HTML5, CSS and JS is trendy, is cool, is Web-Standards. And the better: you may create a project with inexpensive tools! With some patience and average knowledge, you may create beautiful projects with them too. Flash like? Sorry, not for a while, at least not without a nice amount of time spent and expert knowledge on JS and CSS, to say at least. And they’re SEO friendly. But you must learn at least HTML, CSS and Semantics to accomplish something useful. And you must account render differences/bugs between browsers. And JS conflicts sometimes. But they’ll be aestheticaly pleasant? The nice designed ones tend to be.
In the end I think that nicely designed sites are just that. Just nicely designed. No matter the tool you use. Nor if they are (or not) that awesome, inventive and groundbreaking. Sites MUST WORK in first place. Remember you can get stuck into really nasty traps while developing them in XML, JS, AC2/3, CSS, HTML, SILVERLIGHT, you name it. But you MUST KNOW HOW AND WHEN to use them. And for the sake of webDESIGN, webDESIGNERS must have DESIGN bases. As designers, we must step up and start to show our talents whatever is the platform used. Platforms are as good as their designers/developers are. WE must guide the corps, saying what WE want. Not otherwise. Let’s stop throwing rocks each others and start to reshape this coding hell that the Web is becoming! But, above all, we need to make people leave design for designers, not for corporations or anyone else. Sorry for the loong post. :P What you think? Agree? Disagree? Anything else? Not at all? :D
Victor
April 12th, 2010 9:09 pmI cannot think of anything useful to add to this article. Maybe this is the reason why it should be considered near to useless. It’s bad written, illustrated, argued, and also generates poor comments and opinions. Just like this one of mine. What a waste.
Darren
April 12th, 2010 10:01 pmHot topic for designers AND developers! Here’s a related debate: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=417312&highlight=webcopyplus&page=4
joe
April 12th, 2010 10:15 pmcalredd made a lot or realtors upset because they made all of the mls software for agents 100% in flash. Seems like a mistake to have an all flash website in 2010 and beyond. Just my opinion.
jeanie
April 12th, 2010 11:13 pmSuddenly i can’t get access to any articles from smashing mag on my mobile- n97. When i select an article it takes me straight to comments only, no article.
Noooooo…… I can’t live without smashing….. Is there something i’ve done to my mobile or is something amiss with smashing mobile version?
Kashif M Qasim
April 12th, 2010 11:36 pmGreat one! Keep it up [SM]
Marko
April 13th, 2010 12:01 amI still don’t see why it must be one or the other. Flash is widely supported, and it does stuff you can’t do with any other technology (or you can, but it isn’t worth the hassle). Web isn’t failing because of Flash, so we have to get rid of it… au contraire. And it’s in constant developement, year after year something new and useful is being introduced to the platform (not the case with HTML btw).
It’s a good thing, it’s one more tool you can use to present your stuff. If there was no Flash, everybody would be going “if at least there was some standard platform that we could use for…”.
Bad and unusable web is being made with Flash, but guess what, it’s being made with HTML/JS too. No standard will ever help a production team that isn’t willing to invest time into making a decent product.
Chaz Scholton (iDude)
April 13th, 2010 12:16 amAsk me, there’s too many things that all us monkeys have to bang out on the keyboard to get things done. Some monkeys make poor poor coding choices or mistakes. CPU’s become stressed out like Hamster Wheels with great big fat Gerbils running inside…. I’ve encountered some flash on websites you’d swear was based off the Byte count of the Windows OS. Also, have encountered sites with Extremely Bad JS that was stressing out the Memory and CPU as well. Sort of nice to get alerts in my browser about out of control Javascript and if I want to stop it. Don’t see that control feature with Flash. I really have seen more Done with RIA javascript and Ajax. Stuff that a human being could crack open with a text editor and fix… no special tools or expensive software involved.
I think Adobe should be figuring out how to translate Flash into the inside of the canvas tag. Come on folks, If you can port and run Quake II inside of it why not flash? I think Adobe is poised with some excellent tools that could translate into effect tools for things to go into the Canvas tag. Perhaps it’s time for flash to become a little more innovative and evol a little.
eco_bach
April 13th, 2010 4:21 amhttp://news.softpedia.com/news/Adobe-Flash-CS5-Can-Export-to-HTML5-Canvas-139597.shtml
Craig Pearson
April 13th, 2010 1:13 amI do feel this article is pretty pointless and I lost the motivation to put my time into reading this with the passion Smashing Magazine perhaps intended. Halfway through this post I realised that I wasn’t learning anything new here and here’s why:
In the opening paragraph it was boldly stated that we’ll fewer flash driven websites. There was no real evidence for this, no figures and quite frankly it was in my opinion – a hunch which came across a little narrow minded.
I’m not sure about other professionals out there but I always make the decision on what “tool” to use for the job based on the needs of the client but most importantly the customers the end product is aimed towards. Of course Apples move to not allow flash on their iPhone/iPad makes our job more challenging, and yes HTML5 opens many new doors for web developers and designers.
Most of our lives consist of overcoming the dilemma on what tool to use, and I think common sense prevails here, If I am designing a website which I want accessed across all mediums including the iPhone I’ll just have to consider alternatives to flash, just as if I wanted to build an online web application for multiple mediums I’d have to consider the people still using IE6.
Arguments such as this go round and round in circles. And this seems to be a complete waste of time, most comments on here focus on whether people like flash or hate flash. It’s not about your preference it’s about what the people accessing media want and the hardware/software they are using to access that media. Flash, like every other “tool” has it’s pro’s and cons, it’s up to you to decide on what “tool” to use, the fact is there’ll always be something that flash can do which HTML/Javascript can’t and vice versa. I for one certainly won’t be dropping flash just because there is this fear that it’s going to be an out dated technology, I also won’t be so stupid as to make bold claims based on the future of a “tool” in such an ever changing industry. We adjust to changes, improvements and set backs all the time. Let’s stick to making great media, not becoming mediums!
I’d have been way more interested in this article if there was some actual figures involved, that way I could have took this article as an informative piece and something I can use when making decisions in the future as opposed to a wasted hour of my day.
Flow
April 13th, 2010 1:48 amEverything is said.. this is definitively one of the worst and incompetent articles on smashingmagazine..
I think you people should imagine or notice which position you got in the international industry and focus a bit more on resarch for this articles, better than kick out one or two articles every day stuffed of BullSh****.
But okay.. when all the kids just read the headlines of THIS amazing magazine and tell it with the stupid useless brains to other stupid brainless people.. sure.. everyone is on the same position.
/ironic off?!
Martin
April 13th, 2010 2:26 amI like how the “Content Management” section makes it sound like Flash can’t use content from a CMS.
Jorge
April 13th, 2010 3:27 amEy!, nice article.
I think you´re right, but, I think this could became a “lucha de egos” (sorry I don´t know how to explain this sentence in english) as we say in spanish.
I think both (apple and adobe) are looking for money, don´t forget both of them are big companies, so they have to mantain their status on the web. The last Apple advice, I think it´s a tantrum (I´m a user mac) and it responses to the next iAd system appearance, that could close the door to google and adobe´s technologies.
I´m flash and xhtml developer, I can´t tell to my customers what to use, flash or hxtm.
Customer idea of the web and their purpose are the elements that finally select the lenguaje, for online shops I use xhtml, and for corporate projects I use both, because the manipulation of video in flash plataform it´s impresionant.
I really think we don´t have to be with or against flash or xhtml5, we have to do our job as better as we can, using wathever we use.
jk
April 13th, 2010 4:25 amI hate Flash especially because it is an external piece of software controlled by Adobe running on my PC and in many cases it stores Local Shared Objects (LSOs) “Flash Cookies” (trackers, etc.) on my computer without notifiying me. Clearing cookies in my browser leaves the hidden flash cookies untouched. Even Firefox plugins like Flashblock just stop them from being shown, but they still load.
I wonder if there are more people blocking flash in their browsers or people who think they need such stuff on their website.
Josh Chernoff
April 13th, 2010 5:03 am@jk
Yeah if you spent all day looking at illegal sites I could see how you maybe worried.
But for the rest of us no one really gives a rip.
Also if you cared so much about it you would have clicked on the first line in a google search for. “how to turn off shared cookies from flash” which brings you to an adobe site where they give you full detail about what a SO is and how to turn them off in flash permanently.
http://www.adobe.com/products/flashplayer/articles/lso/
so why don’t you try again and this time try to have a valid point.
John B
April 13th, 2010 5:06 amEach has its place. From my point of view, the anti-flash movement stems from bias against cost and learning a yet another technology. I’ve worked with Flash since version 4 and there are appropriate uses for it. I’m not about to create medical animations in JavaScript and canvas, nor am I going to create web forms in Flex when I can use jQuery to enhance UI. Ever compiled a Flex form with two fields and a button? It was about 500k!
Jerome
April 13th, 2010 5:16 amHere’s the deal:
1) Get the coolest, “flash like”, full of shinny things, website done without using flash that can reach 90% of the internet users right now.
2) Go to FWA and look at some of the top flash sites.
Now you should understand why developers use Flash and why our clients want Flash.
Joel Nealy
April 13th, 2010 5:25 amHaving been animating and designing within Flash for many years I have also been around to see scripting become more and more relevant as far as creating rich websites go.
But to say Flash is dying…thats an error.
Flash provides an editing environment similar to photoshop with the addition of a timeline that allows you to be a conductor…to “orchestrate” while you create. The more talented a Flash designer got the less work they had to do with the addition of newer coding practices and greater understanding of functions.
When Flash cs3 came out and actionscript got “rewritten” into its cumbersom but more durable form…alot of people got turned off.
Yet and still to create interactive sites as well as animations quickly and painlessly, Flash is the way.
I will never enjoy scraping through code for hours to get windows or boxes to line up properly when I could place them in their right place physically. Flash is an amazing program and if the powers that be would honor Adobes great contribution and make it worthwhile to import the program to mobile phones and devices….we would not be having this discussion.
ae
April 13th, 2010 5:36 amThis is perhaps the worst article I’ve ever read on smashingmagazine.com. Bad research and terrible arguments – as proved by many of the comments here.
I just want to comment on one more thing though. When it comes to flash-sites, flash-haters has been whining for years about that “if I turn off flash, I can’t use the site”, which is partly bollocks, but anyhow… I think about 80-90% of the “javascript enhanced” websites I click through nowadays, including most on your list (those that are still active), doesn’t work at all if I turn off Javascript. That’s NOT “javascript enhanced” – that’s just “javascript”! And that’s just trying to pull a frikkin’ accessability-card out of the hat, when there isn’t one.
Flash, html5, javascript, whatever… I don’t care if they all survive, one die, or they all die and get replaced by something new. I’m a webhead and I use the tools most appropriate for the case. Flash is a tool that’s miles ahead of the alternatives for some cases – so I use it. Stupid people put everything on a single card.
Paulie
April 13th, 2010 5:49 amThis has to be the stupidest “article” I’ve ever read on Smashing Magazine. It’s hardly factual, it is OPINION. Please let the author spout his opinion on his own blog.
I have never come to Smashing Magazine to be preached at – I’m usually here to learn. I have to say – I’m coming to SM less and less – much more of this drivel and I won’t be back, as grateful as I have been for so much great CONTENT.
BTW – The author seems to imply that there has to be a choice between web standards and Flash (I can’t stomach re-reading to check). This, of course, is drivel.
keyf213
April 13th, 2010 6:01 amwoooooo!!!I came acorss a great hot cougar dating site.
If you put “A GE” and “MIN GLE” together, then you will get the url.
It’s a nice and free place for Younger- Women and Older Men, or Older Women and Younger Men, to- interact with each other. Maybe you wanna check out or- tell your friends
aQuib
April 13th, 2010 6:16 amThis article is misleading. Flash is not declining but is simply being used more efficiently. Designers and developers who were seeking to a degree simple effects and interactivity in the past only could achieve this with Flash. Unfortunately this was a majority of developers and designers so as a results Flash became the driving force. But with the introduction and popularity of java script libraries, css3, html5 etc, these same designers/developers who are seeking such simple and easy effects and interactivity can achieve it without Flash. Does that mean Flash is on the decline? No, it means the development of website in Flash is getting purge and the use of Flash is being more efficient, which is good and will continue to make Flash a vital player in the web. HTML5 and CSS3 have a long long way to go to caught up with the interactivity possibilities of Flash.
I will hate to consider this article being inspired by Apple products iPad and iPhone. Don’t forget that Apple is a private organization seeking to make a profit – so I highly doubt their reason for not supporting Adobe Flash and application development in it was only to increase Web Standards and promote HTML5.
espositomr
April 13th, 2010 7:26 amI agree with you, Flash is definitely not declining. The showcase of state of the art websites exposed on THEFWA.COM does not compare with any of the Extended JS and CSS websites which still struggle with cross browser compatibility, deficient custom font display (some techniques use flash to accomplish this XD ) and above of all this facts, the SIZE of the page site is waaaaaay bigger than a full flash site.
Please let me know when a CSS/JS website accomplish such a rich media experience like the one shown by ‘seagullsfly.com’
Alexander Trefz
April 13th, 2010 9:07 am“Extended JS and CSS websites which still struggle with cross browser compatibility, deficient custom font display (some techniques use flash to accomplish this XD ) and above of all this facts, the SIZE of the page site is waaaaaay bigger than a full flash site.”
each character of this sentence is bullshit(except the font-replacing). JS libraries do NOT struggle woth cross-browser compabilities. js and css would not struggle with cross-browser if browsers would be standard compatible(this is not just IE, Opera(except 10.5) and other arent much better) but this is on a good way(Opera 10.5, IE9)Flash site are at more then 80% bigger than a css/js based version IF the solution makes sense on css/js. custom font display is easier then ever with css3.
The point is: Flash is used in the wrong way in most cases, which means that it is used for a simple slideshow. That isnt the thing that flash or silverlight are build for. this: http://agencynet.com/ is what flash is build for. sites like this one are absolutly great and could not be build with js/css without extreme effort.
Ben
April 13th, 2010 8:20 am“This is perhaps the worst article I’ve ever read on smashingmagazine.com. Bad research and terrible arguments – as proved by many of the comments here.”
Amen.
What a dumb post. You are all over the place, and the title is horrific. The Gradual Disappearance of Flash Websites. Flash websites aren’t disappearing. You make it sound like we are in Back to the Future and someone changed the past. If anything there are more of them, there may be more Javascript and JQuery based sites too but they are not replacing Flash anytime soon. By the way, a lot of those sites suck the life out of my computer as bad as or worse than any Flash site ever did. Flash is going to be here a while. I used to respect stuff on this site, but it seems the quality of what you put on here lately is horrible. This is such a sensationalistic post with absolutely no consistency. If you want a good post written on this topic check A List Apart and read Dan Mall’s post. Wayyyy better and far less sensationalistic.
M Burke
April 13th, 2010 8:38 amAnyone notice how developer oriented these claims are? “Everything you can do in Flash you can do in X with some J and some H!!!” Sure… we could also do it in Fortran and Cobal but it’s much easier to drag the little image across the screen and select “tween”. Go back to your Linux box and write some code
Joel Nealy
April 14th, 2010 5:57 amAmen Brother.
Alexander Trefz
April 13th, 2010 8:50 am90% or more of the actual flash(-parts of) websites are not needed. This could be done better with js. And the improvement would be: selectable text, standards based websites and and and…
Sam
April 13th, 2010 9:03 amYou Flash guys are so lazy. Drag this, tween that. Sounds like flash guys are insecure… Just learn how to code and grow with the future
Josh Chernoff
April 13th, 2010 9:52 am@Sam
wtf do you know about people who support flash, Like I haven’t learned JS, PHP, ASP, JAVA, C/C++ in addition to learning AS3/AS2.
What exactly do you do that gives you the right to spout off this bs. If I need to learn to code then you need to learn to not be so ignorant.
@Alexander Trefz
90% of people who think they know it all don’t know shit.
@Smashing Mag
By the way this is the first thing I seen when I cam to this post, yet I’m a bad developer cause I use flash????
http://www.flickr.com/photos/josh_chernoff/4517977101/
Good job on spamming 90% of the top viewable part of this blog post. Since we are on the topic of web standards I think that you guys could learn a thing or two about web ethics. Just because it’s JS and follows web standards doesn’t mean a thing, crap is still crap no matter what tech it was made with.
Sam
April 13th, 2010 6:10 pmReading books about those languages doesnt mean you know them. Any developer who who truly knows how to apply C++ or Java would know that Flash and AS2/3 is a joke for what it is. A bloated piece of software with the psuedo developers that come with it.
ae
April 14th, 2010 1:33 amDo you know how to code AS3 or did you read a book?
Besides, this isn’t a choice between c++/java and flash. It’s between javascript and flash. And anyone who does both for a living, like me, know that the current state of the javascript scene is a MESS, compared to what you get on the flash platform.
Stick to the point, this is about frontend web development, not programming and technology in general!
Josh Chernoff
April 14th, 2010 5:56 am@ae
Well if you had taken the time to read your self you would have seen the ass hat who commented before me stated “You Flash guys are so lazy, learn how to code”
So yeah I think I stayed on the point that just cause someone learned one technology that are not branded as lazy or ignorant, though on the other hand….
This post is hosted on hypocritical site for it claims to support better standards/ethics. The post it’s self is asinine and the people who are in support of this post are commenting with little fact or prof and dismiss others peoples handwork and efforts only to spout off BS in a public domain with sheer ignorance and arrogance.
@Sam
If your such a proud coder with superior skills to any flash developer/designer then prove it! Post links here of your work. Otherwise stfu moron.
Ben
April 13th, 2010 10:55 am@Sam
You sound like you’re still living in 1999.
“Just learn how to code and grow with the future”
Reading this sentence spells you are not a developer.
Kids nowadays.
Erik
April 13th, 2010 11:48 amLets see your port.
Pau
April 13th, 2010 11:04 amhttp://www.converse.com/
After seeing this ecommerce, I believe that everything what says this article is bullshit.
Thnks
Sam
April 13th, 2010 1:58 pm“http://www.converse.com/”
The Checkout process is still html. Why would Converse switch back and forth between flash and html? Cause its stupid to run ecommerce thru a plugin…. geez
Just move on Flash Developers…….
ae
April 14th, 2010 1:37 am“Cause its stupid to run ecommerce thru a plugin…”
And it’s stupid to do rich internet experiences in html… Geez… Since when did using both technologies become a bad thing?
Erik
April 13th, 2010 11:46 amThis article has come way to soon in my opinion. Sure new markup and scripting languages are creating more complex effects but they still simply cannot touch what Flash is capable of. We are really at a point where that should go without saying.
This one would have hit the mark, if the mark existed.
Bulldog
April 13th, 2010 12:17 pmDo you remember…
not so long time ago JavaScript was the evil one and now surprisingly Flash is the bad guy.
to the “Web Standards” faction:
you want to make the web “standard”!? LOL you’re daydreamers!
How “Standard” is the REAL world? Just ask a handicapped!
go to work and be creative no matter which technologies are used and stop talking bullshit.
Chris
April 13th, 2010 12:54 pmI got a better idea. Learn how to create things in flash(as2, as3), learn html5, learn jquery/ajax/js, and stop stating which is dying and which is not. Learn how to do all of them and you will be better than the designer who comes to SM to full on follow. SM is a great place to read certain things here and there but never take inspiration or follow someone 100%. Be your own designer, have your own tools, fight your own fights.
May
April 13th, 2010 2:33 pmWhy don’t you take a few outstanding Flash sites, say some recent FWA sites of the month – and then do a tutorial how to build these in HTML/JavaScript, running in all currently used browsers?
People always make these vague claims how standards have caught up but all we see as proof is more or less lightboxes and slideshows.
The really interesting new thing is canvas, but how can it ever become mainstream if it’s most likely not even included in the next InternetExplorer version?
It might be nice for iAds .. but apart from that?
I love the IDEA of standards, but in reality it’s always just a promise for a distant future.
Cathrine Olsen
April 13th, 2010 2:35 pmThis looks like a great article, but I only get to see the comments (no article) on my iPhone. Can you please fix this bug?
Vectortrance Studios
April 13th, 2010 4:36 pmAs a designer who followed every move of famed interactive studios like 2Advanced, Pixelranger, Fantasy Interactive, etc, I used to be a big time supporter of Flash based websites. But still, in all my enthusiastic naiveté, I recognized that Flash sites were starting to drop off the map. Usability, and accessibility are important, and once web2.0 trends began to take a foothold, people started to recognize this and the webscape saw a shift from style to substance. The portfolio sites of many designers big and small started moving away from high intensity Flash towards a format that increased usability and placed content as the center of attention.
(I’d bet that the next iteration of 2Advanced Studios’ website is likely done with some form of web-standards j-query magic instead of Flash.)
I think we’re still quite a ways off from the day when HTML5 and CSS3 are a viable reality. (Due to Microsoft’s history of crawling towards standardization, and the sheer magnitude of their marketshare.)
Flash will continue to be king of the web for things like microsites, movie/music websites, advertisements, and streaming video. It’s much quicker to develop/design in, and works accross most browsers like a charm. And as others have said, it commands respect, having been installed on ~99% of internet-connected computers. And lets not discount that Flash is assuredly going to be a whole new creature by the time HTML5 is widely standardized. Adobe is a pretty agile company. I’m sure they are very aware of the trending of their products. They’ll innovate, rest assured.
As for Apple, I’m sure they’re going to see a reasonably large decline in Marketshare as Android and other platforms gain popularity among the masses and position themselves to be much more developer-friendly. Trying to whorde the market on their own terms isn’t wise. You’d think with a company as smart and innovative as Apple is, they would have learned from Microsoft’s mistakes.
mutis
April 13th, 2010 6:02 pm@ Vectortrance Studios You make some really great points about Flash, I for one love flash but don’t use it at all anymore with so many customers going online on their phones. The only thing I disagree with is your statement about Apple, the thing that makes them stand out is the fact their delivery system is so streamlined with their products. I think the industry is probably going to end up following apple, there is only so much stuff you can give away without making a profit.
Chris
April 13th, 2010 9:59 pmI disagree on the industry following apple. As any famed company will have their “top of the hill” moments (i.e microsoft back in 95 ~ 98), nothing stays the same. Just like how friendster / myspace was the revolution of social networking and doing the “catch up with old friends” thing, this was over passed by facebook. Apple will lose it’s touch sooner or later with another company that will over power their current ideology in technological advancements. iphone is the big thing now, but make no mistakes, with growing platforms like the droid and windows 7 mobile, there will be a time when a mobile platform will beat iphone os.
Andrei Potorac
April 13th, 2010 11:44 pmWhat’s up with these examples? :-)
Why do people confuse Flash websites with websites where the content fades in and out with an elastic ease in front of the user?
Have you seen the amazing user experience created in the Flash websites (like most of those on the FWA) in the past years? I’d love to see at least ONE example.
VIsit Mini or Mercedes websites. Do you see how exceptionally well they use Flash to promote their brands? How would you be able to do that with HTML?
I don’t want to live in a boring world, and Flash is here to make sure we don’t.
Jo
April 14th, 2010 12:08 amReally good read – actually there already is a battle between Flash vs. HTML5 going on:
http://www.html5-vs-flash.com/
A little comptetion between two Berlin-based web designers/developers, developing the same web app in different technolgies – let’s see who will make the race.
Paul
April 15th, 2010 2:17 amI think you mean http://www.flash-vs-html5.com ;)
Md Hilwan
April 14th, 2010 2:45 amFlash have afew problems. I agree. But don’t we all have problems of our own (HTML5, CSS3 etc etc)?
Afew problems of Flash sites include problem with SEO.. crawlers cant crawl through… deep linking… back button… mobile viewing (iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad especially)
Ok fine… So why not we solve the problem a step at a time.
SEO, Deep linking, back button can all be solved. Just add in SWFAddress! Blitz Agency manage to make their Flash site SEO friendly and the contents can be indexed by search engine. Read their article here (dated June 11th, 2007 that is 3 years ago man!): http://labs.blitzagency.com/?p=171
Mobile viewing can also be solved. There are open source scripts out there that allows you to detect a mobile browser. Just google it. A simple if else statement would sound like this:
if i detect mobile browser, bring me to a mobile optimized site..
else, bring me to a Flash site.
Sam
April 14th, 2010 4:12 amIm surprised that other companies are not backing Adobe and there Flash product. I think all Browser company want to see Flash limited at some point. HTML5 is natural for a web browser. Just live with the changing tech.
FlashPredator
April 14th, 2010 4:49 amwhether we want to admit it or not Flash is the middle future of website’s, minus the holographic ones you see in films.
static websites are slowly going out of fashion, it’s all about accesible content, ask yourself how many websites are using moving jquery or ajax elements?
Sam
April 14th, 2010 6:33 am@Andrei Potorac
“VIsit Mini or Mercedes websites”
These websites will change over time to HTML5. Why would you want to create an entire site in Flash, even adobe.com is more html than flash. Its just laughable that Flash Developers managed to convince Managers, Leads and VPs that this is the tech to use. incredible!
Lawrence
April 14th, 2010 7:04 am@Sam
Adobe.com is not only Flash.
It is also Dreamweaver, Photoshop, Acrobat, After Effects, ColdFusion, Illustrator, InDesign, AIR, Flex, etc.
There is no tool better than Dreamweaver for html5 and css3.
Anyway, flash and specially actionscript 3 and Flex or Air will not die for sure.
Tanja
April 14th, 2010 7:23 amVery funny, headline is “The Gradual Disappearance Of Flash Websites” and riiiight underneath it is an ad for “Creating free Flash websites”.
Stan Scott
April 14th, 2010 8:55 amIt’s disingenuous to write about the future of Flash without mentioning one of the most important reasons for it’s future decline: Apple refuses to support it. If I can’t view Flash on my iPad, I insist that the site support a standard such as HTML5.
Josh Chernoff
April 14th, 2010 10:48 amstop buying crappy apple products and that will fix your problem.
Sam
April 14th, 2010 11:11 amcrappy? your so insecure
Jolle
April 15th, 2010 1:03 pmA device with mid-size screen, that is used in huge part for viewing web pages, that does not support a browser plugin that is installed on 99% of desktop browsers, certainly is crappy to some extend.
I’m an Apple fanboy, but this is ridiculous. Much more so than ‘an Apple guy’, I am a creative (and the people in the creative industry have helped Apple stay alive over the lesser years) who loves to create in Flash. Now Apple is simply giving us creatives the finger.
Don’t even get me started on their treatment of the export to iPod feature on Flash CS5. That was just below the belt. Apple is officially no longer the free spirited underdog for creative minds but a cold and greedy corporation. Shame on them.
David Wilder
April 14th, 2010 10:31 amDear Mr. Cooper are you aware that articles about technology, especially within the hallowed confines of Smashing Magazine, are supposed to be Non-Fiction?
After reading your article — which is far more opinion than fact — I went to your web site and reviewed your entire portfolio to get a sense of how YOU view the technological landscape.
And given the scope of your work there is only one possible conclusion — You shouldn’t use Flash.
What would be the point?
Now, was that so hard? I bet you worked long and hard to create this tragically flawed masterpiece when the real story — the non-fiction story — is that you were unqualified to write about a topic you knew nothing about and unwilling to do what good writers do — research.
And alas Mr. Cooper… no platform can ever fix that.
Fx
April 14th, 2010 11:42 amWhat this article — and most of the commenters, who I’m guessing are web designers? — fail to acknowledge is that Flash is a terrible resource hog. All those ‘neat’ but largely non-useful-to-the-end-user Flash effects consume too many CPU cycles and too much memory and bandwidth that I would rather have devoted to the primary content of the webpage, rather than fancy banner ads, video ads, or even clever webpage tricks.
If Flash is needed to enable the primary purpose of the webpage — showing video, games, etc. — then fine, I can accept it as part of the ‘price’ for visiting that webpage (but I may choose to find an alternative website offering the same or similar content that uses techniques that are less taxing on system resources). But if it’s used simply to enable extraneous B.S. or to make life easier for the web designer, it’s an inefficiency that I can’t and won’t tolerate. (And gross inefficiency = non-green in my book, btw.)
On the worst websites, the cycles and/or bandwidth consumed by ‘non-content’ Flash can be greater than the actual content I’m looking for by a factor of 4 or more! That’s just plain stupid imho….
I admit that HTML5 may or may not be better than Flash in this respect… both are merely tools, and the responsibility of the effects of their use lie with the tool-user, not the tools themselves.
I will say though that Flash has a nasty habit of remaining running in the background (and continuing to consume resources) even after I’ve closed the browser that invoked it. That too is intolerable, and I’m seriously considering making my PC a “No-Flash” zone!
Sebastian
April 14th, 2010 3:08 pmFlash is a visual tool. It is used for creating innovative webapplications, athmospheres and some kind of experience. Flash is not made to deliver (text-)contents in the first place (although it can, of course). If you want your www to be boring, step back to some text browser. It´s your choice.
btw, I rarely recognise an unacceptable increase of my CPU, caused by well coded(!) flashsites.
tunecandy
April 14th, 2010 6:22 pmThis argument flies in the face of what I have been taught as a computer science student.
The following article explains it much better than I could:
Tech Is Too Cheap to Meter: It’s Time to Manage for Abundance, Not Scarcity
Read More http://www.wired.com/techbiz/it/magazine/17-07/mf_freer#ixzz0l8DLvj2t
also, if you actively manage your resources with well written code – you can eliminate memory leaks.
it’s like ANY other technologies… javascript, php, asp, python etc… can also crash a browser very easily
David
April 14th, 2010 9:54 pm@Fx: Flash indeed is quite CPU intensive. But remember, if you’re building something really interactive and visually rich stuff using HTML5/JavaScript, it’s probably using as much CPU power (or more) as Flash.
I think it’s perfectly okay to use both technologies at the same time. If one can produce exactly what Flash can do, then, yes, I reckon using something standard is logically better. But if one cannot produce the same effect, and his compromised solution doesn’t really meet the business objective of a design, then, no.
I’m glad that HTML5/JavaScript is developing because, I must say, it does fit nicely with content-driven sites. For really simple stuff, like accordion menu and image slide-show, they are the right tools. But when a developer is asked to do something a lot more complex, then he must be realistic about which tool he should use, instead of being stubborn about web-standard. I’m sure a really good front-end developer can eventually produce it with JavaScript, but I’d imagine the task would be really complicated to do.
Just take a look at the examples the author put up. They are really impressive. But if the exact same things are done in flash, most people would say ‘what’s so special about them?’
Anyway, I think the single most important thing to keep in mind is that if the cost of pursuing web standard is to restrict the creativity of designers, then there’s a strong reason to use plug-ins. If not, I don’t see a reason not to.
PS: Yes, I think some people hate flash because there are many examples of bad flash stuff. But please don’t dismiss stuff that are made with flash for a reason.
Sebastian
April 14th, 2010 3:59 pmUh… I just validated some websites Mr. Cooper created:
They are not only ugly (are you really an educated designer??) , they don´t validate… (at least the only one, that is online)
http://validator.w3.org/check?verbose=1&uri=http%3A%2F%2Frichlucia.com%2F
66 Errors, 7 warning(s)
JR Prospal
April 14th, 2010 4:36 pmI hope I’m not repeating anyone else said. What ever happened to the practice of offering a non-Flash version of a Flash site? Didn’t we have to do that back when Flash was new? I love the richness of Flash when I’m on my desktop or laptop, but what if I didn’t have the Flash plugin installed. Those site are useless. Why does it have to be one technology vs another instead of making sure your audience gets your message no matter what the technology? Apple isn’t saying that no Flash is allowed anywhere, just on the iPhone, so Flash isn’t going away. Would I miss it on my phone? Nope, as long as I can see something.
tunecandy
April 14th, 2010 6:13 pmI’ve done a little with jquery. It’s pretty cool but it’s javascript and dhtml. html5 is kind of a misnomer because its a combination of the same web technologies that html developers have always used… just the next generation.
the thing that gets me is the people who say html5 is the new flash are pidgeonholing flash into a video player hole.
they also ignore the fact that as3 has evolved into a very powerful structured OOP language, and flashbuilder is arguably the best developer tool out there. I’ve played with silverlight, visual studio, xcode, and none of those platforms are as intuitive and well structured as flex/flashbuilder (IMHO)
html5 isn’t even universally supported or even finished for that matter. I will be shocked if it is universally interpreted by browsers the same way (form elements in safari and IE are completely different)
Flash plug in for the most part displays exactly the same in every browser.
Apple hopefully will cave and support flash if hp slate, windows phones , android and other competitors support flash.
The verdict is still out whether ipad is awesome or a big turkey. time will tell… (if they supported flash it would definitely be huge)
one last point – people say flash is buggy and processor intensive….
it’s as good as the developer writing the code. My tunecandy app is super complex, but i can run it on a shitty hp laptop and it performs almost as good as it does on a 10,000.00 mac pro.
The bottom line for apple is if they kill flash, they get rid of a major competitor. That pisses me off because my career is built on flash. sure I can adapt to other technologies, but I don’t want to throw away a technology that is really awesome to work with something inferior.
There is so much that flash can do that has not been explored by developers yet and it would really suck if it died because some greedy soulless corporate monster decided to kill it.
if they kill flash they kill a lot of access to people who aren’t full fledged programmers. we will see less innovation and the accessibility of innovative development gets taken away fro creative people who do not want to be hard core programmers.
thats my 10 cents on the subject :-)
Enlightened
April 16th, 2010 2:39 pmExcellently put. It’s time to get behind platforms like Android, who will leave the field open thus creating more jobs, foster more creativity, and not stagnate the growth and offerings of the web.
JLuna
April 14th, 2010 6:29 pmThis article reminds me of those developers always saying that Linux is replacing Windows, talking about freedom while telling us what we should use and what we should not use, carrying torches pitch forks and strong words wnenever they can. Everyone misses the point in letting users decide what content and designs like the most.
Flash can be missused and no one is claiming that is perfect but is definitely much more than photo galleries and dropdown menus.
William
April 14th, 2010 7:19 pmgood points
David
April 14th, 2010 10:33 pmI couldn’t agree more
William
April 14th, 2010 7:31 pm“The Gradual Appearance of Programmers that Can’t Afford Web Premium CS4″
Reg
April 16th, 2010 1:57 pmFlashDevelop and Flex SDK? Open a book.
Chris
April 14th, 2010 7:45 pmAnother useless flash vs html5 debate… Flash is not going anywhere same as html5 they will co exists as many other technologies… flash is still superior in performance for heavy animated graphics… javascript is still pretty slow.. although in chrome it is kinda acceptable..
Also the open debat is kinda useless… there is a opensource compiler.. get flashdevelop and code away… If you have programmed in both AS 3 and Javascript you will definitly see the stroing points of flash.. goodbye cross browser headaches… welcome strict typing.. ^^
Anyway… yes for the application types of websites html wins… for heavy graphic intensive (smaller) websites flash is king.
The listing of some javascript websites is kinda pointless too.. I can just list some of the sites in http://www.thefwa.com/ and say oh look no javascript used… that must mean it is better… doh.. X_x anyways enough time waisted on this bullocks back to coding :P
kenarrox
April 15th, 2010 6:14 amagree…
sometime flash visualize idea in nice way…
like autodesk did at http://www.homestyler.com/designer
Mauro
April 15th, 2010 3:06 amAs I said many and many times. Smashing Magazine is all about bashing flash and go pro into HTML5. You can see by the volume of posts that they try to inject you the idea that HTML5 will win. That plus the completely Jobs, makes this website not a good place for those who want a clear and clean picture of all this debate.
You still can’t do what many sites do with Flash right now, and eveything you see done right now in HTML5, Flash does it for years…
As I said in Twitter more than once. Smashing Magazine should really try to not choose a side in all this technology thing.
A good magazine is one that can say good and bad things about a technology and I can’t see that, for at least, the last 3 months from Smashing Magazine.
Robert
April 15th, 2010 4:19 amSo who is this Brad Cooper? What an ignorant. Just look at his portfolio he hasn’t got a clue. I’d be ashamed to display such work on a website.
Mauro
April 15th, 2010 5:40 amThis comes better when you read in his profile:
“… and an advocate of open source & web standards.”
C’mon Smashing Mag! You can do better than this!
flashopen
April 15th, 2010 6:21 amFunny article… also very immature!
@flashopen
Sam
April 15th, 2010 6:44 amWell, Adobe seems to be worried about, especially not being on 80 million iphones and ipads out there. Major websites are moving to HTML5 and leaving Flash behind. No need for useless flashy animations. Move on Flash Developers…. Learn a REAL development environment and language.
Keane
April 15th, 2010 9:13 amIs that guy with the yellow speech balloon on the photo Steve Jobs? Seriously.
Enlightened
April 15th, 2010 12:56 pmI get a kick out of all the people who like to bag on Flash and predict it’s demise. What is there purpose in life other than to be totally ignorant, irrelevant and annoying? I mean, no one can deny that without Adobe and Flash in particular, the internet would have no where near the functionality, capabilities, or creativity that it has today. So why would they want to see such a demise? I understand that people can and do build some crummy stuff with Flash. I have also been to equally crummy sites built with HTML and Java. In that case however, you do not hear people shouting “HTML must die!”, it is interesting how Flash on the other hand takes the flack for poor designer work. I have some theories on why some people are so anti-Flash. One reason may be that the group is spear-headed by disgruntled designers who do not have the capabilities and could not write “Hello World” with ActionScript to save their life. Well I have news for you, HTML5 and Javascript are not going to make it much easier. OK, it’s just a theory, but really what other reason is there to wish for the demise of such an awesome tool that produces such awesome results? It’s also obvious that Steve Jobs is having an impact with his anti-Flash stance on the iPhone/iPad. I am an Apple user myself, but I also have news for all of the little iSheep who follow Steve Jobs and Apple religiously: he is actually not a God, but only a marketing genius with a nice sense of style. So all of the people who have their iPad and are OK with not being able to view all the content from about 80% of the sites on the web, you are truly as brain-washed iSheep and you might want to open your eyes a bit. In fact, Steve’s choice to lock down his platforms to any non-Apple-approved languages is in fact a backwards maneuver and may only serve to stunt the growth of the internet and developers in general, it is so far from the ‘open web’ a lot of other people seem to be ironically championing. Hey, at least Steve finally admitted it was so he could retain control (and make more money), and that it really had nothing to do with Flash.
Omarrr
April 15th, 2010 2:46 pmCan’t understand this obsession with predicting who will be the winner of an inexistent battle.
When making this arguments, please try to keep in mind that websites must be build to accommodate visitors needs and requirements and not designers and developers preferences.
itisforyouforyou
April 28th, 2010 7:19 pmBut irony, most designers and developers know that HTML standard cannot replace Flash. Only user think it can due to Steve Jobs saying it can without thinking. HOW SILLY THEY ARE! If user think that web-site should be built by Pascel, do u think designers and developers have to used Pascel to do things. Users should only care the results, not what tools designers and developers use. FUNNY MAN!
Raphael Pudlowski
April 16th, 2010 2:25 amwell, seeing how shitty is the portfolio of the autor, he mau be frustrated about all this good designers that do awesome flash stuff. Maybye people are dreaming that with the demise of flash, they will again be the only masters and people to know how to code an animation in canvas, because good designers won’t bother to learn code by hand to do what they do with flash. The linux comparison was wery nice :)
Simon Stark
April 16th, 2010 5:46 amYou’re right, one of the worst portfolios ever. I mean, just look at his favorite picture. I’m not being rude or anything but this has to be the worst article on SmashingMag ever. :)
Justin Carroll
April 16th, 2010 4:38 amWith almost 300 comments I’m not sure I’m adding anything new here, but until HTML5/CSS/JS can import 3D and After Effects onto a timeline and tween it better than Flash I’m pretty sure Flash will be around for awhile.
The bottom line is that some companies, mostly worldwide brands like Coke, Phillips, etc. could care less about the tidy SEO delivered through browser-based technologies – what they want is an interactive experience that dominates, that no one has ever seen and Flash can do that better than anyone else and always has.
Leading interactive agencies like North Kingdom, Big Spaceship and 2Advanced Studios create sets, like movies, with green-screens and shoot video, apply After Effects and post production processing, render 3D, add audio and other effects to produce online interactive experiences that tell a story and change the way consumers feel about a brand. To date, I’ve never heard of anyone doing this for HTML/CSS/JS.
I’m willing to bet about 90% of “designers” in this industry who have something to say about this debate have no idea how Flash is really being used by true, authentic interactive agencies. The FWA exists. The day it doesn’t, that’s when you know it’s over.
Danilo Ramos
April 16th, 2010 6:03 amI preffer CSS3 and xhtml !
daemonna
April 16th, 2010 6:41 amall Flash haters WAKE UP!!!
see http://www.openscreenproject.org/ and ask yourselves… Intel, Cisco, Disney and other 70 partners signed for flash… it will be on every mobile phone, in every car and PC… do you think you can beat this??? Not even apple can beat that :P
okeedokee
April 30th, 2010 11:01 amStill waiting for Flash on any mobile platform, but it keeps not happening. I believe it when I see it (i.e. in my hand in a shipping smartphone product), and then we’ll see what it does to a smartphone’s battery for real.
Reg
April 16th, 2010 1:37 pmNerp, sorry :( . But wait…. Javascript has that amazing 3D library that… Oh yeah, it doesn’t.
Sam
April 16th, 2010 3:36 pmFlash doesnt have 3D in it. Idiot!
Reg
April 19th, 2010 2:18 pmhahaha, ok
Sebastian
April 21st, 2010 7:25 am…another idiot who doesn´t know what he is talking about.
itisforyouforyou
April 28th, 2010 7:14 pmNo 3D? who is idiot… you said yourself??
Sam
April 30th, 2010 7:10 amReally morons, It can render depth of field, Ambient occlusion and do subdivision modeling??? idiots!
mmu_man
April 17th, 2010 4:59 amFlash Websites ?????
This is an oxymoron!
The web is defined as the way to bring the information to everyone regardless of their platform. (just ask Sir Tim!) This can’t be done with Flash™ exactly because it’s proprietary and thus not available for every platform. When you understand this everything else unravels. The only way to make the Web real is by using open standards, namely the ones form W3C. Last I heard this wasn’t the case of Flash™.
So please stop talking about “Flash Websites”, this hurts by ears and eyes!
Flash sux anyway:
http://revolf.free.fr/img/shot_luxetv_noflash.png
http://revolf.free.fr/img/why_I_banned_flash.png
http://revolf.free.fr/img/why_flash_sux_also_on_osx.png
http://revolf.free.fr/img/why_flash_sux_even_on_linux.png
Dragisa Mirkovic - Gile
April 17th, 2010 2:16 pm“Flash, HTML, CSS And JavaScript Are Just Tools”…well… I like to think about it that way, but you don’t need years to learn how to use hammer or screwdriver.
First you got to learn a complex structure of Flash interface + AS1. After that you begin to learn AS2, and just when you’ve get used to it, they come with AS3 (complex oop language, btw)…and again, just when you’ve get used to AS3, they tell you that Flash is dead and that your knowledge is for nothing.
nice…
camdagr8
April 20th, 2010 5:44 pmUm.. wrong.
Juan
April 28th, 2010 10:01 pmGrow up, that’s the way everything works. If you don’t like to stay on top of things, retire!
Glen Doss
April 17th, 2010 5:59 pmFlash and advanced AJAX are often a nightmare to make Section 508 compliant. Granted these technologies have made great strides in that area in the last few years, but it’s still a big issue. For those of us who work in Federal Government consulting, 508 compliance often adds a huge amount of additional work when building interactive apps.
antoine
April 19th, 2010 1:17 amGood one! May I kindly request the “go ahead” to translate it in French?
Pedr
April 19th, 2010 4:09 am“Standards-Based Websites That Shine”
Really? If that list is the best you can put together, you’ve missed your own point.
Pedr
April 19th, 2010 4:11 amHold on. Just had a look at the author’s portfolio. Now it all makes sense. When you set the bar that low, even a turd looks like its glowing.
Peter Broom
April 20th, 2010 3:57 amOn the subject of CMS and Flash, I would say that CMS developers need to look at how they build their systems rather than looking at it from the point of view that Flash is a suitable front-end platform if you want a CMS system.
Take Silverstripe CMS for example, it does not tie you down to using just one technology to render your site. So you can use xml instead of html for instance which you can easily combine with Flash. Therefore there is no reason you can’t have a robust CMS system behind your nice Flash interface.
camdagr8
April 20th, 2010 5:40 pmI develop in as2/3, js, java, php,.net, and a list of other languages; so don’t think I’m just a Flash developer here. Although Flash has been responsible for the major portion of my success as a developer and creative. I’m open to all languages but I have to say that Flash is the one that encompasses the most functionality, development rate, and visual wiz-bang. The Flash community is very large and has shown no signs of letting Flash go anywhere.
I find that people who opt for standards over creativity are the losers here. Flash currently offers an environment where you can dream it, create it, and everyone (well 99%) can see it the way you intended them to.
Yes, HTML5/JS/CSS have made HUGE strides, but guess what, they’re not where Flash IS now and when they are, where will flash be? I’m guessing blazing the trail of where the next STANDARD is wanting to be.
At the end of the day:
End users could careless what delivers their youtube, facebook, and tweets.. they just want them reliably and fast. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather deliver on something tried, tested and true over something that’s new, cool, and buggy.
:End my 2 cents
Sam
April 21st, 2010 7:53 amFlash dies a little bit everyday. lol
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9175881/Adobe_tosses_in_Flash_towel_after_Apple_limits_iPhone_dev
Craig Anthony
April 22nd, 2010 7:35 amFlash dies a little bit every day? Really?
http://blogs.adobe.com/conversations/2010/04/adobe_air_on_the_android_platf.html
Better sell your Apple stock. Six months from now when Android is dominating, please come back and review your comments.
Juan
April 28th, 2010 9:59 pmFlash Does, And Will Continue To Do, Many Things… Great!!
Where would the Internet be without Flash and the innovations it brought? It would be all XHTML and boring, we’d be wearing a hat and grow beards :) Zeldman will be the second most feared last name after Jobs. I like the section where it says BROWSER COMPATIBILITY on HTML5 tutorials.
I think SmashingMag should stick to the lists, cause these “definitive” articles are not great at all. Do you work for Apple?
okeedokee
April 30th, 2010 11:22 amIf you are using Flash for video, you might find this helpful: HTML 5 video with a Flash fallback. This lets you reach those 250million+ users with Firefox (Linux, Mac, Windows), Chrome (Linux, Mac, Windows), Safari (Windows, Mac, iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad).
http://henriksjokvist.net/archive/2009/2/using-the-html5-video-tag-with-a-flash-fallback
antonio brandao
May 5th, 2010 3:32 amIt’s a myth thatFflash sites can’t be “web standard” and indexable. Many flash sites have an HTML content in the background, making them indexable, they use deep linking, etc, and they are amazing! HTML5 is years behind Flash.
Tell me about motion blur, displacement maps, convulsion filters, etc….
luke
May 5th, 2010 10:53 amFlash is dead, killed by the iPad and iPhone: http://lumilon.com/blog/?p=2889
snowboardfoo
May 5th, 2010 12:07 pmWell, the author of this article is yet another Flash-hater idiot with a license to blog and no real research.
I’ll save you the 2,000 line post on why, and just say that for one, if you’ve got this much of a boner for Ajax and HTML5, do some freakin benchmark tests before you open up you’re ego on your blog and watch a nice Flex / Flash library like GreenSock’s TweenLite absolutely crush HTML or JavaScript performance, and trumps the look and feel of Javascript / DHTML / Ajax / HTML5 / CSS or whatever else you want to call it as soon as you get into animating more than 1 little box at a time. HTML5 and Ajax are ok, great for some things like backend system interfaces, data entry apps, forms, little slide out widgets, updating data on the page without refreshing, etc, but when it comes to the next level of user experience, web presentation, slick interface design, rich interactive applications (RIAs), and the evolution of web, HTML5 and Ajax (JavaScript) are unfortunately always going to be subject to issues between competing browsers.
I love how you bash Flash and advocate web standards, and yet the Flash player is more standard across web browsers than web standards are! Hah! Web standards at the moment are almost an oxymoron in themselves. Simple point: Setup a website viewing with FireFox and make use of margins and padding as defined by W3C (web standards authority), then load it in different versions of IE and observe the cluster-f*ckery of web standards as the browser craps out it’s interpretation. Web standards would be great if all browsers adhered to them and handled the DOM exactly the same- but they don’t. Perhaps the real end-all for Flash vs Web standard HTML and JS will be a browser that you can actually say does it 100% right and the majority of the world deletes internet explorer (which you can’t in Windows) and switches to this new amazing browser… good luck getting that done.
All in all, like most Flash developers that put out junk and give flash a bad name, you probably can’t even program a nice flash app, and thus pass judgment on the entire technology because your favorite corny flash game performance sucks and you can’t do any better. I’m not saying there’s not a lot of flash out there that shouldn’t be, there is. I’m saying there’s just as bad HTML sites- worse in many cases- and it’s not the technology that’s the problem, it’s narrow minded developers like yourself that hate it because you are too stuck in your ways and ill informed to read or make a post on how to use it correctly.
Save your breath bashing some of the most advanced technology on the web that is largely responsible for the phrase Rich Interactive Application, and start helping to evolve web technology. Learn some Flex / Pure AS3, get a free compiler like FlashDevelop, the free open source Flex SDK, and start helping on a site like actionscript.org, instead of whining and making the problem worse.
Boom!
Sam
May 6th, 2010 12:27 pm“Boom!”
This comment make you an idiot.
“but when it comes to the next level of user experience, web presentation, slick interface design, rich interactive applications (RIAs), and the evolution of web”
I think Apple knows more about the next level of user experience and apps to leave Flash behind. Flash is old and you need to learn to move on.
richRemer
May 7th, 2010 9:43 amI think citing performance as a benefit of Flash is pretty specious. Even if you ignore the fact that Flash is mature technology and therefore has had more time to become a strong performer, you’re missing the fact that most devices on the web are mobile devices which Flash absolutely kills. HTML 5 will perform dramatically better on these platforms that processor/memory hungry Flash, not to mention suck battery life.
As far as L&F go, “Look” comes from the designers, and there’s nothing that Flash can do in this space that HTML5/CSS/SVG/JS cannot. As far as “Feel” goes, Flash apps consistently have the most clunky, non-standard interfaces on the web, making them a PITA to use. The only UI area Flash seems to do well on is mouse hovers/clicks, which as you are aware are pretty much useless on a device like the iPad and most phones. Everything else like keyboard interaction, mouse scrolling, etc. is complete crap. Flash is primarily successful at making pretty, but useless applications. There are some particular verticals where there are some benefits, but the vast majority of web apps suffer poor UI under the yoke of Flash.
Equating market penetration to standards is also disingenuous. W3C standards are supported in hundreds, if not thousands, of applications. Flash is supported in less than half a dozen, and only one of these (Adobe’s) is any good. An open standard for Flash would allow Apple (for example) to implement that standard on the iPhone/iPad in an efficient manner. No open standards means they’d be chasing the dragon’s tail, just like everyone does with MS Office.
And just as there are bad Flash devs, there are bad HTML “devs” who can’t deal with browser incompatibilities. Good HTML “devs”, though, learn the idiosyncrasies and develop libraries that handle all that so they don’t have to. And because of the open standards, there are hundreds of great off the shelf libraries that already do this for you.
snowboardfoo
May 7th, 2010 11:21 amhaha… ok, Sam you’re obviously a mac fan boy who apparently thinks that Apple is a web company, no response needed there. lol @ “flash is old” – yeah, in the same way computers are old . FutureSplash Animator is old, jackass, FP10.1 beta is brand spankin new and supports more new tricks than your mom. (lord knows that aint easy ;)
Rich… sorry for this.
i love how you said:
“Flash is primarily successful at making pretty, but useless applications.”
>> and you work at a company where millions of dollars, the majority of the prodcut buzz, and the lion share of interesting products are created by thousands of people a day who pay more to create theirs in a FLASH application. That’s what the suits call MONEY, and that’s what pays us. (An AS2 app made for FP8 that is 3 years old to make things worse, and it still does better than any other product)
Nobody ever claimed Flash was a solution for mobile or stuck up Apple products which i can only imagine at this point are conceived in secluded steve jobs circle jerks where they chant “down with adobe” or something. They’ve purposely pushed away common technology screwing over thousands of websites when Nokia phones like 8 years ago had light flash support. Apple’s not making the best product they could, they’re making the most money they can, they don’t give a sh*t about all the sites their F*ing over. So at this point if you have flash content, I think you’re obligated to duplicate it for web/apple in a compatible format. But considering the size of the mobile device, it’s better for your users to provide web UI and mobile UI separately and capture the best of both worlds.
Market penetration? Flash has more penetration (99%) than any other media plugin, more than JAVA for god sake- google could have told you that. http://www.adobe.com/products/player_census/flashplayer/
“and there’s nothing that Flash can do in this space that HTML5/CSS/SVG/JS cannot” –
>> you really gotta know very little about Flash to say this. Have you ever seen a nice full screen media rich website with full video, animations, interactivity, 3d, image processing, sound, games, lighting effects, automatic filters like drop shadow, glow, knockout, bevel, or ANYTHING exciting or progressive that was NOT built in Flash? IF so I would love to see, but probably not. You know why? Because it’s a pain in the ass, not supported the same in all browsers, and doesn’t ever perform well! Do it in flash, its smooth (if you can program worth a dam), and it’s the same in every desktop computer’s browser that has the plugin.
Maybe you guys missed what I was getting at, let me get all number list like:
1) Show me real 3D in HTML5 … you can’t. Google papervision 3d examples for inspiration
2) Show me bitmap manipulations in a practical or mainstream usage in HTML5 / JS… there aren’t any.
3) Show me a fun online game to play that isn’t made in flash.
4) Show me something web that you’ve made that’s animated- if you don’t use flash, then you probably have nothing!
5) Program something fun in JavaScript like a fractal generator or particle generator, program it in flash, compare. Guess which one will be choppy and struggle cross browser? Guess which one looks like “if IE, do it this retarded way, if Firefox, do it like this…” …y1k3s0rz
6) The most successful interactive apps and games on the web (for computers) are ALL FLASH – example: Farmville (i’m not saying i like the game, just that it’s bringing in millions for it’s owner Zynga that people are calling “the first billion dollar IPO”) – name an HTML5 or DHTML / JS game pulling in more users buzz and money – there aren’t any.
Don’t get me wrong, i love what MooTools has done, but it’s not even close to where flash is right now, or where it’s going.
Finally, Flex is open source. It’s free. So is this great compiler called FlashDevelop. All we need now as someone previously mentioned, is an open source player. Yes, then maybe apple would have some open standards to start supporting without feeling like they’re getting on their knees in front of Adobe’s giant flash dong.
Inspiration: http://www.designcharts.com – check out a running list of sites you wouldn’t want to make in anything but Flash and….. oh man…. Silverlight (gag).
Sonic Boom!
CyberGus
May 10th, 2010 11:55 pmMost FWA sites are one hit wonder, they are not mainstream.
Most designers are in love with flash and they are trying to sell technology, not funcionality.
Apparently most flash lovers argue about “What I know and that guy who write this article don’t know”.
As designers we must deliver easy to read content, not just fancy flash sites.
In the end most flash driven sites are the result of an Ad Agency meeting with some art directors and flash stars.
I like this article a lot, because it has important ideas to keep in mind, I like this one first:
“People should be free to consume and create information, without being tied down to the kind licensing restrictions and legalities seen with the likes of Flash, Silverlight and other corporately owned technologies.”
If Adobe wants to open flash, that’s good, but sound like designers are just in love with the tool, we need to focus on content delivery… and that mean Web Standards.
blog.zeusdidit.com
May 25th, 2010 11:12 amyou owe me another 5 seconds of my life for this.
ugh.
Tim
December 1st, 2010 8:16 amWhen HTML 5 can do something like this… anythingbutordinary.saab.com give me a ring, until then I think I will stop reading these articles and get on with making engaging creative content.
Suzanne
December 30th, 2011 1:31 am@Tim………….I had to leave due to the loading time. SLOW and it’s not my internet connection. It would be in your best interest to use a mix of both. Use a few flash components to jazz up your site.
Brett Widmann
December 8th, 2010 4:44 pmThis is a really interesting article. I would have thought flash would have stayed around a bit longer, but I suppose their is such a wide array of tools and programs that can do the same thing.
Mario
December 12th, 2010 6:33 pmMost people on here are clearly Flash fanboys. Well, when you can’t view a Flash site correctly on one fifth of browsers, and when some people leave a Flash site after waiting 30 seconds for the damn thing to load, and when you get a virus through your Flash plug-in..I guess you are all correct lmao
Jafar
April 11th, 2011 7:44 amMake your websites information in XML or JSON and then target either desktop or mobiles.
Use Flash or HTML5, or both….I use both.
Nelson
October 20th, 2011 12:25 pmFunny how Smash title for this article is the disappearance of flash..and yet they promote at the top , you can’t miss it..a banner of wix..all flash based click and drag site builder ..hmmm…..can we say affiliate commissions anyone !..
I’m not a developer but my site is build in wix..I also use wordpress and Optimize press plugin..I love apple but it has turned into a strict draconian play ground where they want to control and rule ..instead of keeping the web open to be as creative as we can with the tools we have, no they try and build monopolies ..Like I said I am not a developer but, I am interested in the future of flash and html5>
Roy
December 18th, 2011 4:25 pmI realize I’m giving you a little more rank in Google by writing this on your site (you’re welcome, by the way) but, sorry, you couldn’t be more wrong about Flash disappearing. Actually, it’s just beginning a new lease on life. Flash did use to be a little crippled in some areas such as SEO, for instance. However, according to Adobe, Flash will be treated like a “first-class citizen” on the major search engines. Why? Because major companies depend on Flash to draw in their online revenue. Hey, my site is entirely in Flash, and I’m always on page one in a common search. And just because Apple decided to give it the cold-shoulder (which I think is a huge mistake) doesn’t mean it’s doomed. You must remember, Apple’s not the only show in town… there’s Blackberry brand and many, many others that will be running Flash full stream (or already are) and blowing away the compitition as they do. You do bring up some valid points about current trends and web standards… but you barely scratch the surface when you attempt to explain Flash.s capabilities to JAVA or other platforms. Flash is far superior to almost all the Flash-wannabes out there. Besides, it’s acually quite easy to make Flash iPhone friendly. So, I think you know how to write entertaining and controversial articles … but you obviously don’t know Flash.
tiago
February 3rd, 2012 11:56 amI was replying to a flash developer the other day that, i bet, he didn’t even knew what “swfaddress” was and the use of it, or he was just a flash hater and had no idea what he was talking about, and kept trolling on posts.
This anti-flash movement started by a brand (that i use too) and can’t develop good enough batteries like the competition, and blame that on the top rich media provider on the web, is somewhat funny, but sad, once you read these people that don’t even know the difference between the two, and they actually don’t, and still claim they are flash developers, or something in between a web designer and a programmer.
Apparently they don’t know the software they use, and basically what they “develop” are plain ” super awesome hardcore websites” with a few stop()’s and gotoAndPlay’s, and that’s basically it.
Suzanne
December 30th, 2011 1:25 amThe real problem with flash is SEO. Once this problem is taken care of then flash would be awesome to have as a full site for any webmaster.
I know that Google is working on a solution. Right now as it stands, it’s not in the best interest of most businesses to have full site built with flash.
2cents
February 7th, 2012 3:32 amI think both flash and html/css are equally important tools in the web industry. They can co-exist, and a web designer should be able to use both these tools.
Each of them should be use appopriately, for example I would use html/css for a web project that has lots of articles to read, needs SEO, etc..Use flash when videos, sound, animations and lots of pics involved.
As for accesiblity, I think both needs to be accessed in all devices and browsers. If flash can’t be accessed in an iphone, then have a mobile site directed to the device. The same goes html/css sites, even if they are accesible in iphones, sometimes they are just too small.