This discussion has been all the rave recently in countless forums...if you google you'll see why. Flash is not going to die out anytime soon. Yes, HTML5 IMO is going to give it a bigger run for its money than Silverlight, but as it is the HTML5 spec is not totally ironed out...e.g. they haven't standardized the video format to use. OGG is the one mostly in use with HTML5 btw. I've checked out some demo sites...I admit the font embedding and drag/drop features are slick without having to right-click and see "Silverlight" or "Flash Player x" but the video demos for HTML5 I've seen are a little bit buggy. Several things to note here: - Flash is ubiquitous - it's installed in over 98% of machines worldwide...i.e. computers and smartphones...save for Apple products. - Flash is WORA - write once, run anywhere. Can't say the same about HTML5, even the latest version of Firefox doesn't score all HTML5 benchmarks - I had to use Chrome to view a HTML5 video demo. - The other underestimated aspect of Flash is Flex and AIR - this app-oriented approach has not hit the mainstream but I believe in the near future more guys will be regarding Flash/Flex/AIR as more of an app development platform than just something to make those annoying ads online. - The tools for building Flash apps are getting more advanced by the day - google Flash Catalyst and see what I'm talking about...who imagined you create an app with from an image/wireframe you drew in Illustrator or Photoshop in a few minutes? - As for Silverlight I believe M$ was reacting to Adobe's dominance in that sector - everything that you can do in Silverlight can be done in Flash - and more. As for a Flex equivalent in Silverlight...I saw a bashful on this silverlight forum so judge for yourself: http://forums.silverlight.net/forums/p/634/1076.aspx I might sound like a Flash/Flex evangelist - yes - I'm an enthusiast. HTML5 will rock in the future, but it will take a while to iron out standards issues, garner significant market share and convince Flash/Flex affictionados like me to head over there. I'll only bother with HTML5 if I see something worthwhile that I can not do in Flash. I'm sure at this point you're all screaming Apple? Adobe Flash CS5 will support compiling your app into a native iPhone app. That's a sure selling point for me to keep investing in Flash/Flex/AIR in the foreseeable future. Already there are apps built in ActionScript 3 that are on the Apple App Store: http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/flashcs5/appsfor_iphone/ On a lighter note, is your cousin a she or he? Got a bit confused there :) On Tue, Mar 2, 2010 at 12:26 PM, albert kamau <kamau.albert@gmail.com>wrote:
Hi Skunks/ettes,
Need a bit of advice .
My cousin came to me and told me he needed to add a new tool to his arsenal . She was torn between flash/silverlight and javascript.
We visited quite a few sites and noted developers could achieve similar experiences that were traditionally done with flash using javascript . Javascript has the additional advantage over flash in terms of accessibility, Search engine friendliness, speed, Cross browser compatibility. The only downside we found with javascript was scripts turned off.
A flash banner that would take hours tweening, importing, exporting can be done in minutes with javascripts jquery. The only usage of flash I can see in the near future is making games and an intermediate javascript developer should be able create a decent javascript game
Given that, Apple is not longer supporting flash in some of its latest products(iPhone, iPad) and HTML 5 which allows embedding of videos, which was the domain of flash, are the days of flash numbered ?
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