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Flash is a huge area with many, many facets and has been around for awhile and is going to stay around for awhile longer.
So how about a forum all to itself?
I personally feel there are more than enough forums that are just for flash. It would be interesting to hear how many people like it here?
Used in the right place maybe it's just ok, but unfortunately more often than not it just used by poor quality website designers that don't know how to plan & build a good site forcing people with slow connections to wait for long downloads while some silly little graphic tells them they only have another 68% before they can enter a site.
Just my thoughts, good flash sites are very few and far between
I've only seen a small handful of sites displaying a 'good use' (understated and elegant and on a site that it's somewhat relevant to) of Flash and I personally try to disuade my clients from including it in their sites. (successfully so far!)
Just my thoughts, good flash sites are very few and far between
i agree ... <emphasis>very, very, very !!!!!</emphasis>
what is good can be excellent, but it is a mostly inappropriately used technology
People use Flash, I use Flash - I think its great!
I would like to see yet another useful forum here providing useful info from people in the know just like the other forums.
Also most of the flash forums I've seen have been people posting there URL to get views on the lastest all singing all dancing work of art
I don't do SEO i use "webmaster" world to check out code, graphics etc.
There are loads of forums on most subjects including SEO but I like the format of WMW and prefer to use this one.
PS I've got very short arms ;)
I know one home page (no names mentioned) that takes 30+ seconds on average to load, and I have an ISDN line....
Is that a bit of sarcasm Mitch?
You do make very nice Flash stuff, but I reckon you'll be struggling for support here. Although there are a few 'Flash is the be all and end all people' about.
Aren't there any decent forums on all those Flash sites you visit?
Webmaster World deals with things related to webmaster type stuff, search engines, scripts, graphics etc.
Flash is something that webmasters deal with therefore I feel it would only reflect webmaster issues if a section deaing with Flash was created.
I didn't ask for peoples opinions on if they like Flash or not .
All I wanted to suggest was to perhaps allow an area for people like myself who do use Flash and who would benefit from like minded people helping each other out.
All I wanted to suggest was to perhaps allow an area for people like myself who do use Flash and who would benefit from like minded people helping each other out.
Unfortunately Flash is Seen just like I would love to see a NT user group for the three guys that like it forum;)
People tend to forget that WEBMASTER WORLD is not just about SEO.
BUT when google starts indexing actionscript I can hold my head up and say i supported knighty and flash
So, for instance, if the Graphics forum became thick with good, useful threads about Flash, then that would be a sign to consider a dedicated Flash forum.
OK thats fine I was after all only making a suggestion ;)
I would like to point out though that the sort of Flash stuff I'm interested in does'nt really have anything to do with graphics its pure scripting stuff.
That is something the webmasters here, by-and-large, understand: the "wave of the future" doesn't matter one whit if you're trying to sell something or attract the largest possible audience to your site. You have to be flexible, compatible, and fast, something that Flash and various multi-media formats simply aren't... yet.
That said, if there were sufficient interest and sufficient Flash-related threads being posted in the Graphics forum, Flash would end up with its own forum... but it certainly doesn't warrant it based on the number of related posts now.
It's interesting to me that audio and video were also called leading edge back when I first got into web development six years ago. Well, so far they definitely have their uses, but things aren't moving nearly as fast as predicted and I have clients who need results today.
I have worked with Flash since version 3 was released, but have found very little commercially viable application for it so far. Right now the leading edge for effective commercial work in my mind is XHTML and (at long last) CSS, which languished for years due to poor browser support.
That being said, I love the look and feel of Flash and wish I had more commercial reasons to enhance my skill set. I assume that it's coming into its own, and some day I'll be there because the infrastructure and the market will be there. If the members here who are deep into Flash today start posting about it, then I'll be following those threads avidly.
The advent of internet audio/video (whatever the format) reminds me of the mobile market, where so-called 3G (third generation) applications have taken so long to materialize that 2.5G got invented. And even that has just barely begun to show up. If I had started to develop for that market when it was first touted, I'd be starving by now.
In the US about 25% of the PCs attached to the Internet are on 56kb or faster connections. They account for over 60% of the pageviews.
This may not be true outside the US, but here certainly the bandwidth is generally available to support audio and quarter-screen video. So audio and video are not futures but here and now.
Laggers always seem to point to the failures of emerging technology and very often they can find some great examples, while Leaders are always talking of flying with eagles.
The trick it seems is to strike a balance. Flash has been around long enough to not be leading edge any more, it seems to me.
A lot of press about the "leading edge of the future" is fed from those who have invested in broadband, ISP's, software makers, and the like. Outside US, and on dial up (Like me), flash and video does not make any sense at all.
If i go to a site that uses it, I turn away immediately, not on principle, but becuase I am usually looking for fast, good info, and flash, video, and audio all get in the way (and sometimes crask my browser.
Sorry to have gone off topic. Tedster I think says it well. If enough threads generate about a technique or topic, then a new category is created. Like Tedster, I loved learning Flash, and what it can do, but every time i tried to use it in the site, it got in the way of the message,, and for the net, getting out your message quickly and clearly to anyone who needs it, is key.
There are ways to integrate Flash into your site to enhance the look but the complexity of the program will keep it out of reach for the "average" webmaster...those of us without graphic arts degrees. ;)
This is exactly right, flash has been around for a while and is evolving with each release. Flash supports XML, ASP, PHP, JavaScript and has many features and benefits which HTML cannont provide.
The key to using Flash is WHEN to use it. I see flash more as an tool to be used within sites rather than to create entire sites.
Example -
I have a client at the moment who wants to show where certain people traveled to in the World. So I have an Animated GIF which is 16K, I took this into Flash and added 3 locations to make it interactive. So now the user see's a spinning globe, clicks next and the globe spins to a new position, a dot flashes indicatng the location along with some appearing explanatory text.
The whole thing weighs in less than 15k, its faster, leaner, looks better and is a lot more useful.
Flash is a very useful format for making interactive vector graphics and animations...if you weren't going to use a vector graphic or animation then doing so simply because you can is not gaining you anything
when faced with a new toy try remembering the Monty Python "Piston Engine" sketch..."...it was a bargain"
I have a couple of potential uses for Flash...I'll get round to doing them both some time soon...one will save a k or so on every page of a site by replacing an animated gif...the other is adding an animated site tour...I'm not going to go around looking for places to use Flash when there is no existing need
Why would you do ANYTHING just for the sake of doing it unless it serves some purpose?
Additionally, most uses of leading edge stuff involves using corporate formats. Unlike HTML and good old text, and like Flash, once you are sucked in, you continue to pay the rent to a landlord.
That's how corporations like MS get rich, and innovators die poor. Nothing against it, that's capitalism and the free market.. and that's the reality...
Eric is absolutely correct, the real future is in miniature and/or mobile and/or non PC based devices. There the real challenge is packing as much info as possible into a small space/bandwidth.
I would go so far to say that the Web itself is reaching the limits of it's usefulness. That of course is not to say it will die, but there is a limit to what can be delivered efficiently and economically through the Web. The present proliferation of popup/under/intrusive ads delivered by desparate guys and the like show that the Web is becoming increasingly inefficient. Something like micro payments or an acceptance of subscription based cntent will give it a few more years but the real excitement is in how to deliver information in more efficneint ways than how to develop "cool" sites... (Notice how that term has almost disappeared from the lexicon?)
It makes lots of money for me.
I target customers with flash sites and convert their sites into HTML that get search engine traffic. Then I get paid money.
As I said, I love flash:)
We are pragamatists who do what works for the majority of our users. Audio/video, may be the wave of the future, but it is not the wave of the present.
Profound thought for the day:
Most of our members are independents who've been around the internet and the computer scene for many years (some decades). Most are making a good living off the internet - some as high as six figures and a couple at seven.
Do you realize, that most members of this community have made more profit in the last year than Amazon, Inktomi, Altavista, CMGI, PriceLine, Excite, and Lycos COMBINED?
We'll leave the bleeding edge to the money pits.
i like sites that integrate flash so well, you can't tell they use it on a moderate-spec system (200mhz). but still i keep an old 486 win95 8mb ram, 33k modem for testing.
to me, designing a good site is about keeping the vistiors interested/coming back etc = information. secondly, looking after the *users* = user-friendly. thirdly, it's about getting more visitors = searchengine-friendly.
flash is very good at making a virtual tour, or a product demonstration, but essentially it's something that isn't going to be the "main feature" (or at least not for long).
a friend who "discovered" flash last year, starting advertising it on her site as "only the best sites use Flash". but that was after sitting through a 860KB flash "intro" with no "skip" feature... (i saved it for prosperity)
i'm for intelligent flash use (where appropriate).
As a consumer what do I want? Information - and if Flash helps me get that information better (e.g. virtual tour) then it serves a purpose. If it hinders my search with wobbling text or overlong intros, then I will click away.
However...as a site owner, what do I want? I may have a site that I produced myself on FP with CD collection animated gifs and Java. I decide that it is really time to get a design professional in and, guess what, I'm a sucker for Flash.
Flash is sexy to non-internet professionals, it sells, and unless you get in the door to explain HTML, SEO and usability to prospective customers, they will see Flash as The Leading Edge and want that.
