Browser Stats

[tedster]

How many people have the Flash plug-in? What percent still surf at 600x400 or with 256 colors?

The Elegant Hack [eleganthack.com] has compiled a nice list of resources for wrestling with those browser stats questions.

I find that it's important to check many sources, since no two seem to agree with any degree of closeness. WebSnapshots [websnapshot.mycomputer.com] says 82% have Flash, but The Standard [thestandard.com] says its 97%. Big difference!

[tedster]

By the way, the Flash plug-in statistic is heavy on my mind. I would like to use Flash as a tool to embed sound files, or, more important, small animations that are much classier than animated GIFs.

If 97% have the plug-in, it's a green light. If 82% is more accurate, it's still a no-go.

Does anyone have any experience here? Can you see how many people call for a small Flash file on a page compared to how many call for the HTML?

For some odd reason, I would trust a few reports from real, live webmasters than the numbers from the big statistics compilers.

[BoneHeadicus]

Wise thinking tedster. Flash can't be beat (yet) for embedding sound. If you make the attributes "0" then its invisible (duh) and it doesnt hold up the rest of the page like java. If they don't have the plug-in they are automatically prompted to install after it downloads (640K). As to who doesnt have it. Maybe the Linux crowd and maybe the WebTV? people, not sure exactly...but I do know I wouldnt trade Flash for anything to accomplish what I do. 99.9% of my logs are either spiders or 4+ browsers so I might miss some people but my target market is "hip" so I dont lose sleep over it. Besides it's never in a vital navigation position where they are excluded completely anyway.

[BoneHeadicus]

BTW you dig up some of the best sites...love WebWord