Things you should know about Flash

[korkus2000]

A lot has been said about Flash. There are many viewpoints about its usefulness on the net. I thought I would make one central post as reference on what is good and bad about this tool.

Search Engines
Macromedia released a search engine SDK to help engines search Flash content.
[macromedia.com...]

Fast seems to be the first engine to index all flash content.
[webmasterworld.com...]

Google will only index anything that looks like a URL within the flash file.
[webmasterworld.com...]

Inktomi can’t really do anything with Flash so they may take your DMOZ description.
[webmasterworld.com...]

Altavista, Teoma, Ask Jeeves, and Wisenut can’t see it and needs html on the page.
[webmasterworld.com...]
[webmasterworld.com...]

Pros and Cons
Feelings about “All Flash” Sites.
[webmasterworld.com...]

Promoting an “All Flash” site
[webmasterworld.com...]

Good use of Flash
[webmasterworld.com...]

Good business use of Flash
[webmasterworld.com...]

What irritates users.
[webmasterworld.com...]

People who like Flash
[webmasterworld.com...]

General feelings about Flash from webmasters.
Part 1
[webmasterworld.com...]
Part 2
[webmasterworld.com...]

Usability and Flash.
[flazoom.com...]

Jakob Nielson
[webmasterworld.com...]
[webmasterworld.com...]

Accessibility Praise For Flash
[webmasterworld.com...]

Market Penetration.
[webmasterworld.com...]

Using splash pages
[webmasterworld.com...]
[webmasterworld.com...]
[webmasterworld.com...]
[webmasterworld.com...]

Embedded Flash vs. 100% Flash
[webmasterworld.com...]

How To
Loading Page
[webmasterworld.com...]

Printing Flash
[webmasterworld.com...]

Tutorials
[webmasterworld.com...]

Flash navigation and frames.
[webmasterworld.com...]

Exporting Flash to a gif
[webmasterworld.com...]

Premade Flash files/templates
[webmasterworld.com...]

Stopping Flash auto install
[webmasterworld.com...]

Uninstalling Flash
[webmasterworld.com...]

[DaveN]

yep that about covers it all ;)

Great Post Korkus,

just one of the many things why people come here.

DaveN

[Alex_Gilman]

about covers it all? ..um what didn't this post cover ;)

[kingkelly]

Very nice!

Unfortuneately, my major problems with printing content made in Flash (oppose to Illustrator!) is still troubling me. I end up having to export as .png

Call me crazy and totally unprofessional, but i still would take flash over illustrator as my vector tool of choice for print any day! I can just make cooler stuff in flash. Someone please agree with me.....

[korkus2000]

Why not use Freehand. I love it. Its Flash's big brother and comes with studio mx :)

You can export either a frame to an eps or the movie to eps sequences. You can open these in freehand. Freehand will allow you to create excellent vector images. You can also do a lot of flash work from freehand. If you like Flash for creating vector art definetly check out Freehand.

<whispers quietly>I think mivox uses Freehand instead of Illustrator.</whispers quietly>

[copongcopong]

how about vectors Fireworks then put it in to flash? which do you think is easier? Or better?

draw in Fireworks put in flash

or

draw in Freehand put in flash?

BTW, this thread is very handy! :)

[korkus2000]

Freehand is a much more powerful vector program than Fireworks. Fireworks is mostly a raster program. Freehand is fully functional for print and to go to Flash. I use Freehand to create vector graphics for logos and to go into Quark Express, something Fireworks is really not meant to do. It is a head to head competitor of Illustrator. There really isn't much difference between Freehand and Illustrator. It is basically personal preference. I started back when aldus owned Freehand and it was a lot cheaper than Illustrator. It now is bundled with Studio MX so I couldn't be happier. :)

I think if you can get away with Fireworks and you don't have Freehand go for it. If you have Freehand you will find that it will be able to create more complex art than Fireworks can.

[zeus]

I just use flash if I want some effect on my sites and its the best for that, I dont mind that the SE cant find flash sites.

zeus

[lorax]

Korkus2000
Very nice post. Of all the issues with Flash I think the top 2 are how much it is used and how efficient you can make the swf file. And then there's learning ActionScript.;)

[WebManager]

All very well when everyone is Broadband connected!

[copongcopong]

korkus2000,

I am interested and use FreeHand before but I do not see some inspirational pictures or site which would make me say "wow!" do you have any links that you may share and even tutorial sites?

Thanks in advance.

[korkus2000]

As far as examples go macromedia [dynamic.macromedia.com] has a few.

The parka by Trevor Johnston always boggled my mind for a vector graphic.

[gilli]

[fullasagoog.com...] - blog aggregator for all things Macromedia related. Much of it has a strong flash focus.

[korkus2000]

That is an excellent resource gilli.

[BlobFisk]

swftools.com [swftools.com] has links to many Flash tools (such as screensaver creators, compressors etc.). Most are 15/30 Day trials, but there are a few nice little apps in there.

[edited by: korkus2000 at 1:16 pm (utc) on Nov. 15, 2002]
[edit reason] splice clean up [/edit]

[BlobFisk]

Another interesting Flash tool:

This product allows you to build flash animations and sites on the fly online.

http://www.toughmedia.com/ [toughmedia.com]

[lorax]

All very well when everyone is Broadband connected!

I know how you feel. But not all Flash files are fat! Flash can be used tastefully and the files can be as small as 6kb - same as a small jpg. Of course - it takes talent to get them that small. ;)

[dhdweb]

All very well when everyone is Broadband connected!

Are you all forgeting that flash is streaming media!

No matter how fat the swf file is, if optimized correctly, a person on 14.4 modem would not have any problem viewing it!

Tip:
To avoid useing preloaders, the front end of your flash file should be very light weighted and only use vector graphics. This way the heavyer stuff can load while the veiwer is occupied by what is on the screen now.

e.g. A very short intro works well for this with a small amount of animation.

Of course - it takes talent to get them that small.

How very true!

dhdweb

<edit> fix my bad typing </edit>

[lorax]

Are you all forgeting that flash is streaming media!

Well it is and it isn't. That being said, Flash is meant to be streamed just but not everyone supports or optimizes their files/server to accomplish this. Unfortunately, there are far too many instances of Flash files that must download 100+kb before they will begin to play. Tis a combination of poor planning and execution.

For more info: [macromedia.com...]

[dhdweb]

Great link there lorax, All flash developers should read that.

[korkus2000]

Update

Google optimization for all Flash site.
[webmasterworld.com...]

Flash banner generator
[webmasterworld.com...]

Printing in Flash
[webmasterworld.com...]

[dhdweb]

Lets give this thread another go, shall we.

Also see this thread:

If you use flash for this, Please stop! [webmasterworld.com]

[trismegisto]

very nice and useful thread korkus2000. threads like this make webmasterworld unique.

i personally use flash for multimedia purposes, when a client asks me for an animated presentation of the company or their products, i use flash and it’s great, because you can do a .swf with full screen and put an autorun file in your cd, and it will start the presentation. a flash inside a cd it’s really awesome, and A LOT of people will like that flash presentations.
i only use flash online for a couple of buttons or navigation bars, (although someone just recently told me it was not a good idea to do nav bars and buttons with flash, because a user without flash in his browser wouldn’t be able to go around in the site. any opinions about this?)

recently i lost in a web site contest organized by apple computer mexico. (no one has uploaded the sites yet, but you can see my name here as a finalist, i’m the fourth) i did a nice web site with many things; i just used flash for effects, the main nav bar, for a map showing the location of a place, and for an interactive art gallery. and i was very disappointed when i saw i’ve lost because of an all-done-flash website, i couldn’t belive it, because imho, i think flash is great as a side tool, but not as an all-around tool to make all your site just using flash, i mean, you can do it, but it is not ok, right? or am i the only one who thinks this way?

[edited by: korkus2000 at 9:08 pm (utc) on June 30, 2003]
[edit reason] URL outdated [/edit]

[korkus2000]

Welcome to WebmasterWorld trismegisto,

I agree with you that Flash is a tool and should be used to enhance a site. It should not be the entire site. Flash is not search engine friendly yet.

[korkus2000]

Some more to add

Flash detection
[webmasterworld.com...]

Flash books
[webmasterworld.com...]

Flash and digital video
[webmasterworld.com...]

[hakre]

flash has defenetly been cool long ago. the hype is over. it can be used wise, as stated here, but who needs this coolness anyway. i much more enjoy films in cinema rather than on popup pages....

it's defenetly non-web except these cool toons available everywhere, a stream can't beat out because of size.

[dhdweb]

the hype is over

?!?

It just getting started! ;)

[korkus2000]

Since its been bumped again

Flash and Dynamic Data
[webmasterworld.com...]

Indexing Flash Sites
[webmasterworld.com...]

it's defenetly non-web except these cool toons available everywhere

There are so many applications for the web besides toons.

[sem4u]

Good stuff, but you will still have to think about how SEs index flash related pages.

Also, dont forget about the millions of 56k users out there!

[dhdweb]

Also, dont forget about the millions of 56k users out there!

Does the word STREAM mean anything?

If the Flash file is done CORRECTLY, it will stream just fine on 14.4 modem!