Earlier quoted context omitted.
They're easier to fork.
and abandon.
And fork again.
Without Flash the current web tech stack might look different
21–30 of 201 posts
Re: Without Flash the current web tech stack might look different
#22One thing I recently discovered that is very cool is Adobe's Alchemy (later called FlasCC and then CrossBridge) which is able to generate SWFs from C++. Not too much documentation can be found around it but it certainly intrigued me to realize you could bring your C++ applications to the browser (assuming Flash is installed/enabled)!
I used that for a project where the core business logic was shared with an iOS app (which was fairly simple but verbose C++ generated from CSV files provided by a researcher).
Alchemy wasn't very well documented initially but worked just fine once we got it working. It integrated with the Flash code nicely. Saved me a ton of time when updating the two platforms and testing the changes.
Re: Without Flash the current web tech stack might look different
#23I feel as though the author missed talking about Flex, which really took flash to the next level. It was short-lived, as it came a few years before the end of Flash-as-we-know-it when Steve Jobs decided to block it - but it was a great way to build sophisticated SPA's before the javascript ecosystem was able to catch up. Thanks Flash!
it came a few years before the end of Flash-as-we-know-it when Steve Jobs decided to block it
I forgot about that. Does anyone have any info about this? I didn't pay much attention at the time, but in retrospect it seems like it was one of the main reasons everyone stopped using flash.
Did Adobe try to get Steve to pay a licensing fee, or was he just inherently against implementing flash?
The excuse Steve made at the time was that it was too CPU intensive to run flash. I'm not sure how true this was, except for the earliest iPhone models. I've always wondered what the real reasons were.
It was certainly a good decision in retrospect, but it's an interesting bit of history.
Re: Without Flash the current web tech stack might look different
#24The question is, do any of the existing web stacks come close to the beginner friendly aspects of the original flash? I don't think so.. I can imagine any of my musician friends installing $FRAMEWORK and building a web site full of their own animations, menu's, and music playback.. Flash for all its "evilness" still IMHO hasn't been matched.
The authoring software was user friendly but sites made that way were atrocious in terms of usability in every way possible. Slow loading and also everything else about a browser didn't work as expected - bookmarking, back button, cut and paste, open in new window were all broken in flash sites. I don't think that it's laudable to create a tool that empowers beginners to create useless and difficult websites.
Indeed, lets condemn everyone who creates easy to use and powerful tools! I think everyone prefers pain in the ass tools and don't do much, this is the best way to protect the holy order of coders. Long live shitty tools!!!
Re: Without Flash the current web tech stack might look different
#25I think what Flash (the program) really excelled at was giving creators the ability to draw, animate and program interactive objects, all wrapped in a single neat package . I would contest that no other software, even today, has come close to being able to do these three so seamlessly at once (Really, I encourage you to try to name one!) Sure, when it came down to it you can say it had poor performance, security, fil…
Processing, especially the javascript library is ready to go on HTML canvas.
Re: Without Flash the current web tech stack might look different
#26I think what Flash (the program) really excelled at was giving creators the ability to draw, animate and program interactive objects, all wrapped in a single neat package . I would contest that no other software, even today, has come close to being able to do these three so seamlessly at once (Really, I encourage you to try to name one!) Sure, when it came down to it you can say it had poor performance, security, fil…
I think security was not fixable, at-least not to the user's and browsers liking. You had to disable flash for safety and stopping the most annoying ads. The other issues could be left to consenting adults. But browsers and IT departments turned against plugins in general. Now even Java is almost gone (from browsers) for the same reason.
I think Flash screwed up security because of the way users could control what Flash had access to (through a Security Sandbox Controller on the Macromedia/Adobe website)
Imagine that instead Flash went the way of App Permissions: asking users for permission to access, read, and write different things to the browser. Could you imagine? Advertisers wouldn't be able to pull as many annoying/shady things, and security would start to become a non-issue.
If anything, Flash gave developers too much freedom at first to tap into the browser. Then they tried to backpedal by adding more sandboxing rules that still connected to their awkward security manager. And so, advertisers contently continued on abusing all the ways they could get their ads to become as intrusive and in your face as possible, and people began to be angry with Flash because of it.
Re: Without Flash the current web tech stack might look different
#27I think what Flash (the program) really excelled at was giving creators the ability to draw, animate and program interactive objects, all wrapped in a single neat package . I would contest that no other software, even today, has come close to being able to do these three so seamlessly at once (Really, I encourage you to try to name one!) Sure, when it came down to it you can say it had poor performance, security, fil…
Processing, especially the javascript library is ready to go on HTML canvas.
You can't draw or animate in processing. You can program lines and shapes and animations, but that's hardly comparable.
Re: Without Flash the current web tech stack might look different
#28I feel as though the author missed talking about Flex, which really took flash to the next level. It was short-lived, as it came a few years before the end of Flash-as-we-know-it when Steve Jobs decided to block it - but it was a great way to build sophisticated SPA's before the javascript ecosystem was able to catch up. Thanks Flash!
it came a few years before the end of Flash-as-we-know-it when Steve Jobs decided to block it I forgot about that. Does anyone have any info about this? I didn't pay much attention at the time, but in retrospect it seems like it was one of the main reasons everyone stopped using flash. Did Adobe try to get Steve to pay a licensing fee, or was he just inherently against implementing flash? The excuse Steve made at the…
Flash is a security nightmare. It's a 3rd party application that opens up the device up directly into the OS if compromised. Jobs blocked it because it would make iPhone vulnerable to attacks they couldn't control. I don't blame him for blocking it honestly, even though it meant we had totally change tech stacks.
Re: Without Flash the current web tech stack might look different
#29Actual content creators have a much different perception of flash than IT administrators, chinstroking tech bloggers and the inventor of Javascript.
Re: Without Flash the current web tech stack might look different
#30The question is, do any of the existing web stacks come close to the beginner friendly aspects of the original flash? I don't think so.. I can imagine any of my musician friends installing $FRAMEWORK and building a web site full of their own animations, menu's, and music playback.. Flash for all its "evilness" still IMHO hasn't been matched.
Similarly, Visual Basic. Has anything since allowed non-programmers to build a GUI as easily as that? Just drag and drop, then double click the button and follow the on-screen prompts to glue it all together. It gets a lot of shit from real developers, but what can match it?