is Apple's word = law?
May 27, 2010 8:53 AM Subscribe
Flash is going to be dead? My job is based almost solely in flash development. I love it. Am I going to be out of a job (soon)?
I'm in kind of a mild panic (exaggeration).
Life As We Know It is going mobile. Smartphones, tablets, tvs are connecting to the internet from Everywhere. Everything is on demand now.
Apple says that Flash is not going to be in The Future. Adobe says hell yes it is. Half the internet agrees with Apple.
The battle of Flash vs HTML5 has begun.
From my understanding this is about video only. But what about me? I'm a flash developer. The catch is I don't work with video. My skills lie in everything else flash can do.
I love it. I really and truly have fun making and building things in flash. I enjoy my job!
But if everyone is trying to view my stuff from a iPad or iPod or iNextAwesomeThing.. they can't see it. Because Apple doesn't support it.
Should I be concerned? Or is the internet making a mountain out of a molehill?
I realize things die slowly on the internet, especially something as well ingrained as flash. Still, if all the mobile device makers decide that Flash is not something they want to support.. will it really kill flash?
I'm in kind of a mild panic (exaggeration).
Life As We Know It is going mobile. Smartphones, tablets, tvs are connecting to the internet from Everywhere. Everything is on demand now.
Apple says that Flash is not going to be in The Future. Adobe says hell yes it is. Half the internet agrees with Apple.
The battle of Flash vs HTML5 has begun.
From my understanding this is about video only. But what about me? I'm a flash developer. The catch is I don't work with video. My skills lie in everything else flash can do.
I love it. I really and truly have fun making and building things in flash. I enjoy my job!
But if everyone is trying to view my stuff from a iPad or iPod or iNextAwesomeThing.. they can't see it. Because Apple doesn't support it.
Should I be concerned? Or is the internet making a mountain out of a molehill?
I realize things die slowly on the internet, especially something as well ingrained as flash. Still, if all the mobile device makers decide that Flash is not something they want to support.. will it really kill flash?
Flash is not dead yet. Word on the street is that there are a number of mobile devices which will support flash in the next couple years. However you should be concerned.
What do you do in flash? If you're doing games, apps and or web-ui stuff I'd suggest brushing up on generic programming fundamentals and also making a foray into html5, javascript and css.
If you have basic programming fundamentals, and a good grasp of what looks good or makes a great UI you can weather any development language storm.
posted by captaincrouton at 9:02 AM on May 27, 2010
What do you do in flash? If you're doing games, apps and or web-ui stuff I'd suggest brushing up on generic programming fundamentals and also making a foray into html5, javascript and css.
If you have basic programming fundamentals, and a good grasp of what looks good or makes a great UI you can weather any development language storm.
posted by captaincrouton at 9:02 AM on May 27, 2010
Yes, Flash will die someday. Technology dying is part of working in the computer industry, and locking yourself to a single tool opens yourself to being out of a job when that tool becomes passé. What kind of things are you building in Flash? Can these things be built in Silverlight or for HTML 5?
Flash isn't disappearing entire from smartphones. Android can run Flash and it's just as big a player in the market as the iPhone.
posted by mkb at 9:02 AM on May 27, 2010
Flash isn't disappearing entire from smartphones. Android can run Flash and it's just as big a player in the market as the iPhone.
posted by mkb at 9:02 AM on May 27, 2010
Remember that a HUGE chunk of online content is free because it is ad supported. Then remember that virtually 100% of online ad content is Flash based.
Flash ain't going anywhere. Not for a good while. It's just a popular target to hate at the moment, so sit back and let the hoi polloi have their two minutes' worth. Really, what are the alternatives? Silverlight is a joke and a half, and HTML5 could have 100% of the functionality of Flash *tomorrow*, and work uniformly across all browsers (ha!), and clients would still balk at its use until it had near the penetration that Flash has.
Also, take note and appreciate the fact that *almost everything* people bitch about when deriding Flash is either outright false, or is the fault of the developer/their client more than it is the fault of the tool itself.
Case(s) in point: deep linking, SEO optimization, keyboard control, screen reader access, selectable text... can ALL BE DONE IN FLASH without much work, and yet people LOVE to bitch about their perceived absence.
This is not to deride HTML5. I think it's a good thing. I just think that people are making this into some huge epic battle, and chicken-littleing the everliving shit out of all this.
posted by kaseijin at 9:04 AM on May 27, 2010 [2 favorites]
Flash ain't going anywhere. Not for a good while. It's just a popular target to hate at the moment, so sit back and let the hoi polloi have their two minutes' worth. Really, what are the alternatives? Silverlight is a joke and a half, and HTML5 could have 100% of the functionality of Flash *tomorrow*, and work uniformly across all browsers (ha!), and clients would still balk at its use until it had near the penetration that Flash has.
Also, take note and appreciate the fact that *almost everything* people bitch about when deriding Flash is either outright false, or is the fault of the developer/their client more than it is the fault of the tool itself.
Case(s) in point: deep linking, SEO optimization, keyboard control, screen reader access, selectable text... can ALL BE DONE IN FLASH without much work, and yet people LOVE to bitch about their perceived absence.
This is not to deride HTML5. I think it's a good thing. I just think that people are making this into some huge epic battle, and chicken-littleing the everliving shit out of all this.
posted by kaseijin at 9:04 AM on May 27, 2010 [2 favorites]
Learn JQuery. No software developer should peg their entire career on the success of a single language or platform.
The writing's been on the wall for Flash for quite some time now.
posted by schmod at 9:06 AM on May 27, 2010 [1 favorite]
The writing's been on the wall for Flash for quite some time now.
posted by schmod at 9:06 AM on May 27, 2010 [1 favorite]
This is not to say, however, that Flash won't eventually die. As pointed out above, this is the way with all technologies.
I just don't think its time has come just yet.
posted by kaseijin at 9:06 AM on May 27, 2010
I just don't think its time has come just yet.
posted by kaseijin at 9:06 AM on May 27, 2010
Best answer: First off, the reports of Flash's death are greatly exaggerated.
Second, the skills you learn in one of these technologies should translate easily to another. For example, Flash ActionScript is just a dialect of ECMAScript, just like JavaScript. You won't be left in the dust if Flash should suddenly kick the bucket.
That said, it never hurts to expand your knowledge portfolio. In your spare time, maybe tinker around with the other technology of your choice. It helps to get a pulse for everything that's out there.
posted by Herschel at 9:07 AM on May 27, 2010
Second, the skills you learn in one of these technologies should translate easily to another. For example, Flash ActionScript is just a dialect of ECMAScript, just like JavaScript. You won't be left in the dust if Flash should suddenly kick the bucket.
That said, it never hurts to expand your knowledge portfolio. In your spare time, maybe tinker around with the other technology of your choice. It helps to get a pulse for everything that's out there.
posted by Herschel at 9:07 AM on May 27, 2010
Yes. No offense to you, you didn't write the player, but it's a miserably shitty technology once you've stepped away from the Windows desktop. Crashes all the damn time, stomps on your battery life if you're on a portable, many other Bad Things.
That said, Adobe is working on making web development tools for HTML5, which between WebGL, Canvas and the new audio work being done is going to to make flash obsolete in the next year or so and irrelevant in the next three. But you have the fortune of having job experience and awareness of the impending shift, here, so get to work learning the new stuff.
posted by mhoye at 9:08 AM on May 27, 2010 [1 favorite]
That said, Adobe is working on making web development tools for HTML5, which between WebGL, Canvas and the new audio work being done is going to to make flash obsolete in the next year or so and irrelevant in the next three. But you have the fortune of having job experience and awareness of the impending shift, here, so get to work learning the new stuff.
posted by mhoye at 9:08 AM on May 27, 2010 [1 favorite]
Most likely outcome is that Adobe releases a version of Flash that supports rendering to javascript/HTML5 with a ton of supporting javascript libraries. That will get it working well enough on the Apple devices that no one will care anymore. They already developed a Flash to ObjectiveC converter that Apple killed, so clearly they see this as a viable strategy.
At the same time, the power of these portable devices is still growing in leaps and bounds. The idea that Flash is slow and kills the battery will be quaint in no time, especially if people can just turn it on when they come to a page that uses it, like on Android 2.2.
Finally, I feel that the iPhone has already peaked as far as market share. The competitors like HTC have caught up in terms of features and beat Apple on price and they have no principled stand against supporting Flash. Apple will either cave or be the odd man out in a year or less.
posted by smackfu at 9:09 AM on May 27, 2010
At the same time, the power of these portable devices is still growing in leaps and bounds. The idea that Flash is slow and kills the battery will be quaint in no time, especially if people can just turn it on when they come to a page that uses it, like on Android 2.2.
Finally, I feel that the iPhone has already peaked as far as market share. The competitors like HTC have caught up in terms of features and beat Apple on price and they have no principled stand against supporting Flash. Apple will either cave or be the odd man out in a year or less.
posted by smackfu at 9:09 AM on May 27, 2010
Response by poster: Just to answer the general question: I make games and web-ui/learning tools in flash. I work for higher education. We can simply tell students that they need flash, but I wanted my question to be more broad for any concerned flash developers out there.
I know (and plan) to learn more, as stagnation is never good when you're a developer for the internet.
I guess my question is more: How big a deal is this?
posted by royalsong at 9:10 AM on May 27, 2010
I know (and plan) to learn more, as stagnation is never good when you're a developer for the internet.
I guess my question is more: How big a deal is this?
posted by royalsong at 9:10 AM on May 27, 2010
From my understanding this is about video only. But what about me? I'm a flash developer. The catch is I don't work with video. My skills lie in everything else flash can do.
I think that's a misconception that a lot of people have. It's basically separable into two categories: video, and everything else Flash does.
I also think people think Jobs is just being his usual control freak maniac self rather than having some good points here, and I disagree with these people. Most non-video Flash applications would not work correctly with a finger-based touch UI. Application design is hugely different when the smallest click is 40px wide and there's no mouseover (no rollovers, no tooltips, no popout menus, no highlight things that are clickable...there's tons of hover-based behavior in normal UIs). So on iPhone OS devices, all the non-HTML apps are written against their APIs, which solves a lot of this problem. The web isn't perfect, and some things don't work great (sites with ajaxy popout functions that don't have any other way to access them), but most things work OK.
So even if Flash could magically work fast and bug-free on the iPhone OS devices, what would you really gain? You'd gain access to a bunch of software that is not well-suited to a finger-touch UI.
Anyway, I bring up this long digression because I think this really affects how we should look at this issue going forward: how much is this Apple being dicks and how much is this a similar problem any mobile device is going to face? If we go back to styli, its a different story, but I don't think we will. My buddy showed me his Nexus One running Android 2.2 with Flash yesterday. Video worked great. Non-video content was almost entirely useless, with the exception of restaurant/bar/band sites that just use Flash to build menus and stuff that you could just as easily do in HTML.
On top of that, these embedded devices are really taxed by Flash. The iPhone 3G is extremely taxed by rendering HTML.
As I see it, the Flash calculus for a mobile device developer goes like this:
1) We can put a shitton of work into getting this run time to work, and it still might not work in a CPU-, memory-, and power-efficient way, but we'll have a leg up on Apple.
2) Once we do that, we'll have access to Flash video, which is great, but a lot of that we'd have access to anyway via alternatives. That's nice, but not a huge win. Sites like Hulu will still not be available on mobile devices due to licensing issues. So...mixed bag. We'll also have access to a large volume of mouse-oriented applications written in flash and distributed via HTTP: games, etc. An enormous amount of these will provide a subpar user experience on our device (Assuming we are sticking with finger UI, touch, small screen). So, again, mixed bag.
3) We will gain access to a developer community that could make good stuff? That's a win, but we already have HTML + our other stack...so its hard to characterize how valuable this is.
4) We are taking a dependency that is 3rd party, in the middle of an insanely competitive rush to build. That sucks.
It's hard for me to see how, given this situation, Flash becomes a big part of the mobile future. If I was Adobe, I'd stop all this public bitching about Flash and get cracking on an awesome HTML5 development tool for the Creative Suite.
The thing is, there's till jobs around for COBOL developers. Flash is huge. I know a guy who's a flash developer: none of his work is ever used on personal computing devices. He designs motion graphics and stuff for VH1. They upload them to a server and they get alpha blended with the live video feed. There will be jobs building and maintaining flash apps for a long, long time. Personally, though, I don't see Flash as being a runtime everyone has in their pocket five years from now.
posted by jeb at 9:11 AM on May 27, 2010 [2 favorites]
I think that's a misconception that a lot of people have. It's basically separable into two categories: video, and everything else Flash does.
I also think people think Jobs is just being his usual control freak maniac self rather than having some good points here, and I disagree with these people. Most non-video Flash applications would not work correctly with a finger-based touch UI. Application design is hugely different when the smallest click is 40px wide and there's no mouseover (no rollovers, no tooltips, no popout menus, no highlight things that are clickable...there's tons of hover-based behavior in normal UIs). So on iPhone OS devices, all the non-HTML apps are written against their APIs, which solves a lot of this problem. The web isn't perfect, and some things don't work great (sites with ajaxy popout functions that don't have any other way to access them), but most things work OK.
So even if Flash could magically work fast and bug-free on the iPhone OS devices, what would you really gain? You'd gain access to a bunch of software that is not well-suited to a finger-touch UI.
Anyway, I bring up this long digression because I think this really affects how we should look at this issue going forward: how much is this Apple being dicks and how much is this a similar problem any mobile device is going to face? If we go back to styli, its a different story, but I don't think we will. My buddy showed me his Nexus One running Android 2.2 with Flash yesterday. Video worked great. Non-video content was almost entirely useless, with the exception of restaurant/bar/band sites that just use Flash to build menus and stuff that you could just as easily do in HTML.
On top of that, these embedded devices are really taxed by Flash. The iPhone 3G is extremely taxed by rendering HTML.
As I see it, the Flash calculus for a mobile device developer goes like this:
1) We can put a shitton of work into getting this run time to work, and it still might not work in a CPU-, memory-, and power-efficient way, but we'll have a leg up on Apple.
2) Once we do that, we'll have access to Flash video, which is great, but a lot of that we'd have access to anyway via alternatives. That's nice, but not a huge win. Sites like Hulu will still not be available on mobile devices due to licensing issues. So...mixed bag. We'll also have access to a large volume of mouse-oriented applications written in flash and distributed via HTTP: games, etc. An enormous amount of these will provide a subpar user experience on our device (Assuming we are sticking with finger UI, touch, small screen). So, again, mixed bag.
3) We will gain access to a developer community that could make good stuff? That's a win, but we already have HTML + our other stack...so its hard to characterize how valuable this is.
4) We are taking a dependency that is 3rd party, in the middle of an insanely competitive rush to build. That sucks.
It's hard for me to see how, given this situation, Flash becomes a big part of the mobile future. If I was Adobe, I'd stop all this public bitching about Flash and get cracking on an awesome HTML5 development tool for the Creative Suite.
The thing is, there's till jobs around for COBOL developers. Flash is huge. I know a guy who's a flash developer: none of his work is ever used on personal computing devices. He designs motion graphics and stuff for VH1. They upload them to a server and they get alpha blended with the live video feed. There will be jobs building and maintaining flash apps for a long, long time. Personally, though, I don't see Flash as being a runtime everyone has in their pocket five years from now.
posted by jeb at 9:11 AM on May 27, 2010 [2 favorites]
Maybe this article from today will make you feel a little better?
posted by brainmouse at 9:13 AM on May 27, 2010
posted by brainmouse at 9:13 AM on May 27, 2010
Consider the horse and buggy industry, when cars came along, their jobs were, one by one, obsolete. What prospects now for the budding horsewhip artisan.
Flash has become devalued by poor implementation and security problems, people will move away from it as soon as something better becomes available (and a good thing too I reckon).
Whether Apple's scepticism (OK hostility) towards Flash is reasonable is a matter of opinion but being a one trick pony is never a good idea. Diversify your activities, perhaps build up a sideline in Flash to HTML5 migration.
posted by epo at 9:13 AM on May 27, 2010
Flash has become devalued by poor implementation and security problems, people will move away from it as soon as something better becomes available (and a good thing too I reckon).
Whether Apple's scepticism (OK hostility) towards Flash is reasonable is a matter of opinion but being a one trick pony is never a good idea. Diversify your activities, perhaps build up a sideline in Flash to HTML5 migration.
posted by epo at 9:13 AM on May 27, 2010
"but it's a miserably shitty technology once you've stepped away from the Windows desktop. Crashes all the damn time,"
I would hazard a guess that better than 50% of the Flash developers out there work on Macs. I haven't noticed Flash be any more crashy on a Mac vs. a PC, when it's written well. Not to say that there isn't a lot of badly written Flash out there... same as there is a lot of badly written [insert anything]. Let's not blame the trowel for the bricklayer doing a shitty job.
That said... yeah.. battery. It does drain the battery, but come on. That is SUCH a straw man. It can't drain my mobile batter any more than goddamned bluetooth. That and WiFi are the biggest culprits ever on my mobile devices, and yet Apple is perfectly content with those. If it was really about battery life, then Apple would give us a toggle to enable/disable the player... same as they do with other settings. It's about ad revenue, clean and simple.
posted by kaseijin at 9:14 AM on May 27, 2010
I would hazard a guess that better than 50% of the Flash developers out there work on Macs. I haven't noticed Flash be any more crashy on a Mac vs. a PC, when it's written well. Not to say that there isn't a lot of badly written Flash out there... same as there is a lot of badly written [insert anything]. Let's not blame the trowel for the bricklayer doing a shitty job.
That said... yeah.. battery. It does drain the battery, but come on. That is SUCH a straw man. It can't drain my mobile batter any more than goddamned bluetooth. That and WiFi are the biggest culprits ever on my mobile devices, and yet Apple is perfectly content with those. If it was really about battery life, then Apple would give us a toggle to enable/disable the player... same as they do with other settings. It's about ad revenue, clean and simple.
posted by kaseijin at 9:14 AM on May 27, 2010
Best answer: Will Flash die soon? Not too likely. Will it die? Absolutely. I do think it's safe to say even in the worst case scenario you've got a while before the work dries up. I won't repeat what everyone else said, but there are a number of factors effecting Flash's fate, with video support being probably one of the biggest.
Anyway, in general technologies change, die, new ones come along. Developers should be excited to learn new languages and platforms. You can't get stuck on one thing. To use myself as an example I wouldn't have much of a job if I was still trying to do everything with Perl :). More recently I've been making Flash games (last 10 years), got into iPhone development last year, and I'm pretty intrigued by the possibilities of HTML5 games. Don't be scared of change.
And worry not, you're in great shape!
If HTML5 takes off, I'd be hard pressed to think of an easier jump than going from Flash to HTML5. Sure, they'll be new APIs, new quirks, but the language is pretty much identical. Javascript and Actionscript are both based on the same standard after all.
In my experience, each new language you learn is easier than the one before it. It's never too soon to convert to a platform agnostic developer.
posted by malphigian at 9:19 AM on May 27, 2010
Anyway, in general technologies change, die, new ones come along. Developers should be excited to learn new languages and platforms. You can't get stuck on one thing. To use myself as an example I wouldn't have much of a job if I was still trying to do everything with Perl :). More recently I've been making Flash games (last 10 years), got into iPhone development last year, and I'm pretty intrigued by the possibilities of HTML5 games. Don't be scared of change.
And worry not, you're in great shape!
If HTML5 takes off, I'd be hard pressed to think of an easier jump than going from Flash to HTML5. Sure, they'll be new APIs, new quirks, but the language is pretty much identical. Javascript and Actionscript are both based on the same standard after all.
In my experience, each new language you learn is easier than the one before it. It's never too soon to convert to a platform agnostic developer.
posted by malphigian at 9:19 AM on May 27, 2010
I'm strongly in the Flash should die camp (even though we do a lot of Flash content so this is giving me giant headaches at work right now). That said, Flash authoring is going to be around for a long time. If the Flash plugin starts losing ground Adobe will update their tools to generate content for the HTML5 world.
posted by ecurtz at 9:20 AM on May 27, 2010
posted by ecurtz at 9:20 AM on May 27, 2010
kaseijin: Remember that a HUGE chunk of online content is free because it is ad supported. Then remember that virtually 100% of online ad content is Flash based.
These, along with video players, will be the first category of content to be converted large-scale to HTML5.
posted by mkultra at 9:26 AM on May 27, 2010
These, along with video players, will be the first category of content to be converted large-scale to HTML5.
posted by mkultra at 9:26 AM on May 27, 2010
(at the risk of chatfiltering)
mkultra: I've thought about that, too.. but I'm not entirely convinced of it being an issue in the here and now. When serving ad units, penetration is a huge issue. A lot of ad servers still require units to be produced in Flash 8, for example. Eventually, of course, I think you are correct... but that's on a pretty long time line.
Video players will be converted long before ad units are.
posted by kaseijin at 9:28 AM on May 27, 2010
mkultra: I've thought about that, too.. but I'm not entirely convinced of it being an issue in the here and now. When serving ad units, penetration is a huge issue. A lot of ad servers still require units to be produced in Flash 8, for example. Eventually, of course, I think you are correct... but that's on a pretty long time line.
Video players will be converted long before ad units are.
posted by kaseijin at 9:28 AM on May 27, 2010
Flash is definitely on the way out, and video is just one part of it. Flash became popular because it allowed Web developers to do things that weren't possible with the native technologies in browsers. That has already changed; see chromeexperiments.com (ideally in Chrome, but many of the experiments work in other modern browsers).
Those experiments use no Flash, no plugins, no browser-specific features—just existing or emerging W3C standards that will soon have universal browser support. Between HTML5 (with HTML Canvas, native video, and native audio), CSS3 (with unprecedented control over page styling), and hugely more efficient JavaScript engines, there will be very little that Flash can do that a browser's built-in technologies can't.
But you shouldn't be afraid; you should be expanding your skill set. If you know some ActionScript, then you should have no problem picking up JavaScript; they're vey similar. Learn some jQuery; brush up on modern Web design using things like PNG alpha channels, CSS image spriting and text replacement, etc.
It sucks to lose something you love, but trust me—you'll love this brave new world even more.
posted by ixohoxi at 9:47 AM on May 27, 2010 [1 favorite]
Those experiments use no Flash, no plugins, no browser-specific features—just existing or emerging W3C standards that will soon have universal browser support. Between HTML5 (with HTML Canvas, native video, and native audio), CSS3 (with unprecedented control over page styling), and hugely more efficient JavaScript engines, there will be very little that Flash can do that a browser's built-in technologies can't.
But you shouldn't be afraid; you should be expanding your skill set. If you know some ActionScript, then you should have no problem picking up JavaScript; they're vey similar. Learn some jQuery; brush up on modern Web design using things like PNG alpha channels, CSS image spriting and text replacement, etc.
It sucks to lose something you love, but trust me—you'll love this brave new world even more.
posted by ixohoxi at 9:47 AM on May 27, 2010 [1 favorite]
(And Apple's position is neither here nor there. They obviously have ther own reasons for wanting Flash to die, so I wouldn't look to them for an objective judgment on the matter.)
posted by ixohoxi at 9:49 AM on May 27, 2010
posted by ixohoxi at 9:49 AM on May 27, 2010
The worst thing you can do in technology is to hitch yourself to a single piece of tech.
Learn the fundamentals of the goal of the thing you do (which is in your case, to "make interactive stuff"), and branch out from there.
posted by Threeway Handshake at 9:52 AM on May 27, 2010
Learn the fundamentals of the goal of the thing you do (which is in your case, to "make interactive stuff"), and branch out from there.
posted by Threeway Handshake at 9:52 AM on May 27, 2010
Adobe was at the recent Google IO conference and showed off their next version of development tools... and they make CSS/HTML5/Javascript stuff that's just as interactive and animated as flash. check it out: http://blogs.adobe.com/conversations/2010/05/adobe_delivered_some_very_exci.html
seems to be if you do most of your flash work in Adobe's tools, your skills should cross over nicely to the HTML5 future.
posted by jrishel at 10:03 AM on May 27, 2010
seems to be if you do most of your flash work in Adobe's tools, your skills should cross over nicely to the HTML5 future.
posted by jrishel at 10:03 AM on May 27, 2010
I guess my question is more: How big a deal is this?
For you, it doesn't have to be. As long as you know their tools, Adobe will likely always put tools to export to the dominant implementation. You may still save and work with your files in AS, but you'd publish to HTML5 or whatever. HTML5 itself is not just about video, so I'd follow the general trends rather than worry about Adobe or YouTube or whoever..
posted by rhizome at 10:28 AM on May 27, 2010
For you, it doesn't have to be. As long as you know their tools, Adobe will likely always put tools to export to the dominant implementation. You may still save and work with your files in AS, but you'd publish to HTML5 or whatever. HTML5 itself is not just about video, so I'd follow the general trends rather than worry about Adobe or YouTube or whoever..
posted by rhizome at 10:28 AM on May 27, 2010
You should be worried in about a decade. By then Flash and you (and HTML 6,7,8) will have evolved.
posted by filmgeek at 11:26 AM on May 27, 2010
posted by filmgeek at 11:26 AM on May 27, 2010
Flash isn't going anywhere any time soon.
That being said, if your livelihood is dependent on one (single-sourced) technology, it's time to diversify.
posted by blue_beetle at 11:40 AM on May 27, 2010
That being said, if your livelihood is dependent on one (single-sourced) technology, it's time to diversify.
posted by blue_beetle at 11:40 AM on May 27, 2010
Learn JQuery.
Jesus what terrible advice. If you already know Flash, you basically already know Javascript (since they're both just ECMAScript). I would concentrate on honing your Javascript skills writ large more than any particular JS compatibility framework.
And don't worry, Flash isn't dead. HTML5 has a loooong-ass way to go before it's anywhere near as performant as Flash. And it still won't support TrueType fonts (unlike Flash, with its native support). I would suggest you start looking into Flex, though, or just concentrate on pure-ActionScript since it will be the most portable.
Then remember that virtually 100% of online ad content is Flash based.
I can't wait to see where the Flash-haters direct their anger once the advertisers move to Standards-Compliant™ HTML5.
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 11:53 AM on May 27, 2010
Jesus what terrible advice. If you already know Flash, you basically already know Javascript (since they're both just ECMAScript). I would concentrate on honing your Javascript skills writ large more than any particular JS compatibility framework.
And don't worry, Flash isn't dead. HTML5 has a loooong-ass way to go before it's anywhere near as performant as Flash. And it still won't support TrueType fonts (unlike Flash, with its native support). I would suggest you start looking into Flex, though, or just concentrate on pure-ActionScript since it will be the most portable.
Then remember that virtually 100% of online ad content is Flash based.
I can't wait to see where the Flash-haters direct their anger once the advertisers move to Standards-Compliant™ HTML5.
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 11:53 AM on May 27, 2010
I avoid flash whenever possible and even though I've got a 30 megabit connection, I choose the low bandwidth option if I'm presented with one. I may be in the minority, but I know I'm not alone. Your sites haven't been reaching me since long before the iPhone.
But I agree with what everyone else says above, it sounds like you've bet the farm on one thing. That's never a good idea. I assume you know there's more than one way to create a dynamic website, right? Learn a second one. When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail?
I don't think the way Apple is going about the flash issue is the best way, but I cannot stand flash, so I just sit on the site and smile at the entire issue.
posted by Brian Puccio at 12:46 PM on May 27, 2010
But I agree with what everyone else says above, it sounds like you've bet the farm on one thing. That's never a good idea. I assume you know there's more than one way to create a dynamic website, right? Learn a second one. When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail?
I don't think the way Apple is going about the flash issue is the best way, but I cannot stand flash, so I just sit on the site and smile at the entire issue.
posted by Brian Puccio at 12:46 PM on May 27, 2010
A lot more people still surf the web on regular old computers vs. iPads and iPhones. Sure, the tide is shifting against Flash at the moment, and who knows, perhaps Flash will indeed go the way of the dodo. But I don't think that will happen any time soon. Adobe is likely to evolve Flash in one way or another to keep up with the times, and even if they don't, there is still going to be a demand for Flash developers for the foreseeable future.
But as others have said, you can't let your skill-set stagnate no matter what. So I say don't worry about is or isn't going to happen with Flash -- you can't control that. Worry about what is or isn't going to happen with you. Learn something new simply because learning something new is a good thing to do. Everything else will work itself out in time.
posted by spilon at 1:05 PM on May 27, 2010
But as others have said, you can't let your skill-set stagnate no matter what. So I say don't worry about is or isn't going to happen with Flash -- you can't control that. Worry about what is or isn't going to happen with you. Learn something new simply because learning something new is a good thing to do. Everything else will work itself out in time.
posted by spilon at 1:05 PM on May 27, 2010
Response by poster: Thanks Everyone!
My skill sets range outside flash and actionscript, but for right now that is the main focus of my job and the main focus of my concern. Still, I appreciate all the advice to diversify myself!
I shall put my eggs in multiple baskets.
posted by royalsong at 2:07 PM on May 27, 2010
My skill sets range outside flash and actionscript, but for right now that is the main focus of my job and the main focus of my concern. Still, I appreciate all the advice to diversify myself!
I shall put my eggs in multiple baskets.
posted by royalsong at 2:07 PM on May 27, 2010
Half the internet agrees with Apple.
Half the Internet? What, you mean the quarter of smartphone buyers and 5% of desktop/laptop buyers who own Apple products?
Flash garners a lot of (oft-deserved) opprobrium. You can't have a 40 year career in tech without using a few new tricks. But "Apple product users" are actually no-where near as pervasive as noise on, say, the front page of Metafilter might have you believe.
posted by rodgerd at 12:43 AM on May 28, 2010
Half the Internet? What, you mean the quarter of smartphone buyers and 5% of desktop/laptop buyers who own Apple products?
Flash garners a lot of (oft-deserved) opprobrium. You can't have a 40 year career in tech without using a few new tricks. But "Apple product users" are actually no-where near as pervasive as noise on, say, the front page of Metafilter might have you believe.
posted by rodgerd at 12:43 AM on May 28, 2010
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by jmnugent at 9:01 AM on May 27, 2010 [1 favorite]