
HTML 5: Could it kill Flash and Silverlight?  - jeroen
http://tech.yahoo.com/news/infoworld/20090616/tc_infoworld/79291
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kqr2
For a transition strategy, I think the browser makers should make an HTML5
plugin that's as easy to install as the flash player.

Therefore web application developers can have more confidence in developing
with HTML5 since it will work on legacy browsers.

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ROFISH
Safari 3.1 already supported most things (4 is still missing WebSockets).
Firefox 3.5 (out soon) is a massive update to add missing HTML5 features and
their updates are automatic and very transparent.

You can start doing HTML5 today and be assured that a nontrivial portion of
your audience will support it out-of-box when 3.5 rolls around.

~~~
buugs
You kind of missed the point... html 5 isn't going to hit it big if it only
has that portion they need to be easily accessible to the entire audience.

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enomar
I wish. Flash will continue working on IE 6 and other older browsers though.
Until all the browsers you want to support have HTML 5 implemented
(correctly), you're going to have to either use Flash or some hybrid/piecemeal
solution.

~~~
lhorie
Not only that, creating animations in Flash tend to be a lot faster than
anything else. Very often at my job we opt to use Flash for things that could
technically be done with straight HTML/CSS/JS, simply because the former would
take orders of magnitude less time to create (and that time can be invested
into polishing, etc).

~~~
mindhacker
Not to mention the size. A HTML + CSS + JS (jQuery) implementation of a simple
component such as a menu would end up being ~50KB. In flash it turns out to be
less than 1KB.

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slig
Most of it can be cacheable, so it's not a problem.

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rythie
I hope so

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poppysan
I for one, see no problem with a properly done flash project (not bad amateur
work). We can argue open-ness, but realistically it amazes me that everyone is
wishing for something that already exists!

(prepared to be down-voted for liking flash)

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LostInTheWoods
The answer is Yes. The real question is 'when?'. My guess is it will take some
time before Flash and its competitors finally join the dinosaurs. It will be
slowed down by html5 adoption and by the need for tools/libraries that take
canvas to the level of what flash can do today.

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zokier
Does HTML5 have authoring tools comparable to Flash? There is your answer

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TweedHeads
Yes, it is called a text editor.

html, css, js, canvas, svg, xml, etc. all can be authored easily with a basic
text editor.

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redcap
I'm sure that html,etc can be _written_ with a basic text editor, but I'm not
convinced that's the easiest way to get things done.

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diN0bot
really. why?

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kqr2
Flexbuilder (now Flashbuilder) is nice because you can easily switch between
the source code and design/layout view. It also takes care of all the build
dependencies.

For pure programmers this isn't a big deal but for someone who is more design
oriented, it's a lot easier.

~~~
tjmc
I think Flex trades off user experience to make developers' lives easier
though. That's never the right choice IMHO.

Every Flex app I've seen, no matter how simple, starts with a "Loading" popup.
Flex apps also notoriously overreach by reimplementing everything in Flash
rather than use HTML where appropriate. It's great to have good tools, but
they should never produce an inferior product.

~~~
poppysan
That's not the right choice for a non-visual programmer maybe. But its
popularity is partially due to it being designer friendly.

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joezydeco
This line really bugged me:

"Google may also face some touchy decisions. For example, its YouTube
subsidiary uses Flash for its video, but the inclusion of HTML 5 capabilities
in browsers might cause YouTube to rethink that decision, notes Fette. "It's a
cost/benefit analysis that they'd need to make."

I know Yahoo! doesn't like to drink the Google koolaid, but they should have
at least paid attention to the fact that Google has been converting the video
on YouTube from FLV to H.264 for some time now. They launched it alongside
iPhone (no flash player there, remember?)

If HTML5 got enough momentum, you'd see the FLV content on YouTube disappear
overnight.

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poppysan
Actually since flash player 9, flv's have supported H.264 video.

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joezydeco
Very true, and something I realized I didn't mention. But I think that shows
Adobe is hedging it's bet on FLV and the ON2 codec.

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dimarco
Silverlight might not make it. Flash will be fine. The Flex + AIR combination
is pretty solid, and I'm looking forward what we[my company] can do with AIR
once we get our application rewritten in Flex.

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taitems
Radio, the death of newspapers? Television, the death of radio? Internet TV,
the death of television? Silverlight, the death of flash? HTML 5, the death of
flash AND silverlight?

This reads like a TechCrunch headline.

~~~
derefr
Have there ever been any media that _have_ died?

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taitems
telegram?

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Retric
Telegram as media... Encoding messages to be transmitted point-to-point long
distances over copper wire. If anything it just evolved telegram > ticker tape
> computer networks. Signal fires > road flares. Smoke signal's > Rescue
flares given to pilots etc.

Protocol's might die (Apple Talk, Analog TV), but technology's tend to just
find a niche.

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abstractbill
Not unless it gives me access to the user's webcam (but I'd love to see it
happen).

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radley
_cough_ : <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=661026>

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Oompa
Maybe if we ever end up using it.

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cookiecaper
No, IE will not support it for many more years, making any real-world
deployment impractical.

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ideamonk
Yaay!

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TweedHeads
Canvas will make a dent

SVG will finish it

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bvttf
Man, fuck silverlight, Microsoft should kill flash by pushing HTML5. It's not
like they need to gain much marketshare, just not-lose it.

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bbsabelli
Silverlight allows .Net developers to target a Rich web interface from Visual
Studio. If you program in windows, you'll naturally choose Silverlight. If you
want to develop using open standards, you'll choose html 5. Flash will be
gone.

~~~
poppysan
Why do you assume programming in windows == microsoft affinity. Im a windows
man and am openly anti silverlight. I am actually amazed its survived this
long...

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bbsabelli
Reasons?

