

Adobe CTO Kevin Lynch: We're going to make the best tools in the world for HTML5 - coderdude
http://techcrunch.com/2010/05/05/adobe-cto-kevin-lynch-were-going-to-make-the-best-tools-in-the-world-for-html5/

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davidedicillo
> We’re going to make great tooling for HTML5. We’re going to make the best
> tools in the world for HTML 5.

This is a good news. No shipping day: not really a good news, if we are lucky
we'll see it with CS7

> We’re focusing on everybody else. There’s a huge wave of innovation, there’s
> going to be a wide range of devices.

I think it would be fair to say that smartphones have been around for at least
5 years. I can't recall to see a huge wave of phones using Flash in a decent
way

> Regarding the prototype tablet that has been shown off at Web 2.0, there are
> a bunch of manufacturers building devices with those guts.

Prototype =! successful product. We'll revisit this statement when those
manufactures will ship a million of those devices in 28 days.

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raganwald
Quote:

 _It’s not about HTML 5 vs Flash. They’re mutually beneficial. The more
important question is the freedom of choice on the web..._

 _Look at the iPhone helicopter we just saw — why should I only be able to use
an iPhone for that? Why can’t you do that with any phone? If you look at
what’s going on now, it’s like railroads in the 1800′s. People were using
different gauged rails. Your cars would literally not run on those rails.
That’s counter to the web. The ‘rails’ now are companies forcing people to
write for a particular OS, which has a high cost to switch._

Translation:

 _We will lower the cost to switch phones by moving the switching cost out of
the hardware and into the tooling. Then we will benefit because you will need
to buy our tools to write applications and you won't be able to switch tools._

Adobe _will_ make all the tracks the same gauge, but you won't be able to
manufacture a locomotive without their tools.

p.s. I upmodded this post because it's important to hear what they have to
say, not because I support what they're saying.

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not_an_alien
Funny, because you're able to create SWF content using only free, open source
software, including their own compiler. I don't believe your point holds. Do
you ever do any Flash work?

~~~
raganwald
The same could be said of the CLR, and there have been efforts like Mono to
replicate it independently of Microsoft. Nevertheless, in practice Microsoft
control the .NET platform and the CLR. Like any other platform, they can
control what underlying features of the OS or hardware it does or doesn't
support, and they can give their tooling an advantage over free, open source
tooling.

For example, what if they add a new set of op codes to the next release? Don't
their tools arrive in the marketplace with full support of the new op codes
while the free, open source tools must toil away to replicate them?

We can quibble about how much advantage their tools have in the marketplace,
but unlike the late Sun Microsystems they are very clear about being in the
business of making money from tools and commoditizing operating systems,
browsers, and hardware to support that business model.

~~~
DrSprout
Except Microsoft doesn't provide fully functional implementations of the CLR
for a reasonable set of platforms. Microsoft intentionally crippled the CLR on
non-Windows OSes, and continues to do so.

~~~
daeken
> Microsoft intentionally crippled the CLR on non-Windows OSes, and continues
> to do so.

Citation needed. I'm a heavy .NET user on both MS.NET and Mono, and I've never
seen this crippling you speak of.

~~~
DrSprout
I guess I lump .NET together with Silverlight, and the software I have to use
for work is currently unusable on Moonlight.

------
Terretta
_But look at the iPhone helicopter we just saw — why should I only be able to
use an iPhone for that? Why can’t you do that with any phone? If you look at
what’s going on now, it’s like railroads in the 1800′s. People were using
different gauged rails. Your cars would literally not run on those rails.
That’s counter to the web. The ‘rails’ now are companies forcing people to
write for a particular OS, which has a high cost to switch._

What a silly argument.

But look at the Quickbooks app we just saw. Why should I only be able to use
Windows for that? Why can't you do that with any OS? If you look at what’s
going on now, it’s like railroads in the 1800′s. People were using different
gauged rails. Your cars would literally not run on those rails. That’s counter
to personal computing. The ‘rails’ now are companies forcing people to write
for a particular OS, which has a high cost to switch.

(Footnote: QB for Mac is not the same product or feature set.)

But look at the SUV we just saw. Why should I only be able to use gasoline for
that? Why can't you run that with any fuel? If you look at what’s going on
now, it’s like railroads in the 1800′s. People were using different gauged
rails. Your cars would literally not run on those rails. That’s counter to the
open road. The ‘rails’ now are companies forcing car buyers to buy SUVs for a
particular fuel, which has a high cost to switch.

Etc.

This is the sort of thing markets decide.

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dman
Adobe needs to get over their "We will ship when its done" way of doing
things. They have a ~18 months - 24 month cycle to refresh products. I think
in todays day and age thats too long. Adobe tools do not currently fit in well
with either RoR, Django or jquery.

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reitzensteinm
They should start by making the best tools in the world for Flash development!
I personally use HaXe, it's significantly better than Flex, which is kind of
sickening because it's mainly written by one guy.

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sjsivak
I have been saying this since the first proclamation that HTML5 will kill
Flash. It will not kill Flash CS it will kill the Flash Player. Artist and
designers still need a tool to build content, Flash CS will continue to be
that tool.

~~~
not_an_alien
Really?

<http://www.craftymind.com/guimark2/>

So less features, slower adoption, and worse performance will kill the Flash
Player. Interesting.

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csmeder
So has Adobe just basically said: "Hey Steve Job's is right to not put Flash
on the iPad, the real solution for Adobe is to move into the future, its just
that we are lazy and greedy so we didn't want to do this, but Steve is forcing
us to be a better company!"

~~~
not_an_alien
No. They're saying there's a bunch of inane people who think Adobe is against
HTML5 and that HTML5 is the death of Flash, while it isn't.

~~~
csmeder
good counter point

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petervandijck
That is pretty good news.

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ahoyhere
Any seasoned Adobe user will know that when Adobe says "we'll make" they mean
"in the next 5 years" and "the best" they mean "moderately decent, will still
crash a lot, also be frustratingly inconsistent".

~~~
callmeed
Or it means "we'll acquire" ... like they did with Flash and other stuff

