Reactive have noticed some websites coming to market that are primarily text based that have been developed entirely in Adobe Flash which led some of our team pose the question: Why would you do that, aren’t you creating a lot more work for yourself?As the Interaction Director at Reactive my first reaction is, 'why not?' For starters Flash works on all platforms in all browsers and will remain absolutely pixel perfect no matter what. As opposed to HTML/CSS sites which currently need to be tested, tweaked and retested in a minimum of 6 browsers across two operating systems. If you need more reasons see my entry: Tackling the thorny issues with Adobe Flash.

The example cited is http://www.pierinc.com/ a company that develops online applications using Adobe Flex and there in lies the primary reason for delivering their entire website in this manner: If you aren’t using the technology then you are going to have a tough time selling it to clients.With the latest release of Adobe Flex companies have the ability to quickly and efficiently deliver these applications on an enterprise level utilising the agile development model with a Flash front-end which will not have any of the issues prevalent in CSS.

Flex is a server side code based on xml which allows you to write and deploy flash based applications like pier in a very short timeframe. It is specifically designed for use with modular/component based systems/sites where you write the component; let's say the "news module" and then you just have to write something like this for your home page
Code for Pier site (very simplified):

This would grab the components and build them on the fly on the server and the deliver them to the client making it more efficient.

Find out more about Adobe Flex here

Yahoo maps using Flex

And the hard sell

The primary reasons Reactive does not utilise Flex is the current license cost of $20,000USD per CPU and the extensive use of component based development process which does deliver a more robust solution but the ramification is an increase in the time lines a decrease in flexibility and of course an increase on the bottom line.

The advantage of Flash sites in general however is that they can deliver a much more seamless user experience with a higher degree of feedback and a quicker delivery of specific requests, currently known as Rich Internet Applications. A couple of great examples developed by Reactive using Flash include, Global Corporate Challenge and Ferguson Plarre's Design-a-Cake.

With cManager, the new Reactive Content Management System (CMS), Web-Services and good use of Object Orientated coding practices we have developed a quick way of rolling out data driven flash websites.

Dan Oxnam, Interaction Director

Labels: Design and Usability, Technology