Posts Tagged ‘HTML5’

Why I remain skeptical of HTML5

Posted in Article, Documentation, HTML5 on July 20th, 2010 by Ian Ford – Be the first to comment

The chart above is just a sample of one of the reasons I remain skeptical of HTML5 going into the future. The table above lists support for new form attributes. It’s hardly the only table of this sort with this many obvious conflicts. As a developer, how the hell can I be expected to navigate this sort of information? Headaches will abound…

The Buzz on Free Assets

Posted in Article, Flash, HTML5 on May 19th, 2010 by Ian Ford – Be the first to comment

I received quite a response yesterday to my post offering a circular fill animation. First of all, I had a brief conversation with Frank Salim.

Frank: drawArc
?
is there a reason that isn’t an appropriate solution?
me: drawArc isn’t a function in flash.display.graphics
Frank: wacky
arcTo is a function on the canvas 2d context in html5
me: There is a curveTo function that takes 2 anchor points
Frank: are there any curve functions?
ok
me: but it’s not very intuitive
and this is easier
once the asset exists
Frank: can an asset contain code
me: sure
Frank: shrug
Yes, ultimately I could have come up with a programmatic solution to this problem. In the near future, for arguments sake, I suppose I will.
Another thread of conversation was running at the same time in (*gasp*) Google Buzz. Yes, some of us are using it. A coworker (Stephen Weber) ribbing me about how I was spending my time turned into a brief discussion on the “Flash vs. HTML5″ debate circulating right now. It expresses my views on the matter quite nicely.
Stephen Weber - Are you really this bored to be making 360 frame loading animations? I expect a new 3D physics engine or gaming engine. Or even better why not learn JS so HTML5 will be your next love.
Ian Ford - Ultimately this is more useful than a 3D physics engine in flash would be.
Stephen Weber - What about HTML5?
Ian Ford - I’m waiting to see what it will really be useful for. Video is a small niche that HTML5 doesn’t entirely fill (at least for our uses at Ignite), and I’m not sure there’s anything I’d like to develop that HTML5 is better suited for than flash.
Stephen Weber - I completely agree and they still have to decide on a video standard. I really am surprised about your thoughts though. I really thought you would be all for HTML5. I am really interested in the fact that Javascript takes a lot of resources to do something that is pretty easy to Flash (there are various examples of this). There is definitely a push against Flash out there right now. I am starting to think it would be important for our group to explore other technologies in case Flash starts getting less popular (I doubt this will happen).
Ian Ford - I support a universal standard for markup and layout adopted by all browsers, implemented to the same standards, with support for dynamic content and rich media, hopefully released on an open platform.

HTML5 would like to be that. If it ends up doing so, I’ll be a big supporter.

Stephen Weber - Ditto. Standards help developers make better more universal products.
Ian Ford - Developers should flex their influence and support standards. We shouldn’t put our resources into draconian platforms. We should vote with our fingertips, as it were.
Stephen Weber - How does that go along with your development in Flash?
Ian Ford - Flash is already a great approximation of what I want in a platform. Its wide penetration makes it a de facto standard. I am confident that when I develop in Flash, everyone who sees the final product can see it in the same way. This is something developers have never been able to confidently say about HTML+CSS+JS, and unless some real consensus is reached amongst browser vendors the problem will persist into HTML5 as well.

While it may not be completely open, those aspects of it which are closed allow the platform to grow rapidly (as it has) without waiting for the consent of larger bodies and opposing forces.

Stephen Weber - Nicely put.

Boredom and Disinterest

Posted in Links on April 20th, 2010 by Ian Ford – Be the first to comment

Matt Kenefick over at Big Spaceship Labs posted a thoughtful, level-headed examination of the debate on the future of Flash considered against the emerging “threat” of HTML5. This is one of the better articles I’ve read on the matter.