© 2010 Adobe Systems Incorporated. All rights reserved. Used With permission, mLearnCon, June 15, 2010Adobe, the Adobe logo, Adobe AIR, the Adobe AIR logo, the Adobe PDF logo, AIR, ColdFusion, ColdFusion Builder, Flash, Flash Builder, the Flash logo, Flex, LiveCycle, and Reader are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Adobe Systems Incorporated in the United States and/or other countries.

Why I Stand With (Adobe) Flash

Ellen WagnerSage Road Solutions LLC

June 15, 2010

Do You Know What Flash Is?

“It's a serious question. During the past few months, volumes and volumes have been written about Flash. It's dead. It's dying. It's lazy, buggy and bloated. It's everywhere. It's efficient, it makes the web work. It's ubiquitous. It creates rich, engaging digital experience. It is going to drive the knowledge commerce economy. It's proprietary. It’s mostly open. It is irrelevant. In its future iterations, it's where the mobile Web is headed.”

http://elearningroadtrip.typepad.com/elearning_roadtrip/2010/05/flash-primer-for-non-techies.html

The Many Faces of Flash

• It's a file format. Most commonly known as SWF. Like PDF for web content. • It's a free media player available on the web. You need it to view SWF

files - movies, video, animations. Comes in two forms: Flash Player and AIR.

• It provides a way to share animations, interactive content and video on the web.

• It's a web animation scripting software, known by the name of Flash Professional.

• It provides a Flash-based path for creating Rich Internet Applications (RIAs)

• It's a published web specification. • It's the basis of most non-technical authoring for rapid elearning.• It’s the foundation for much of the learning content developed for use

over the Web.

SWFs have defined eLearning (Almost as much as LMSs have)

• “Flash equals SWF”• Many rapid elearning tools produce SWF files. In fact, there

are so many SWF tools that there are entire websitesdedicated to sharing information about them.

• A 2008 survey of Flash tools sponsored by Adobe and conducted by the eLearning Guild showed that 52% of all Flash tools do NOT come from Adobe.

• Adobe has a lot of Flash producing tools...Presenter, Captivate, Flash Professional, Connect, Flex to name a few. But there are lots of other SWF tools out there, as well. NOT from Adobe.

News Flash:To paraphrase Mark Twain…reports of Flash’s

death have been greatly exaggerated.

Beyond SWF desktop apps: Rich Internet Applications

Users who find a web site difficult to use will simply switch to one that isn’t.

“Rich Internet Applications: What’s the Business Case?” Info-Tech Research Group, December 2008http://www.adobe.com/enterprise/pdfs/infotech-ria-business-case.pdf

Data Changes Everything

Phil Ice, 2010

http://educomm2010.sched.org/event/a1248128f71ab444a4476052c20f943d

Rich Internet Applications - RIAs

• Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) enable the creation of user experience (UX) that is more responsive and engaging than those found in traditional web applications

• RIAs span a range of technology alternatives: Flex, Ajax, Silverlight

• RIAs are based on the premise that a rich productive user experience can be achieved using only standards based technologies built into a modern browser

9

Common use cases for RIAs

Customer self-service applications• Intuitive, guided self-service applications lower

costs, increase visibility and use, increase overall customer satisfaction

• Guided selling applications increase revenues, while reducing errors and returns driving down costs

Data visualization• Rich, interactive data visualization simplifies

complex data and leads to faster decision making• Dashboards enable real time pulse of critical

business metrics, uniting key data from disparate sources

• Reduce data entry time up to 40%

Browsers

The Flash PlatformThe Flash Platform leverages data from any back-end system and

exposes it in a rich, easy to use user experience.

RESOURCE TIEREIS Databases Directories ECM

RepositoryMessageQueues SAP…

DESIGN &DEVELOPMENTTOOLS

HTTP/S, Sockets, AMF, RTMP,SOAP, WS*, SMTP, REST, …

Flash Catalyst

FlashProfessional

Flash Builder

Creative Suite

3rd PartyServices

SERVICES TIER

CLIENT APPLICATION TIER

AIRFlash Player

Flex Framework

Flash PlatformServices

Flash Media Server Family

LiveCycle

The Flash Platform solution for building RIAsMultiscreenContent and Applications

Flex

ColdFusion

Flash Media Server Family

Flash PlatformServices

AIR

Flash Player

Flash Builder

FlashCatalyst

FlashProfessional

Creative Suite Analytics &Optimization

FLA

SH

PLA

TFO

RM

TOOLS FRAMEWORK CLIENTSSERVICESSERVERS

LiveCycle

http://www.adobe.com/flashplatform

The Flash Platform is open and reliable

“.. Gartner has found that it [Adobe] is more heavily involved in a wide range of open-source initiatives than most of its industry contemporaries.”

Gartner, June 2009

The Flash Player - world’s most pervasive software

of Internet-connected PCs worldwide have Flash Player installed

of top 20 smart phones will support Flash Player this year

develop using the Flash Platform

of Alexa 100 top websites use Flash Player

of web games are delivered using Flash Player

penetration rate in enterprises -Forrester

of enterprise professionals will seek Flash Platform development skills in 2010 – Society of Digital Agencies

Adobe AIR delivers RIAs outside the browser

AIR runtime installations

AIR SDK installations

Installations of Adobe AIR within one year of release

Applications in the Adobe AIR Marketplace

Supported by communities, programs, partners

ADOBE OPEN SOURCE (opensource.adobe.com)

CAIRNGORM

Frameworks

Performance and load testing

Tooling plug-ins

Pre-built components

Product extensions, functions and code

1,000+ global and regional system integrators, ISVs, and VARs

52 Adobe Agency Partners, including the top digital agencies

1,100+ training partners

More than 70 Open Screen Project members

337 User Groups worldwide

PARTNERS PROGRAMSTECHNOLOGIES COMMUNITIES

3.5 million developers

150+ supporting technologies to help in application and project development

Adobe provides optimized Flash Player technology to Google

• Increases accuracy of web search results• Enables top search engines to understand

what's inside of RIAs and other rich web content created with Adobe Flash technology and add that relevance back to the HTML page

• Works with all existing SWF content, across all versions

• Adobe provides techniques for building highly searchable RIAs on the Flash Platform to developers

Adobe provides optimized Flash Player technology to Google for enhanced search engine indexing

Open Screen Project• Open Screen Project was announced May 1, 2008. Many

industry leading companies want to reliably deliver rich Web and video experiences live and on-demand across a variety of devices.

• Adobe has opened access to Adobe Flash technology, accelerating the deployment of content and rich Internet applications (RIAs), including:– Removing restrictions on use of the SWF and FLV/F4V

specifications.– Publishing the device porting layer APIs for Adobe Flash Player– Publishing the Adobe Flash® Cast™ protocol and the AMF

protocol for robust data services– Removing licensing fees - making future releases of Adobe Flash

Player and Adobe AIR for devices free

Open Screen Project Partners• Adobe

AMDAntena 3Atlantic RecordsARMBBCBurda Digital SystemsCELLChunghwa TelecomCiscoComcastCondé NastDaumDisney Interactive Media GroupEPIX

• FOX Mobile GroupFreescale SemiconductorGoogleHTCImagination Technologies IntelLG ElectronicsLionsgateMarvellMIPS TechnologiesMotorolaMovialMTV NetworksNBC UniversalNokia

Open Screen Project Partners • NTT DOCOMO

NVIDIAOpenPeakOpenTVPalmParamountPBSQualcommQNX Software SystemsResearch in MotionRTL InteractiveSagemcomSamsungSonic Solutions

• Sony EricssonST-EricssonSTMicroelectronicsSTERN Symbian FoundationTeleca Texas InstrumentsThe New York TimesTomorrow Focus TechnologiesToshibaVerizon WirelessVizioWind RiverZiiLABS

HTML5

• HTML5 is being developed as the next major revision of HTML (HyperText Markup Language), the core markup language of the World Wide Web.

• HTML5 is the proposed next standard for HTML 4.01, XHTML 1.0 and DOM Level 2 HTML.

• It aims to reduce the need for proprietary plug-in-based rich internet application (RIA) technologies such as Adobe Flash, Microsoft Silverlight, Apache Pivot, and Sun JavaFX.

• But people who don't want to program are going to want tools to build HTML5 programs and apps.

The Flash Platform and HTML5

Adobe does and will continue to support HTML– The Flash Platform has integrated seamlessly with HTML for 14 years, and that won’t change– AIR 2.0 (desktop) includes support for HTML5– Adobe is committed to supporting HTML5 in its leading Web development tools

The Flash Platform delivers cross-platform, cross-browser, cross-device consistency– HTML5 implementations will differ and hinder content adoption of rich features, including video tag

support– No consistency in codec support for video is yet visible

Adobe offers best-in-class tool chain used by 3.5 million designers and developers– HTML5 will require and benefit from Adobe’s investment in breadth of tooling

Rapid update cycles enable Flash innovations to reach ubiquity in less than 1 year– Flash will continue to lead in innovation, much faster than HTML and browsers*“Does HTML 5 Herald The End Of RIA Plug-Ins? Not Really,” Forrester Research, Inc., April, 2010

“HTML 5 and RIA platforms will be complementary technologies, and enterprise development shops will need to invest in both approaches to deliver expressive applications that combine reach and richness.”*

-Forrester

http://www.apple.com/html5/

ouou

http://www.flashlab.com/html5/

Quotes from Adobe Flashlab

“HTML5 compared to Flash is like a hat compared to an umbrella. They can be used together, but a hat won't replace an umbrella.

“In May 2010, 0.86% of all online users use an iPhone or iPad (iOS). “In May 2010, 97.00% of all online users have the Flash Player 10 installed. “In May 2010, 87.00% of all online users CAN'T see HTML5 video h.264. “Speedtests show Flash Player 10.1 outperforms HTML5 “With these figures in mind, does it make sense to leave Flash and jump

back in time with HTML5?”

http://www.flashlab.com/html5/

Before You Get Too Twisted about HTML5…

“Just as AJAX and Web 2.0 became widely misused shorthand for "next generation" web development in the mid-2000s, HTML5 is now becoming the next overloaded term."

Michael Mullany, Ext JS

Thanks for your Attention!!

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

ellen@sageroadsolutions.com+1.707.933.8471

www.sageroadsolutions.comSkype: ellenwagner1

www.twitter.com/edwsonomawww.elearningroadtrip.typepad.com