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March 15, 2008
Flex is The Web!?
Flex is The Web!? I learned something new yesterday, then later had a very strange chain of thought. I already knew the Adobe Flash Lite runtime has been extremely successful as a standalone application viewer on mobile devices. I also knew that an increasing number of devices were also using it for their native interface. But what I didn't know, and what that DevNet PDF above shows, is that Adobe Flash Lite 3 can also be used as a browser plugin for a mobile browser. Three ways to use it, and the last makes "Mobile Web" a practical reality. The Nokia Internet Tablet was the first device I saw that solved this "Flash within a mobile browser" problem, and the argument "but it can't play Flash!" has been one of the biggest knocks against Apple's iPhone. Anyway, Flash Lite 3 can run inside a mobile browser, that's the part I should have known, but didn't -- you can use FL3 as a standalone shell, a UI layer, or browser plugin. But now comes the "strange chain of thought", once I started thinking about the recent ruckus over iPhone capabilities. Assuming the reporting was accurate (I haven't seen a transcript, but have seen other meeting participants raise questions), then I had guessed that the reason Adobe Flash Lite was "not suited" to the iPhone was because it couldn't offer "mobile web", and would not help the browser render the world's existing webpages. But it seems it can! Adobe Flash Lite 3 does function as a regular plugin to mobile browsers, just as in the laptop surfing model. So what else could make it "need something much better than the current Flash player that Adobe makes for cellphones"? The next big difference is ActionScript 3, used by Adobe Flex 2 and Flex 3 -- Flash Lite 3 can support SWF8 files, and does not match the minimum requirement of Adobe Flash Player 9 for current Flex work. So is that it? The reason the iPhone doesn't render SWF is because of the lack of support for Flex applications? That would seem very strange to me, but that's where the evidence, at least from that one DowJones reporter, points. Strange thoughts aside, it's important that the mobile profile of Adobe Flash Player 8 does already run in web browsers... significant implications to that!
Nota bene to adbloggers: Please don't run with this, there's no story here, other than half-a-billion devices already with Flash Lite capabilities are now being joined by fully mobileweb-capable devices. They just can't play Flex 3 work yet, that's all, but we're working on it.... ;-)
Posted by JohnDowdell at March 15, 2008 11:17 AM
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Comments
Flex isn't the only reason people have moved to Player 9 and AS3. AS3 is *such* a better language than AS2. Anyone who's serious about developing real apps with ActionScript should have already moved to AS3. I'd give up on life if I had to do large-scale development back in AS2.
And also think of all the great 3D flash work that's going on right now, all of that is primarily Flash based, not Flex, but absolutely requires the new AVM to run fast enough and is all AS3 based.
So it's not that Flash Lite 3 simply can't run Flex apps, it's that it can't run AS3 apps, and that's a huge deal.
Posted by: Doug McCune at March 15, 2008 12:51 PM
If you were less quick in dimissing my comments as troll's actions, you would have understood that a while ago. By the way, FL3 is NOT Flash 8 compatible as it uses a much smaller subsets of Flash 8 features (both at drawing and coding side). Also, FL3 cannot be used as a UI layer on the phone itself, it is another Adobe product called Flash UI that does it and one capability do not necessarily include the other: the LG Prada, for example, uses Flash UI to render its UI but it is unable to play any Flash content (browser or standalone). Also, put away that Nokia tablet and try ANY of the half-billion devices with FlashLite 3 to navigate to ANY web site that uses Flash and tell me what you see. The mobile web is already without Flash.
Posted by: Emanuele Cipolloni at March 15, 2008 01:57 PM
You still can't expect from a mobile phone to run websites of the magnitude of most Flex website. No matter if these websites are using Ajax, Flash or SilverLight, you can't run an heavy RIA website on a mobile phone anyway.
I've seen the IPhone fail on a mediocre JavaScript, it can't run Flex even if it was written in Ajax.
Flash 8 support or even the Flash 8 subset of Flash Lite 3 would have been a lot more then nothing. It would support a lot of Flash content on the web including the full youtube or alike, and even some nice Flash games.
Posted by: guya at March 15, 2008 07:48 PM
I read somewhere that apple wants sites to run on the iPhone with a semi-perfect user experience, or NOT AT ALL. It makes sense: apart from banners and simple flex apps that would run fine, there's lots of campaign site out there that run smoothly on hardware purchased within 1.5 years. My own www.sandman.be would melt the iPhones ARM processor and drain its battery along the way...
Posted by: Sander at March 16, 2008 04:39 AM
Hi JD. From what I've heard, the N800 has a full Flash Player 9, it's not Flash Lite 3. The main problem for an iPhone is the low spec CPU. Imagine opening a website that instantly loads 5 CPU intensive ads... Even two ads could be enough to kill it. The N800 has a similar CPU and it's apparently no joy at all to use it unless you turn off the Flash plugin for ordinary surfing.
And - Safari on the iPhone is not really stable (even without flash).
J
Posted by: Jensa at March 16, 2008 02:36 PM
Hi JD,
FL3 is quite capable of running current web content. And its been great with Nokia's WRT Widgets and in S60 browser. Anyone want to test how it works on N95-8GB, try it via Nokia RDA service. http://forum.nokia.com/
Flex applications are too heavy, even for N8xx tablets. So, there always be need of a specific content targeted for mobile devices, and for small screens.
So, iPhone is just missing the Rich Mobile Apps party!
Maybe at this time, Apple just want developers to hookup with thier iPhone SDK :/
// chall3ng3r //
Posted by: chall3ng3r at March 16, 2008 05:35 PM