Web application engineer, addicted angler and computer science student

I think, I finally found an answer to the question, why one should use Flash instead of HTML5: Sockets
Update: Nevermind. HTML5 also supports websockets. Darn, is there anything that HTML5 can’t do??

Newer Flash Player versions allow developers to open sockets, which is not possible using pure HTML5/JavaScript in the browser.

Thus, for example, it would not be possible to create a FTP client without Flash or a backend system since such an attempt would require one to open a socket in order to implement the FTP protocol.

The golem.de guys had an interview with Adrian Ludwig, Flash Group Manager at Adobe Systems, and asked him what’s the benefit of the Flash platform compared to HTML5 and if Flash would ever come to the iPhone.

The answers are quite interesting.
After watching the video, I gotta say that Ludwig didn’t really have an answer to the question, what the benefit of Flash is (compared to HTML5). He mumbled something about “content-protection” (whatever he means by that), fast updating cycles (within 12 months?) and features which won’t be available even in newer versions of HTML (.. which would be?).

As much as I like to code using the Flex API, I think that the Flash Player has no future. It’s slow and has some serious security issues which makes it vulnerable for various exploits.

The only thing why Flash could be currently useful would be webcam support, but as far as I know, this feature has already been suggested for further versions of HTML.

So, at the moment I think that I’d more go for GWT instead of the Flash Builder to create Rich Internet Applications of any kind.

I am a passionate RIA developer, especially if it comes up to using Adobe’s Flex SDK. It’s so easy to use and one can built great web applications in no time.
The best thing I always liked (and still do) is that everything comes “from one hand”. Which means, that the whole API is made by Adobe and most common use-cases are already build-in.
Ever tried to create a div box with rounded corners and shadows just with html and css? Good luck. Using the Flash Builder, it’s just two clicks and you’re done. In my opinion, this makes Flex a development environment which is very consistent and easy to handle, unlike pure JavaScript-solutions that often rely on multiple 3rd-party frameworks.

Since I started coding RIA applications, I was always wondering what would the future look like? Would Flash-based apps conquer the web or will JavaScript (with a little help from Google) be the next step for the evolution of the www?
To be honest, I haven’t really found an answer yet.

As good as Flex can be used to efficiently write rich internet applications, so bad is its reputation on “real” programmers like C/C++, Java developers and even Webengineers that completely focus on pure JavaScript solutions not only cause of Flash’s serious security issues. Adobe seems to have both hands busy with fixing security holes while only a minority of the internet users runs the updaters frequently enough to be safe from a wide range of potential attacks on the flash plugin.

However, the one big advantage of Flash, which would be fast and easy video playback, seems to be melting down since W3C’s announcement that html5 will support real movie embedding and playback. I can already foresee how Youtube will be completely flash-free one day.

So, what if it is not necessary anymore to use Flash to embed a little video snipped on your favourite website? What is the reason for web developers to decide for the Flex framework instead of trying a pure JavaScript solution?

Yesterday, something funny came to my mind. I was thinking about Java and how great it failed to reach the desktop while becoming the standard technology if it comes up to web backends.
I find it funny, if you compare Java and Flash. Both rely on an own virtual machine that makes applications written for these framworks always look and behave the same, no matter which operating system you use.
You could also compare Javascript with C/C++ pretty much the same way. If you want to code applications in C, you have to keep many platform-specific things in mind. It’s pretty much the same with JavaScript. If you finished developing your brand new killer website, noone’s gonna say that it will work well in the Internet Explorer 6, only cause you tested it in Firefox 3.5. Even other “w3c-compatible” browsers like Safari, Opera or Chrome might give you a headache as a webengineer. To avoid these problems, most people rely on frameworks like Dojo, GWT and/or jQuery but I’d lie if I said that these would guarantee a clean and fluent development of web applications without any problems. On top of this, one needs to learn how to handle these frameworks, which is very often a pain in the a**.

Since the release of the sourcecode of Google’s Chrome OS, I can finally see how web applications could start conquering over classic desktop applications and I’m really exited about it.

Just imagine, you’d had to write an app for Chrome OS, like let’s say an online graphic editor like Photoshop, but on the web. Why’d you choose Ajax over Flash? Remember that using the Flex framework will speed up the development process a lot since so many components already work out of the box like menu-bars, for instance.

I hope Flash will do better here than Java did in the desktop world and become the cross-platform development enviroment for Chrome OS but without the drawbacks of Java like a slow loading time and low application performance.

Über heise.de bin ich auf riastats.com gelandet, wo man über eine FLEX-Anwendung Statistiken über die Verbreitung von Technologien zur Entwicklung von Rich Internet Applications einsehen kann.

Mich persönlich freut es sehr, dass Flash weiterhin die Nase vor Microsoft’s Silverlight und JavaFX hat, denn die Verbreitung und Erfahrung, die in Adobe’s Platform steckt ist meiner Meinung nach einfach unbezahlbar, während die Konkurenzprodukte von M$ und Sun definitiv (noch) ihre Kinderkrankheiten haben, wenn man das überhaupt noch so bezeichnen kann. Silverlight gibt es inzwischen schon in Version 2 und trotzdem ist die Verbreitung hier eher gering. Interessant dabei: Die Verbreitung des Silverlight Plugins ist bei Firefox-Browsern deutlich größer als beim Internet Explorer. Das deutet darauf hin, dass zur Zeit (noch) viele Entwickler, aber eher wenige Endbenutzer diese Technologie nutzen. Ändern könnte sich dies mit dem neuen Betriebssystem Windows7, dem ich durchaus zutrauen würde, ein Erfolg zu werden. Falls also Microsoft das Silverlight-Plugin bereits im Internet Explorer 8 mitliefert, wird Adobe sicherlich schwer Konkurrenz bekommen.

Maßlos enttäuscht bin ich allerdings von JavaFX. Wie kann man nur eine so weit verbreitete Platform, wie die Java Laufzeitumgebung und den so genialen Aufbau der Java-API dermaßen verhunzen?

• In JavaFX wird nicht in Java, sondern in einer eigenen Script-Sprache programmiert. Ich habe mir mal ein paar Zeilen davon angesehen und ganz ehrlich: Hübsch ist was anderes.
• JavaFX Anwendungen laden unglaublich langsam. Ich wollte mir eben ein paar Demos von Sun’s Webseite anschauen. Ich hab’s irgendwann aufgegeben, nachdem der Ladevorgang länger als eine Minute dauerte.
• Embedded JavaFX Applications nerven Benutzer oft, ein Zertifikat zu akzeptieren. Mag sein, dass das sinnvoll ist, aber es nervt.

Aus diesem Gründen, bin ich ganz froh, möglichst früh auf den FLEX-Zug aufgesprungen zu sein. Sowohl Silverlight, als auch JavaFX stellen, trotz der Macken von Flash, zur Zeit (Meiner Meinung nach) keine Konkurrenz für Adobe’s RIA-Platform dar. Einzig OpenLaszlo könnte hier noch was reissen. Allerdings werde ich das Gefühl nicht los, dass die Laszlo-Jungs hier zu sehr die “guten Jedi-Ritter” im Universum der RIA-Entwickler darstellen und aufgrund der geringen Verbreitung von OL auch dieses schöne OpenSource-Projekt in der Versenkung verschwindet.

Since I started developing FLEX applications, I continously had problems with the dataGrid component.

First, I got into trouble trying to sort formated date strings, which can’t be handled by the dataGrid’s default sorting algorithm so easily, especially if it comes up to (German) date formats. While searching for a solution, I found the dataGridSortable component which extends the dataGrid class and provides a method to define own search functions.

In later development I had to face the necessarity of styling the content of specific rows bold. The problem here was that the function setPropertyAt(rowNum:int, style:String) was deprecated. I still don’t get the idea why Adobe took out this method since it exactly did what I wanted.

However, I had to find a workaround somehow since dataGrid also does not offer anything that look like getRow(number:int) and return me a damn row object to style it via setStyle(…).

After not getting any further with google, I started to make a topic on adobe’s developer forum where some members, especially Amy Blankenship (Thanks again for the help!), helped me out and suggested using her dataGrid_withStyle component. The problem here was that I already had a component which extended dataGrid, so we came up with the idea of simply let Amy’s dataGrid_withStyle component extend the dataGridSortable and tadaa, it worked.

So, for all of you who seek for a sort- and styleable dataGrid component for FLEX, this little example might help you:

Download the example and the source files for the component here.

Wer sich für das Thema Rich Internet Applications interessiert wird an der Thematik “Was ist besser??” (Die freie Entwicklungsumgebung OpenLaszlo oder die proprietäre Lösung FLEX von Adobe) nicht drumrumkommen.

Zu diesem Thema habe ich einen kleinen Artikel auf richability.com geschrieben.

Dabei geht es insbesondere um die Gemeinsamkeiten und Unterschiede zwischen den beiden Technologien. Am Ende gebe ich noch eine Empfehlung für Unentschlossene raus:

In the time of new uprising technologies to create so called Rich Internet Applications (RIA’s), where the weapon of choice is still Flash, the tools and techniques have changed. The “old” Flash Builder IDE is still a nice application to create any kind of RIA’s but hands down: Where designers get a very usable toolkit for creating nice Userinterfaces, the “real” programmer wants more and crys for technologies like FLEX or OpenLaszlo ..mehr

So, mein Paper ist fertig.

Ich würde mich freuen, wenn das jemand lesen und reviewen würde, bevor ich das meinem Seminarleiter vor’n Latz knall