Flash or HTML?

purpleclouds said:
Hard to maintain? It is fully integratable with PHP, XML....it's as easy to keep updated as a normal HTML site is!

Google is quite able to read flash websites..

As has already been said, if you offer a HTML backup, which is seamless to the browser....what is the problem?

A little research goes a long way...
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I suggest a bit more research on the google thing

You clearly havent edited a flash site behind another designer without the original source files

Great - offering a html backup just means doing the job twice... oh, and then you have to do the CSS 3 times for all the browsers

Im not saying never use flash, it is a brilliant tool for what it does, but dont believe for a miniute that a flash site is as SEO friendly as even a totally unoptimised HTML page full of text
 
purpleclouds said:
To a 15 year old lad...that website will keep them entertained for minutes! :p A standard HTML site can't offer the same level of seamless animation and action that keeps youngsters busy. They are visual people. The would find a standard laid out website with nice little links here and there to be somewhat boring.
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This is absolutely spot on.
 
Richard King said:
I suggest a bit more research on the google thing

You clearly havent edited a flash site behind another designer without the original source files

Great - offering a html backup just means doing the job twice... oh, and then you have to do the CSS 3 times for all the browsers

Im not saying never use flash, it is a brilliant tool for what it does, but dont believe for a miniute that a flash site is as SEO friendly as even a totally unoptimised HTML page full of text
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You clearly don't know what a .as file is. Going from your response it sounds like the source files you deal with are .fla files.

As for creating CSS 3 times for different browsers, you clearly are not a competent web developer.

Frankly as long as the client is paying I don't care if I have to build two versions of the site or whatever. Of course if you were building your own site you might do things differently, but as has been said over again in this thread, its all about choosing the right tool for the problem. Innit bruv.
 
funnily enough, of you have a quick look at the SEO sites on the subject they all agree with me. They are talking about:

putting HTML content on the page the flash is embedded in

Matt CuTts (from google) says this:

"It is a good question. I think that we do a pretty good job of reading textual content. Now, stuff within Flash is binary and you can define it in terms of characters and strokes - so you can have things that look like normal text - but that are completely weird and are not really normal text. So it can be difficult to pull the text out a Flash file. I think we do pretty well. It used to be the case that we had our own, home-brew code to pull the text out of Flash, but I think that we have moved to the Search Engine SDK tool that Adobe/Macromedia offers. So, my hunch is that most of the search engines will standardize on using that Search Engine SDK tool to pull out the text. The easiest way to know whether you have textual content that can be read in a Flash file, is that you could always use that tool yourself and verify as well."

In other words, most pure flash sites will have minimal content that google can read

The question is: do you want minimal content that google can read, or maximum content?
 
KayJay said:
You clearly don't know what a .as file is. Going from your response it sounds like the source files you deal with are .fla files.

As for creating CSS 3 times for different browsers, you clearly are not a competent web developer.

Frankly as long as the client is paying I don't care if I have to build two versions of the site or whatever. Of course if you were building your own site you might do things differently, but as has been said over again in this thread, its all about choosing the right tool for the problem. Innit bruv.
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Don't assume anything. We work on all sorts of files day in day out. Most of my customers want to pay to have a site developed once, not twice
 
Richard King said:
funnily enough, of you have a quick look at the SEO sites on the subject they all agree with me. They are talking about:

putting HTML content on the page the flash is embedded in

Matt CuTts (from google) says this:

"It is a good question. I think that we do a pretty good job of reading textual content. Now, stuff within Flash is binary and you can define it in terms of characters and strokes - so you can have things that look like normal text - but that are completely weird and are not really normal text. So it can be difficult to pull the text out a Flash file. I think we do pretty well. It used to be the case that we had our own, home-brew code to pull the text out of Flash, but I think that we have moved to the Search Engine SDK tool that Adobe/Macromedia offers. So, my hunch is that most of the search engines will standardize on using that Search Engine SDK tool to pull out the text. The easiest way to know whether you have textual content that can be read in a Flash file, is that you could always use that tool yourself and verify as well."

In other words, most pure flash sites will have minimal content that google can read

The question is: do you want minimal content that google can read, or maximum content?
Click to expand...

You're quoting this completely out of context. He is talking about the text in a flash site and nothing else. He's not talking about fall back content, which you can have by using things like SWFObject. Fall back content provides exactly the same content but in a readable form for search engines.
 
Richard King said:
Don't assume anything. We work on all sorts of files day in day out. Most of my customers want to pay to have a site developed once, not twice
Click to expand...

If you do it correctly, it doesn't need to be developed twice :)
 
It's funny. A lot of the arguments against Flash are similar to the arguments people used to throw around for not using Javascript in a website.
 
KayJay said:
You're quoting this completely out of context. He is talking about the text in a flash site and nothing else. He's not talking about fall back content, which you can have by using things like SWFObject. Fall back content provides exactly the same content but in a readable form for search engines.
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Thats my point - while you and I may be able to produce fall back content, and xml files, and site maps to inject search engines into deep links.. it doesnt exactly help a typical photographer with a pretty, but invisible templated site

We can talk about the small minoritory of sites where extraordainary efforts are made untill the cows come home.. but the blunt reality is that most photographers that go for a flash site, have a site templated by the company hosting for them, and have little control over the stuff we are talking about

the second issue with fall back content is it is flying pretty close to the cloaking issue - that is presenting different content to a search engine, that what is presented to a user
 
Richard King said:
it doesnt exactly help a typical photographer with a pretty, but invisible templated site
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Actually that is a good point, as although I designed my portfolio Flash site to be as minimal as possible with text content as it is just to show off my images, it gets nowehere near as many search engine hits as my blog. In fact within about 3 months of starting my blog it got more hits than my portfolio site had in it's first two years lol
 
The purpose of my argument is to dispel the myths surrounding Flash. Frankly reading through your posts it appears that they only serve to reinforce those myths. If you know it to be true then why persist in facilitating those myths? I don't think things should be brushed under the carpet. If people don't want a Flash site then that decision should be based on truths, not myths. Wouldn't you agree?

My advice to photographers with little or no web development experience is to build in HTML, however, if you want a Flash website then you need to put the work in. If you don't want to put the work in then pay to get it done properly.

Frankly, if you want the images to be the focus then straight up HTML is all you need, in fact most of the folio sites I've build for photographers are in HTML. The only reason I'm doing my new site in Flash is to serve to purposes, to showcase my photography and to showcase my development skills... and maybe as a little project for myself :)
 
KayJay said:
It offers a tremendous amount, depending on your target audience. The problem with this thread is that everyone assumes, because of poor implementation, that Flash is rubbish and pointless.

I'll find you some great examples of well executed websites that offer something more.
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I'd be interested to see some examples as i'm yet to see a site constructed in flash that actually has anything useful added to it via flash.
 
the reason I still argue this one is that
1. in experience, people are not usually prepared to pay for the extra effort
2. the extra effort, at the moment, is pretty much a sticking plaster which attempts to resolve the fundamental issue - which is search engines struggle with flash files
3. the consensus in the industry is the SDK offered by Adobe is good news, but only a small step in the right direction
 
HTML is easier to master. For that reason I would stick to it. Flash is more complex and easier to get wrong - design wise too.

You can do a lot with HTML. Don't dismiss it as the poor relation.

But it's only a means to an end at the end of the day.

Graham
 
What about an XHTML site with Flash galleries? The best of both worlds.
 
Interesting debate, from my personal experience I find that "most" of the Flash orientated sites I visit can send my PC's CPU utilisation through to 100% and keep it there for up to 20-30 seconds rendering my PC almost unusable..........

I know my PC is "fairly ancient" in computing terms P4 2.2ghz 1.25gb ram, Windows XP - but it does seem strange that Flash and Javascript can slow it down so much, is this evidence of a badly designed Flash website?

For example, I can be browsing on eBay and as long as one of those annoying Flash based adverts is on the screen, my CPU hits 100%, just scroll down the page and once it disappears the CPU reverts back to normal levels ~ 10%.

So from my perspective HTML wins, but agree that a good Flash site can look very slick.

Slightly off topic, is there anyway I can disable all those flash adverts etc?
 
lostsoulal2 said:
Interesting debate, from my personal experience I find that "most" of the Flash orientated sites I visit can send my PC's CPU utilisation through to 100% and keep it there for up to 20-30 seconds rendering my PC almost unusable..........

I know my PC is "fairly ancient" in computing terms P4 2.2ghz 1.25gb ram, Windows XP - but it does seem strange that Flash and Javascript can slow it down so much, is this evidence of a badly designed Flash website?

For example, I can be browsing on eBay and as long as one of those annoying Flash based adverts is on the screen, my CPU hits 100%, just scroll down the page and once it disappears the CPU reverts back to normal levels ~ 10%.

So from my perspective HTML wins, but agree that a good Flash site can look very slick.

Slightly off topic, is there anyway I can disable all those flash adverts etc?
Click to expand...

That sounds like your browser and flash plugin may be having problems! Might be worth checking they're both fully up to date! I think there is a way of blocking flash content somewhere in the preferences...have a dig about :)
 
HTML with just a wee bit of flashy flash
 
I think you should just ask yourself this :

What can Flash offer me that HTML cannot?

The answer, particularly if you are just hosting images....is not a lot. HTML has come a long way since static table formatting :)
 
I agree with the above comment. There is a lot of stuff you can do with HTML these days and it's easier than ever to put a website design together using things like BlueprintCSS, jQuery and Scriptaculous. SlideshowPro is a great flash based Slideshow player that is fully content managed too.
 
Onomatopoeia
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Thanks and Welcome to Talk Photography

Unfiortuntely, several of the main websites I frequent are not supported or compatible with Firefox, so I tend to use IE and also Google Chrome.

I have tried Firefox in the past, but found it consumed more memory than IE or Google Chrome.................. but I will try the latest version again as all those Flash based adverts are a real pain. Perhaps I will have to run 2 browsers?

Thanks for the advice - appreciated.
 
Just to throw a firebrand in .... I thought HTML had been surpassed by XHTML and that XHTML is now the preferred SEO language .... please shoot me down if I'm wrong.

Just a quick one for my info, when stating width is it better to use a pixel count or a percentage count? Any reason why? For instance, if a page is 100 pixels wide for example, should I use <width= 900> or <width=90%> as the first will give a fixed pixel count regardless of the viewers monitor resolution and the second will automatically adjust. I've had this discusion with a couple of enthusiastic amateurs who have agreed with the use of % but I'm yet to meet a pro who uses it but they can't/won't explain why.
 
Flash is taking a bit of a beating in this thread :)


sheddy said:
Just a quick one for my info, when stating width is it better to use a pixel count or a percentage count?
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percentage.. makes the site more liquid to fit in any size window.. thats the way your supposed to do it

however i use fixed because i like to know exactly what people are seeing .. and I am a rebel hahaha
 
KIPAX said:
Flash is taking a bit of a beating in this thread :)




percentage.. makes the site more liquid to fit in any size window.. thats the way your supposed to do it

however i use fixed because i like to know exactly what people are seeing .. and I am a rebel hahaha
Click to expand...

There are arguments for and against. Fluid layouts against static layouts. I use percentages in Flash but in pure html websites I use pixels. In fact most of the time pixels, especially when the site has text. Trying to keep sentence lengths to 12-15 words per line can become complicated when using percentages. It all depends on how much control you want on a layout versus making the best use of screen real estate.
 
Flash has its place, some sites it works some site it better thrown in the bin, flash adverts are one of my pet hates, I agree with lostsoulal2, flash sends my pc throught the roof (P4 2.8ghz with the latest flash player), adblocker and no-script certainly help, kill some of the surrounding trash flash which helps get the cpu back to an acceptable level.

Now I maybe wrong here (correct me if I am) but as far as I know there are no 'Free' software for producing flash based content\pages you need Dreamweaver which cost a couple of arms and legs to prise it out of Adobe grubby hands. Yet for Java, php, ajax, and x\html editors are freely available which do an outstanding job of helping to produce the code for decent web pages.

Tim
 
I've had this discusion with a couple of enthusiastic amateurs who have agreed with the use of % but I'm yet to meet a pro who uses it but they can't/won't explain why.
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% vs fixed vs hybrid - is a facinating debate. But there is no right answer to it. there are passionate entrenched opinions, just like the DIV vs table debate

% is ok, but falls over spectacularly on very big high res screens, and very small screens

Fixed ensures that what is seen is the same on all screens, but can mean scroll bars on small screens, and loads of dead space on big screens

Hybrid is basically a mix of the two

There are a range of considerations - is the content being added fixed in size, is it varible in size, does the design need to be encapsulated in something else etc. etc

for most applications like stores, forums, cms systems, fixed is really useful at ensuring content subsequently added, lands where it is expected, and looks presentable and orderly. imagine the text in each post, 1 line long on a huge monitor at full res - totally impracticle and unreadable
 
To wade in myself...

Flash sites as in full flash I hate. Reasons as I touted in other threads are...

Generally coded by people who are maybe not as well versed in the latest Flash production concepts therefore:

: You cant copy and paste a URL from the address bar to a specific page
: Whole flash file has to load before you get anything including all the images for pages you dont want
: Doesnt work on most mobile devices - iPhone etc
: Runs slow as cr4p on modest PC's - eg: netbooks
: Depending on how built copy & paste and other things like right clicking to print etc dont work

There are others...

However, an HTML site with Flash bits I think is perfectly fine. Im redesigning my own site and will have Flash content but it will be HTML based.

Where Flash is wholely acceptable...

Entertainment sites for games, movies, music releases etc. The same kind of places you'd EXPECT music to start playing right away when you load it up.

In closing...

Web users are getting more ADD by the day, with super fast internet and MOST sites being HTML based they are used to a page loading in a snap. Splash pages (devils work), loading bars or slow to load pages just turn people off. There's plenty of everyone on the web now so if your photography website is taking 5 seconds to load up they can click the back button and find someone else.

My 2p

Full disclosure: I was a Flash developer from around 99-03 using Flash 4,5, MX etc for different things. Things have probably moved on leaps and bounds now but of the sites Ive stumbled across in the last year the above holds true.
 
HTML ... tilll bandwidths are all maximum you will loose business due to people unable to have the download times etc etc... happy medium would be to offer both on the site but this then means doing two sites price goes up unless you know what you are doing ... stick to HTML done well mixed with CSS and falsh animations and you have a winning site over any flash site
 
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