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Mike Champion wrote:
> As I understand it,serious "rich internet applications" are a lot
> easier to write in a portable way with Flash than DHTML, even though
> flash is proprietary and DHTML is standardized. ... On the other
> hand, the XML-based UI technologies such as XHTML+SVG+whatever seem to
> be losingthe mindshare race in a big way.
You need to take the long view and consider the long-term evolutionary
traits of technologies. Flash is dieing but it just doesn't know it yet:
* Knowledge of the internals of SVG spreads more quickly than that of
Flash because of the open file format, "view source", the thorough
documentation and the open source projects around it.
* SVG is making serious inroads into handheld devices. I believe will
eventually be as standard on newer devices as J2ME, Bluetooth and MMS
for newer phones.
* SVG is probably going to be integrated right into the core of some
GUIs like KDE and Gnome -- perhaps a more mainstream OS also
* As an open standard, you could even imagine a graphics vendor
building an API tailored for implementing SVG on top. Flash would never
get that. Flash will never be built into an operating system.
* I've observed that the GIS world is in love with SVG (early niches
are important as a technology gets a foothold)
* Adobe and Corel have a huge chunk of the graphics tool market and
they are both huge investors in SVG
* Canon is talking about putting SVG directly in printers
* SVG can be displayed in Java applications. Flash cannot.
* SVG can be much more easily integrated with XML data sources. That's
why it is a good match for the GML language used in mapping. There is a
whole new market opportunity opening up called "Smart Graphics." This is
why Corel cares about SVG.
> It's odd how Macromedia has quietly out-Microsofted Microsoft here :-)
> One wonders how they got away with it.
Macromedia has not out-Microsofted anybody. Microsoft can pull a
"Windows Media Viewer" on them whenever they feel like. Actually, SVG is
the only thing that would make it uncomfortable for them to do that.
Arguably, Macromedia is Microsoft's bulwark AGAINST SVG.
> Given that Macromedia (unlike, ahem, others that come to mind) don't
> seem to want to use their monopoly in one area to drag us kicking and
> screaming into their future monopolies in other areas, what besides
> the "political andreligious" objections are there to using Flash for
> rich internet apps? The main one that comes to mind is that I can
> sortof imagine DHTML+SVG scaling to a mobile platform or porting to a
> brand new OS that Macromedia hasn't gotten around to supporting yet.
> Others?
You're asking "why are open standrds better than proprietary ones?"
Paul Prescod
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