The same problem. i couldn’ find an answer.

i want to know if Google can read and follow links that are inside of flash files in any way.

thank you, if someone pick this up.

Is there any chances of Google releasing a do and don’t or general tips needs to be followed while creating a flash based Web site?

I was under the impression that reading the text & links inside a Flash file wasn’t the biggest issue… Trying to determine context & prioritize the information found *in* the Flash file appeared to be a problem.

HTML/XHTML provides several options for modifying the “weight” of a particular chunk of text (, H tags, etc.), are Flash files still going to be at a disadvantage due to all of the extracted content being weighted evenly?

No I don’t work for Adobe in any way and never have. I have worked for a cross-platform GUI tools company before the web really took off, and I’ve built my own (quite nice) AJAX framework long before the term was coined, among other things, so I’m in a pretty good position to spot and understand this type of technology.

I certainly won’t be the last person to mention Flex to you, and I’m sure you will see the apps that people are building with it and what it can do in due time. It’s solid stuff, and fundamentally more powerful than anything that can be built on top of the lowest common denominator of HTML rendering engines, at least until native SVG support becomes the norm.

The last argument of yours I will shoot down is what you call your “original” argument. If Flash can’t handle these issues, why should you think that Flex can? This one is easy. If the win32 API can’t handle all our needs why would we need MFC? If AWT can’t do what we need, why do we need Swing? If HTML can’t handle all our needs, why do we need AJAX? Flex is library of widgets on top of Flash that make UI design easy, fast and efficient, on a consistent platform with deep and wide penetration and potentially good SEO characteristics.

Nice meeting you Adam. You made some good points. You can have the last word too; I’m outta here.

Many of the phone lines are still copper, and are not being upgraded…which pretty well eliminates DSL in those areas.
There is a lot of new home construction and development that Bell Canada refuses to prepare itself adequately for, and the first thing that goes in that situation is DSL.
Cable only works when there’s a group of people willing to use it (at least 5 or more). If not, you’ll have to pay the cable company $5000 for the initial install if you want it (that’s not an exaggerated figure either…that’s what Rogers wants to install any cable for a group of less than 5).
There are even spots in Canada where dialup doesn’t work (they’re very remote areas of northeastern Ontario, Quebec, parts of the Northwest Territories, and I think Nunavut as well) but they do exist.

II’d suggest to you that the statistical compilation provided is inaccurate at best. The Original Nick (at least he thinks he is) can shed some light on this subject as well. I’m not sure what the actual statistics are, but the speeds aren’t that high and the services aren’t that reliable. The only thing I can come up with that would increase the average is that there are spots (e.g. 151 Front Street West, Toronto…Google that address) that have an insane amount of bandwidth and, because the population here is relatively low, the average is that much easier to bring up.

But enough about the mess that is Canadian broadband.

You may never forgive Macromedia for killing HomeSite, but should that really have any impact on how you choose technologies for your clients? I don’t think they really care about your vendetta.

Oh, I fully expect they don’t care what I think. I fully expect they don’t care what you think, either. We’re each one person. We’re drops in the bucket.

And I wouldn’t use their destroying of HomeSite as the reason why I don’t find their technologies useful. I don’t find their technologies useful because…they’re useless. That’s it. There’s nothing more to it than that. If they’d help my customers, I’d use their stuff…and have.

Do I like using Flash? Hell no. I hate it. But I’ll use it.

As far as Flex is concerned, this goes back to one of my original arguments…why is it that we need an additional program to do things within Flash that cannot be included within Flash itself? And more importantly, what reason is there for faith that Macromediadobe has finally gotten anything right as far as the issues of SEO, accessibility, user-friendliness, ease of use from a developmental standpoint, and productivity are concerned? The former alone, assuming it’s not dealt with fully (and there’s reason to suspect it isn’t), suggests that Flex may not be the answer.

The other thing that’s interesting in all this is how many people are talking about Flex. No offense, dude, but you’re the only person I’ve ever seen that’s mentioned Flex by name…and how does anyone here know that you don’t work for Adobe or in some capacity with them? I’m not saying you do…but it’s certainly a possibility. Online shills aren’t exactly a new phenomenon these days.

Where are the apps that people are building with it? What does it really do? What doesn’t it do? Who’s using it for something practical? These are the questions that always go through my mind with any piece of technology, and most of the time, the technology fails…usually on the pragmatic question.

This is my whole problem with the idea of Flex…if Flash can’t handle these issues, why would I think that Flex can? And why would I spend $250 to do things that I can do with HTML for nothing?

If I had been more clear that I am talking about Flex running in the Flash VM, not Flash the graphic design program, many of your other arguments would have whithered away.

#1) with that mindset, we would all be using ftp, and nobody would ever write software that didn’t work on Windows.

#2) Firefox is taking up 160Mb on my machine right now, and I run FlashBlocker. A complex Flex app may weigh in at a hefty 1Mb before optimization. But that’s only 0.5 seconds of download time for the median American user (1.9Mb/sec speedmatters.org) And actually your beautiful country has 5x higher download speeds than the US; give your countrymen some credit! Again this is without optimization and download speeds are rising fast, and the download only happens once. Then you get all the interactivity and speed advantages of RIA, even more so than AJAX because Flex RemoteObject uses a binary format, not that it should matter that much.

#3) I’m not sure why you think the Flash VM is less installable than a browser. If you’re just talking about some very large corporate environments, I agree.

#4) Flex is very easy to pick up for anyone with a programming background, and it is very well documented.

#5) Flex again wins here. It is one of the most logical and consistent UI frameworks ever with no cross-platform concerns, unlike HTML and certainly your favorite AJAX kit. It’s true though that transitions don’t always behave the way you want the first time.

#6) of course Flex can allow for reusable code, even dynamically linked if you like.

#7 you didn’t mention SEO, the original thread of the conversation. IF Adobe really has made these improvements, and I’m not sure they have, Flex will be a serious technology for web apps.

And your overarching argument of “Why don’t we see more sites built if Flash?” is confounded with the fact that all those websites were built in the past before Flex/SEO. Oh and also, Flex actually works, and it works well. FlexBuilder can use some touch up, but I’ve found it to be generally reliable and helpful environment. If I leave it up full-time it will crash for no apparent reason about once every week or two. This is probably due to the FlexBuilder plugin of Eclipse and not the underlying Eclipse config itself. Eclipse itself has a bit of a learning curve if you’re not familiar with it. It is extremely popular though so many people have made it over the hump.

You may never forgive Macromedia for killing HomeSite, but should that really have any impact on how you choose technologies for your clients? I don’t think they really care about your vendetta.

Believe it or not, I am totally independent and this is my view, however unpopular it may be with holy warriors.