What You Need To Know About Flash-Based Sites
Flash-based sites have been a craze since the past few years, and as Macro media compiles more and more great characteristics into Flash, we can only predict there will be more and more flash sites around the Internet. Nevertheless, Flash based sites have been disputed to be bloated and unnecessary. Where exactly do we draw the line? Here’s a simple breakdown.
The good:
Interactivity
Flash’s Action script opens up a vast field of possibilities. Programmers and designers have used Flash to create interactive features ranging from very lively feedback forms to engaging Flash-based games. This whole novel level of interactivity will Always leave visitors coming back for more.
A standardized site
With Flash, you do not have to worry with reference to cross-browser compatibility. No more woes over how a sure CSS code displays diversely in Internet Explorer, Firefox and Opera. When you position your site elements in Flash, they’ll Regularly appear as they are as long as the user has Flash Player installed.
Better expression via animation
In Flash, one can make employ of its animating characteristics to convey a message in a much more effective and effective way. Flash is a lightweight alternative for animation because it is vector based (and hence smaller file sizes) as opposed to actual “movie files” that are raster based and hence much larger in size.
The bad and the ugly:
The Flash player
People have to download the Flash player in advance before they may view Flash movies, so by utilising Flash your visitor range will decrement considerably because not everybody will be willing to download the Flash player just to view your site. You’ll likewise have to put in additional work in redirecting the user to the Flash download page if he or she doesn’t have the player installed.
Site optimization
If your content was presented in Flash, most search engines won’t be able to index your content. And so, you would not be able to rank well in search engines and there will be less traffic heading to your site.
Loading time
Users have to wait longer than usual to load Flash content compared to regular text and images, and some visitors might just lose their patience and click the Back button. The longer your Flash takes to load, the more you menace losing visitors.
The best way to go is to utilise Flash only when you absolutely need the interactivity and motion that comes with it. Otherwise, use a combination of Flash and HTML or utilise pure text if your site is purely to present simple textual and graphical information.