Re[4]: [Gnash-dev] Gnash extensions question

[Udo Giacomozzi]

Hello Martin,

Monday, November 27, 2006, 2:08:59 PM, you wrote:

>> Flash developers actually *concerned* because of Gnash. They fear
>> having different players will make development more difficult. With a
>> single Flash player one can be sure that a movie works everywhere.

MG> Right, so following that logic, the internet would be a better place
MG> if there were only Internet Explorer (or NCSA Mosaic) and no other
MG> browser had ever been written.

I know what you mean. But the answer might be: If HTML would have been
designed specifically for the Internet Explorer, then: maybe yes!

The point _is_ that we have some kind of responsibility to avoid a
situation like HTML. Unlike the Internet Explorer, the Flash player
renders everything correctly what has been designed in the IDE.
There's nothing like unknown CSS selectors, misinterpreted
definitions, standard deviations or non-standard HTML tags in Flash -
you get what you write.

So the concerns are not completely wrong. I'm just talking about
keeping this in mind.

It starts with simple little stupid things, like a fixed aspect ratio
and centered position for the player content. In some cases it can be
a _big_ problem if this is not correct. (just took this as an example,
not saying this is a high priority task).


MG> Anyway, you still need to test your movies on windows linux and mac
MG> and their enormously expensive embedded players if you want to improve
MG> the movie's visibility.

In theory this should not be necessary (just like a nice, simple web
page renders fine on all web browsers).


MG>   A professional would test on various different old versions of flash
MG> player as well, since I doubt that people running win3.1 *can* upgrade
MG> to the latest flash player (yes, they do, all over the world), and we

I don't believe there are much Flash developers targeting for win3.1
users :)
Normally one chooses the lowest SWF version he thinks has all
necessary features and configures it in the publish properties of the
file. You can be sure that it will work in that player and all higher
versions. Things changed in a newer player do not affect older files.


MG> remember the MacroMedia linux port lagging behind the latest whizzo
MG> one by a version or two for ages and ages. Given the dodginess and
MG> ever increasing resource-hungriness of most commercial program
MG> upgrades, some people may not *want* to upgrade.

Agree.


MG> My own experience with many different browsers led me to use simpler,
MG> faster HTML constructs that work absolutely everywhere as far as I
MG> know; I welcome the stimulus to Flash developers to do the same.

What makes most web pages break are complex design elements (layers,
nested tables, ...) that abuse the HTML format to create a fixed
layout. Flash however was specifically designed to look equal on each
player. There is a much different idea behind HTML and Flash.
Flash _invites_ the developer to create sophisticated animations. No
Flash developer has to think about "will it work on this or that
player". He thinks "does the specification allow me to do...".


MG> In fact, having gnash available for your existing flash dev platform
MG> makes it *more* likely that your flash movie will work on platforms
MG> that you cannot test.


Even better. It helps you find bugs earlier. :)

Udo