←back to thread

519 points cantdutchthis | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source
Show context
unleaded ◴[] No.44501635[source]
You can do a lot of impressive things with SVGs. Some examples from Wikipedia (no JS in any)

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9b/SMIL_mis... missile command clone

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/13/London_U... tube map

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/49/Rolling_... rolling shutter animation

replies(6): >>44501711 #>>44501713 #>>44502029 #>>44503152 #>>44503500 #>>44518683 #
leonidasv ◴[] No.44501713[source]
SVG started as an open competitor to Shockwave/Flash Player and also an application format for PDAs. It almost got networking support once.
replies(4): >>44501865 #>>44502636 #>>44503050 #>>44503397 #
echelon ◴[] No.44501865[source]
Too bad nothing has ever come close to replacing the SWF format.

You could pack so much into a single binary distributable media file. Games, videos, websites, infographics, tools, chat rooms.

SWF was brilliant and it should have thrived.

replies(3): >>44502006 #>>44502399 #>>44504652 #
unleaded ◴[] No.44502006[source]
absolutely. really is strange that you used to be able to download a music video in less than 2-3mb with lossless video quality, but now that's not really a thing anymore. I feel like if Adobe didn't get greedy and encourage its use for absolutely everything (and/or web standards got up to speed faster) people wouldn't wouldn't approach talking about Flash with the 10-foot pole they often do today (as a platform—not how everyone talks about how much they loved flash games)
replies(7): >>44502113 #>>44502857 #>>44502975 #>>44503523 #>>44504122 #>>44504735 #>>44514802 #
acdha ◴[] No.44504735[source]
Adobe needed to take Flash seriously as a platform. Instead they neglected it, making it synonymous with crashes and security problems, and they milked developers as much as possible.

I bought Flash once. I found a crashing bug and jumped through hoops reporting it. A year or so later, they updated the ticket to suggest I drop $800 for the privilege of seeing whether it had been fixed. I did not make the mistake of giving them money ever again.

They had such an opportunity to take advantage of a platform with a pre-iPhone deployment in the high 90% range, and they just skimped it into oblivion. What a disgrace for everyone who actually cared.

replies(1): >>44511104 #
1. kccqzy ◴[] No.44511104[source]
Yes seriously. At that time Steve Jobs was harping on HTML5 and CSS3 being open standards but Flash not. Adobe could have ensured Flash's survival by making Flash an open standard (much like it has made PDF an open standard where the specification is free to everyone) and making Adobe Flash only one of the possible authoring tools, and the Flash Player only one of the player tools. Basically they should have invited the community and other companies to make more Flash tooling while continuing to sell their own. Given how often I see people still paying for Acrobat Pro today, I think this is a good business strategy too.