I hate Flash
 

Seriously...this program/IDE/cancer on society is such a pain in the ass to work with/in. I absolutely hate it and I hate the fact that I'm an intermediate-advanced user and apparently, out of 3000 employees, the only one with any sort of working knowledge.

I've got three projects that people want in Flash because they heard about it in some management meeting and thing that it's the "it" thing even though I keep telling them it's bad for usability/accessibility, time consuming to work in and everything that is being done in it could be done easier and better in ASP.NET with Ajax.

Sigh.

Re: I hate Flash
 

/me cheers and chants.

I mean, I like it for the youtube-alikes movie display. But for UI? [shudder]. Just for starters, cut'n'paste of text therein rarely works.

Re: I hate Flash
 

do you just hate the IDE itself or flash in general?

i luv flash. its awesome. what other way is there to make a website more dynamic?

Re: I hate Flash
 

Ajax + server-side pages. And hell, I'd even settle for Flex (because while it's final product is Flash, almost 99% of the work is done in MXML, an XML-based proprietary language).

I hate Flash because it's such a royal pain in the ass...the constant need to add a new layer and if you forget, you may have just f00ked a bunch of work depending on when you catch it.

ActionScript can (and oftentimes does) go anywhere...it's not structured enough.

Every time you click or change the tool you're using or hit ctrl + enter to test the movie, the project is labeled as being "changed" so if I leave for a minute, come back and see that, I get nervous if I don't remember exactly what it was I just did.

Besides that, I think Flash is HIGHLY abused. Flash-based websites are terrible when it comes to accessibility and usability as most force you into watching stupid animations as the pages change, the back button on your browser doesn't work and screen readers may as well not exist.

Re: I hate Flash
 

ok true to some extent but it really depends on what needs to be done.
would u use ajax+ss pages for a complex animated intro screen that a client wanted?.

i agree with you on that point

agree with you there too. but sometimes when i go to a website for a new movie or game etc. i wanna see some fancy animations and special effects/sounds and just a really interactive website.

but thats poor design from the webdesigner not flash itself. alot of websites offer html or flash version of the site. As for screen readers, again thatsto do with the way the site was designed.

Re: I hate Flash
 

Flash is good times when done properly, but when it's not it makes me feel like kicking puppies.

One example of good flash design (imo, of course) is 2Advanced.

Re: I hate Flash
 

that's a really cool website

Re: I hate Flash
 

That site is cool, but I can't read a damned thing even at 1600x1200. And guess what? Flash doesn't let you resize text unless you zoom the entire movie in (right clicking and choosing zoom in) which then only focuses on that ONE area of the site and you have to zoom back out...or if the designer codes something in there to allow for you to increase font size.

It's not usable. I'm sorry.

Flash is only good for banner ads and stuff like there where you want to show off and get that "WOW!" factor...it's not good for primetime website usage because it's just far too limiting.

Flash should be a supplement, not the main course.

Re: I hate Flash
 

SON OF A BITCH!

Every time I go to export this stupid project I'm working on, FLASH CRASHES.

Re: I hate Flash
 

I agree with superklye. Flash is for presentation, not UI. Its good for ads etc, but you shouldn't build a whole website in it... Unless its a promotional website for a movie or something, in which case the site is basically just one big ad anyway. Otherwise Flash is bad because it breaks browser accessibility features and site state (bookmarks, back button etc).

People who design whole sites in Flash are usually showing off, to themselves, their bosses, or clients. But they aren't thinking about the end user.

Re: I hate Flash
 

What's wrong with your monitor? I run at 1600x1200 and see the text just fine. Hell, I can even see the text fine if I run at 2048x1536, which is far beyond my monitors recommended viewing res (of 1600x1200).

21" Trinitron CRT, btw. 70.5 pounds of awesome.

Although, regardless of how awesome 2Advanced is, I do agree that in general Flash is better used for presentations and general fancyness (animated logos and whatnot), but should be kept away from the majority of web site navigation.

Re: I hate Flash
 

It's some 10+ year old POS CRT at work.

But see, that's the point: you have to be able to display for any/all users or have functionality built in that they can scale it themselves. That site doesn't allow for it.


Oh, and the absolute best part...I've spent the better part of the last two weeks learning how to use all of these different components, many of which never seem to have been used together before, only to get the word this morning that the project has been canceled.

My first real work in weeks and all that anger and frustration for nothing.


Flash is the bane of my existence.