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There is no doubt about it. Flash is the best tool in any web
designers arsenal. It is easy to use with phenomenal results. You
can create a full blown website in a couple of hours and the file
size can be less than the size of your average .JPEG file, but (and
this is a big but) it is still a plug-in. This means that you have
to download and install the latest flash player in order to view the
website. It is really not a big deal if you are an intermediate to
advanced user, which is what maybe 60% of Internet users are.
However, that other 40% of people may not feel secure having to
download and install software on their computer in order to view
your site. Another downside of a flash based site is the fact that
web crawlers cannot see the text content contained within the file.
This means it has no way to index your site, which can lead to poor
search engine ranking. Don't be put off with the down sides of
flash. There are ways around these problems.
- Only use flash for graphical touches, i.e., headers, images,
navigation structure (as long as the navigation structure is
backed up with text links to your pages as well).
- Create a mirror site, which the user will be automatically
redirected to if the user does not have flash installed.
- Export the flash file in the lowest version needed to be
viewed. Unless you’re using features that Version 3 does not
support, there is no reason to export the file in the latest
Version 7. That way, you don't alienate users who maybe have
flash installed, but not the latest version.
Flash should be used as an enhancement to your site and not the
main construction block. Unfortunately, new technology advances more
quickly than people do, so the tools we have available today will
not be used to their full potential for a long time and, by that
time, we will have new tools to tempt us into making design
mistakes.
Note: When you start thinking about your web site, the most
important thing to think about is your target audience. For example,
if your audience is schools, a lot of schools have their internet
security setting set high so students are not looking at anything
they shouldn't be. If this is the case, then a lot of the time it
will block any site with flash installed because there is no way to
determine the content of the site.
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