Flash Vs HTML5

The Flash vs HTML war has recently intensified with Apple's release of the revolutionary iPad. Adobe has been working on their Creative Suite 5 to make it easier for developers to create Flash and AIR apps that are compatible with the software running the iPod and iPad. In the mean time, Apple was developing iPhone OS 4, which will run on current iPod Touch, iPhone and future iPad releases. With OS 4 came a change in terms for developers.

In the new version of the iPhone Developer Program License Agreement section 3.3.1 now reads:
3.3.1 – Applications may only use Documented APIs in the manner prescribed by Apple and must not use or call any private APIs. Applications must be originally written in Objective-C, C, C ++, or JavaScript as implemented by the iPhone OS WebKit engine, and only code written in C, C ++, and Objective-C may compile and directly link against the Documented APIs (eg, Applications that link to Documented APIs through an intermediate translation or compatibility layer or tool are prohibited).

Apple is forcing out Flash and encouraging developers to use the languages ​​listed and HTML5 and CSS3 for web content. Is this a win for HTML?

Adobe is not pleased with the banning of the Flash to iPhone compiler, but that's not doing to stop them from developing and improving Flash. Since Flash can still do some amazing effects that no amount of HTML5 or JavaScript can come close to at the same speed, they still have a huge market share.

Here are some pros and cons of HTML and Flash:

Flash Pros
Flash player allows for uniformity through all browsers
More effects than HTML5 and JavaScript
Vector based for easy scaling

Flash Cons
External plugin has to be downloaded to view Flash
Search engines do not read Flash well
SWFs can be large and take while to download

HTML5 Pros
Very fast (with CSS)
Canvas and Video
GeoLocation API

HTML5 Cons
Not fully supported on all browsers
Limited animations / effects
Slower animations than Flash

Should I use Flash?

If it enhances the user experience more than HTML would, then yes. If it just gets in the way, no.

4 Reasons for Hiring an HTML5 Developer

HTML5 is a Hyper Text Markup language which is the recent and an improved version of HTML standards that nurtures interoperable implementations and in depth processing models. With a profound way in which web development is conducted, HTML5 is an amazing technology that has kept pace with changing trends & norms. Today a user can connect to the internet, not just through his/her laptop or PC, but all via wireless devices such as smartphones and tablet computers. The escalating popularity of smartphones has surpassed the use of traditional desktops and PC’s. Users these days prefer to connect to the internet through his/her smartphone all the time. They rather receive mails, news and updates on the phone than sit all day on the desktop to reply or get a message. Considering this apparent shift from one placed bulky devices to more portable and compact ones, HTML5 technology seamlessly fits the bill.As a much awaited and most talked about technology amongst the tech fraternity, here are some 4 major reasons why you should hire dedicated HTML5 developers.

1. HTML5 is the new calling: The future of HTML5 is extremely bright. With giant companies such as Apple extending outright support to HTML5, the developer community across the globe is quite excited about the prospects of this new technology. A number of websites have discarded Flash and have embraced HTML5 with great degree of grace and acceptance. Astounding features such as multimedia support without any plug-ins, offline & storage ability for web apps, interactivity and 3D Graphics and effects are some requirements of modern web browsers. HTLM5 is able to support all of these features, which has made it such a desirable platform.

2. HTML5 development is fast and affordable: One of the most endearing attribute of HTML5 development is the time involved in developing it. HTML5 profoundly limits the development time. Only paying attention to the latest browsers, while not holding on old ones, HTML5 developers can purely concentrate on developing elements that are appealing and good. Therefore, the development time is quite reduced.

3. HTML5 technology is with the time: HTML5 is a major breakthrough in the paradigm of internet. The present century is synonymous with digital revolution. For an internet driven ecosystem, entrepreneurs as well as users require recent and updated information related to business, politics and world. Companies can resort to hire dedicated HTML5 developers to create highly interactive web portals and content management systems. A CMS driven website is very much in demand today, for there is a constant demand for updated news and information from the users as well as business end.

4. HTML5 supports multichannel publishing: According to an independent industry prediction, the sale and purchase of smartphones and tablet computers will be much ahead to that of traditional desktop and laptops by the year 2013. One of the major attribute of the current day smartphone is the multi-channel publishing where in a single content piece can be simultaneously posted across different social media and professional networks. Currently HTML5 has the capabilities for facilitating this as it simplifies the display of web content in various formats. So, in order to incorporate this feature, it is important to hire dedicated HTML5 developers.

What's HTML5 & Why Should You Care?

If you have read anything about HTML5, you'll know that most webmasters think it is the next best thing to appear on the internet, and everyone seems to be excited about it, but the truth is, there is still a lot of gossip, and a lot of over-rating of the new web language, and we should not be thinking HTML5 just yet. Here are the reasons why we should not jump on the HTML5 bandwagon just yet.

It's not Supported by all Browsers Yet.

Yes the newer browsers like Opera, Chrome, and the new Firefox supports HTML5 but nothing else does, and even those browsers as yet, have limited support for the new HTML5 programming. When you use those cool and new tags you have to style them for backwards capability. You have to code all the CSS3 differently so that the browser can support it and even Firefox needs you to prefix the property names with -moz- titles. And if you want the site to be seen using Safari then you have to use the prefix -webkit-. So when everyone starts using IE7 or 8 (just think of all the people that are still using IE 6) then there are just too many hoops to jump through to make HTML5 work.

Once You Have all the Work Done No One Will Notice a Difference

Now once you have re-coded eveyrthing, everything looks the same. The reason why most webmasters love HTML5 is the ease with which it makes headers, footers and those boxes with rounded corners. Rounded corners are a part of Web 2.0 design, and its great that we will be able to make those rounded corners more easily, but we all generally know how to make them now.

What About the Cool New Audio / Video Capabilities of HTML5

Well its great that now audio and video can easily be added but that's not anything really new. We can still do it using Adobe Flash and if you do not have Flash then you probably do not have the capabilities of running HTML5 either.

What about Mobile Browsing

Now when it comes to mobile browsing capabilities HTML5 really does seem to be the way to go but only for browsers that really have full HTML5 capabilities, and none of them have full capabilities yet.

SEO's are praising the HTML5

SEO specialists believe that the new features on the HTML5 will give search engines more ease in figuring out how to value a given page and its links. They praise the new tags inside the HTML5 saying these tags will help in SEO by showing the search engines that what is located within these tags is not particularly relevant to SEO. But these website areas, or content located within these areas, are already of little importance to the search engines, so this particular new feature of HTML5 is of little help when it comes to SEO.

Will HTML5 Be Important

Sure HTML5 will be of great importance, but it just is not at the moment. It will still be a couple of years before we can integrate it fully into our web development.

Overview – HTML5 – What’s New in HTML5?

HTML5

The advent of HTML5 has created waves of expectations among internet users and content processors over its new technical adages. So, the incorporation of the much awaited HTML5 software has enabled the launch of YouTube’s mobile version with high end features like video playback in the browser. With the latest HTML version, loading video playback can no longer be a lengthy process.

HTML5 support features

HTML5 is basically used as a standard structure for representing content on the web with innovative technology and features unlike its predecessor of HTML and XHTML. The latest HTML version allows easy navigation of web pages with high-end tools as such video playback, drag and drop without depending on third-party browser plug-ins earlier used like Adobe Flash, Microsoft Silverlight and Google Gears.

Hence, the new upgrade is seen as a welcoming move among large network of web users. Now, you’ve every reason to appreciate HTML5 that allows you better exploration of the library and that’s not all, the search box hints you results as you type. What other better ways then to make your handsets personalized by marking your videos just like web-pages.

The current mobile YouTube site supports small screen handsets and the H.264 is compatible with this kind of hand held device. The basic features that are meant to draw user friendly responses lies in rich video quality, bigger buttons that promotes easier web accessibility and the touch screen. The other hands-on advantage of the new version over its predecessors can be distinguished from its ability to define draft specification in a single language both for HTML and XML. Being a finer product of HTML, it aims at solving the issues faced by the previous mark-up languages.

The arrival of the latest, HTML5, is bound to generate hyper threading among web browsers. For web applications that depend on heavy scripts for various tasks, it poses as a very useful tool. So, the next time you want to embed your favorite video you needn’t rely on third party plug-ins or codec. The best part is that with the new feature on its mobile site, YouTube is able to add on features and updates quicker. If you are wondering how it has been achieved, that is because YouTube no longer need to update the web application for download but rather simply the website.

Web Performance With Flash And HTML5

So, Flash is a vibrant platform that offers a high degree of rich functionality, some of it best-of-breed. Sites and applications developed with Flash are available to virtually every non-mobile Web user, and likely to be available for most mobile users before long, except for those using Apple products.

HTML5 is an exciting, evolving Web coding language with extensive support from all of the Internet’s heavy hitters – Google, Apple, Microsoft (albeit slowly), Mozilla, Opera, and yes, even Adobe. It promises to simplify and speed-up both the Web development and Web browsing experience, has native capability to handle multimedia and rich Internet functionality without external plugins, and has ambitions to be the technology that finally bridges all devices, mobile included.

A number of leading Internet voices argue that it’s not an either-or scenario. Flash is the best platform for some applications, and HTML5 for others. But how is a developer to decide what the best technology is for the project that’s in front of them? Assuming A) that the technology can perform the desired function and B) that the end product is available on user devices, it gets down to a matter of performance.

See HTML5 run

Because it’s an open technology (with the possible exception of video), HTML5 promises to lend itself to the robust performance monitoring, measurement, and diagnosis that’s been available for other open Web technologies. And it is expected that the advances found in HTML5 will, if used judiciously, be a boon to overall page performance.

Aside from any inherent speed gains, another big advantage of HTML5 vis-à-vis Flash is that, because it is an open technology, real browsers can be deployed in the field to measure and record virtually all of its activity and performance. As has been the case with HTML in all its flavors, and JavaScript, AJAX, etc., performance issues are transparent, and problem sources are more readily visible. There are far fewer black holes that require deep diagnosis.

One of the most anticipated features of HTML5 – and one of the most debated – is the ability to handle audio and video natively in the browser. A few simple lines of code is all it takes to embed A/V files, and, once browsers are updated to handle HTML5, the user would need no special plug-ins to run the files.

As mentioned above, Flash is by far the dominant force in online video. But HTML5 is already making inroads. Vimeo has introduced HTML5 video capability in a new universal player, enabling its videos to be viewed on mobile devices, including those from Apple. And Google has introduced a new, HTML5 mobile version of its site, m.youtube.com, which is promoted as delivering better video with a better interface than Apple’s own YouTube app.

Web Design Trends – HTML5 Vs Flash, CSS3, WCMS and More

As the Internet expands the world of design, there are a few trends to be on the lookout for. Web design constantly undergoes changes in trends as the years pass. Certain aspects of design like HTML5 vs Flash, CSS, content management systems, and software development platforms are all changing how people create on the web.

HTML5

Specific trends like oversized logos and headers, huge images, typography, minimalism, and intro boxes have been popular in the past. For the future of web design, there will be more HTML5, CSS, content management systems, and software development platforms. The large debate between HTML5 and Flash will probably forever continue, but HTML5 has some great benefits. HTML5 is better supported on mobile devices and allows for more interactive design on the web. HTML5 is already compatible on most browsers such as Firefox, Chrome, Safari, and Opera. It also gives developers more flexibility and allows them to do more things in-house and it allows for more powerful and interactive applications. HTML5 lets developers manage data, draw, and play video and audio (which developers had problems doing with HTML4). HTML5 has new canvas and also makes it easy to embed video elements. It also has a new geolocation APIs, client-side database, offline application cache, and thread-like operation.

Flash

Flash still has some great benefits. Flash has better support streaming secure and live video, is more ubiquitous and the 2D and 3D APIs are more usable than canvas (allegedly). The developer community is larger and more mature than HTML5 and the tools are strong and well-supported. Designers are also more comfortable using Flash. Flash also gives access to web cam and audio recording.

CSS3

New trends in CSS3 include change of text selection color, gradually changing links, 1px clicks, easier introduction paragraphs, and box shadow with RGBA on hover. With CSS3, designers can change the color of selected text to match the color scheme of the rest of the site. Also with CSS3, designers can change the opacity of a hover link. 1px click makes links that are clicked on move down 1px and return to their original place after the mouse is released. Introduction paragraphs are also easier and CSS3 allows designers to create a box shadow with RGBA on hover.

WCMS

A web content management system or WCMS lets users with little or lots of web programming language know-how create and manage a web site’s content with ease. A WCMS can use templates and the WCMS uses databases to store artifacts, content, and metadata. Most WCMSs use server side caching and most have automated templates, scalable expansion, easily editable content, scalable feature sets, web standards upgrades, workflow management, collaboration, delegation, document management, content virtualization, content syndication, multilingual capabilities, and versioning.

Software Development Platforms

Also known as HTML editors are software applications used to create web pages. Such applications, like Adobe Dreamweaver, allow users to create and preview web sites in locally installed web browsers, transfer features, synchronize features, find and replace lines of text, find and replace lines of code, and use templates. These software development platforms can also use third-party extensions to increase functionality. Most of them can also be used with HTML and are usually compatible with Mac or Windows operating systems. Software development platforms often support CSS, JavaScript, and other scripting languages and frameworks.

Checkout reviews & comparison of design courses.

Because the Internet is rapidly and constantly expanding the web design world, trends of web design are constantly upgrading to new software, languages, and editing platforms. By keeping up with these web design trends, designers and developers can make attractive and interactive web site designs that will increase in popularity and ease of use.

HTML5 – A Feature-Rich Formatting Language

HTML is the language which is used to construct and present the contents on the World Wide Web. HTML5 is a latest formatting language and a modified edition of HTML (hypertext markup language). HTML5 is a package of cult features like cross compatibility, device support storage, browsing and SEO.

Interactivity

With HTML5, you can create more interactive websites along with great animations and effects. It supports the animations that are created from a latest drawing tag feature. HTML5 reduces the additional time and efforts for creating videos, animation etc. through plug-ins. In addition, HTML5 includes drag and drop functions that makes the file handling much easier. Lots of new API’s are available into HTML5 that enables you to make a stunning websites with no trouble.

Canvas

HTML5 has been built with the advanced canvas elements that help developers to manage and control the images and graphics. This can save your time and efforts as you do not require any third party plug-ins.

Storage Capacity

The built-in storage capacity of HTML5 is better than the precursor. HTML5 gives ability to store cookies and client databases offline, which is a most admirable feature of HTML5. You can further open these cookies into different windows with enhanced security and high performance. HTML5 storage system ensures that there will not be any kind of data loss even offline.

Improved Accessibility

Whenever the latest app or trend is being introduced, people always ask if it can run with their existing browser or not? The HTML5 is greatly accessible with all the basic browsers such as IE, Mozilla, Opera and Google chrome. The PSD to HTML5 conversion is now more simple and clear with better coding.

HTML5 supports both types of coding – standard coding and doctype coding. The main advantage of HTML5 is that it is compatible with most of the browsers, and the coding do not requires any updates to be installed in your browsers.HTML5 is compatible with iPad and iPhone as well.

Mobile browsing

The websites created by HTML5 support most of the mobile screens and mobile browsers. You can create a highly functional website with HTML5 that can be seen on mobiles as well without formatting the layout of website manually. You can customize your websites for mobile browsers with the help of Meta tags. The Meta tags contain view port with zoom and width, full screen mode and icons for UI of android and other mobile OS.

SEO

HTML5 websites are highly compatible with popular search engines. Mostly, web developers have a hard time making SEO friendly websites. The HTML5 SEO feature facilitates you to make a higher ranking website without any hassles.

Support Features

HTML5 includes best supporting features such as flowchart availability, better web sockets, email inputs, placeholder, and data caching and grouping from the client area. It also involves error handling system, smart graphic features, and 2D games with several add-ons to increase and evolve user experience.

Using HTML5 to create a website is highly beneficial for the web developers. All the above features and few technical developments are meant for the evolutions in the World Wide Web.

HTML5 Notification Example

HTML5 Notifications are yet another great addition to the new HTML5 specification. The new API allows websites to send notifications directly to your desktop. The purpose of this post is to explain how to use Notifications by providing a concrete example for using them in your own website.

HTML5 Notifications in the real world

Do not be surprised if you see social networking sites or microblogging sites like Facebook or Twitter utilizing the new feature as soon as HTML5 goes mainstream. For example, let's say that someone on Facebook sends you an instant message. Currently, if you're viewing another website in a different window while Facebook is open, and a user sends you an instant message, Facebook will alert you by updating the webpage with AJAX, causing the associated browser tab to flash. With HTML5, Facebook could send an alert directly to your desktop with an embedded instant message.

HTML5 Notifications code

To use HTML5 notifications in your own website, you'll need to add code that looks something like this:

function RequestPermission (callback) {

window.webkitNotifications.requestPermission (callback);
}

function showNotification () {

if (window.webkitNotifications.checkPermission ()> 0) {

RequestPermission (showNotification);

}

else {

window.webkitNotifications.createNotification ("http://a1.twimg.com/profile_images/710503034/lillypad_rss_normal.png",

"Title", "Body"). Show ();

}
}

HTML5 Notification API

Before making use of HTML5 notifications, you'll have to prompt the user for permission first. This is done with the requestPermission () method. It takes one optional argument, the name of the call back function. In this case, the call back function is showNotification (). When the user accepts the request, the showNotification () function is called again. The difference this time, however, is that the notification permission is now set to "0", allowing the createNotification () method to be executed successfully.

The createNotification () method takes three arguments: an image, a title, and a notification body. If you do not want an image to appear in your notification, you can leave the argument blank.

HTML5 Web Sockets Example

HTML5 Web Sockets will single handedly revolutionize web technologies as we know it. The purpose of this post is to explain what techniques have been used to simulate server push until now, define HTML5 web sockets, and then give an example of how to use it in your HTML5 application.

What is polling?

Until now, the web has been one directional. In other words, web pages could only send a request to a web server, and not the other way around. Once AJAX came along in 2005, web developers quickly adopted techniques to simulate a request from server to client known as polling. There are two types of polling, short polling and long polling.

Short polling is implemented by making a request to the web server every few seconds or so to see if data has changed. If it has, the web server will respond with the new data. Otherwise, it will respond with a blank message. The drawback to this technique, however, is both a surplus is server requests and an overhead in CPU usage on the web server to constantly check if an update to the data has been made.

Long polling is implemented by making a single request to the web server and keeping the connection open until the data has changed, at which point the web server sends back a response. The drawback to this technique, like short polling, is that the web server still has to check if the data has changed every few seconds or so, creating an overhead in CPU usage.

What’s an HTML5 web socket?

This is where HTML5 web sockets come in. HTML5 will be the first HTML specification to support client side web sockets. In other words, when data changes on the web server, the web server can send a request to client, eliminating the need for polling.

HTML5 web socket example

Step 1: Create a WebSocket with a valid URL

Create a new WebSocket connection to WebSocket server at finance.example.com.

var stockTickerWebSocket = new WebSocket(“ws://finance.example.com”);

Note that a ws:// and wss:// prefix indicate a WebSocket and a secure WebSocket connection respectively. The default port for WebSockets is 81 and the default port for secure WebSocket is 815.

Step 2: Attach JavaScript Callback Functions

Associate event listeners to handle each phase of the connection life cycle.

stockTickerWebSocket.onopen = function(evt) {

alert(“Stock Ticker Connection open…”);

};

stockTickerWebSocket.onmessage = function(evt) {

alert( “Received Ticker Update: ” + evt.data);

};

stockTickerWebSocket.onclose = function(evt) {

alert(“Connection closed.”);

};

Step 3: Send and Receive Data

To send a message to the server, simply call the postMessage method on the webocket with the content you wish to send to the server.

stockTickerWebSocket.postMessage(“BUY: GOOG,100@200.25″);

This will send the BUY message to the server. Any message coming from the server will be delivered to the onmessage callback registered in step #2.

Step 4: Disconnect When Done

When completed, call the disconnect() method to close the WebSocket connection.

stockTickerWebSocket.disconnect();

As demonstrated in the example above, there are no HTTP requests made to the server from the client side to retrieve data, instead the data was pushed to the client from the server – when it becomes available.

When a new WebSocket connection is established the browser opens an HTTP connection to the server first and then negotiates with the server to upgrade the connection to a dedicated and persistent WebSocket connection. This process automatically sets up a tunnel through to the server – passing through all network agents (proxies, routers, and firewalls) in the middle (very much like HTTPS establishing a secure, endtoend connection), solving numerous issues that the various Comet programming techniques encountered. Once established the WebSocket is a fullduplex channel between the client and the server.

Example provided by http://www.indicthreads.com

HTML5 and Mobile Apps Development

Since decades, Hyper Text Markup Language or generally considered as HTML has been dependably been a standout amongst the most favored, demonstrated and premier advancement stage for web planning, web improvement and in addition for web provision improvement. Software and web development companies around the world always depend on HTML for development and designing of scalable websites and web applications.

Html5 sincerely has a ton of potential for advancement to be made in the web; however one needs to understand the patterns of the markup language before structuring or presenting content with it. At first, it is extremely essential to grasp the idea of ​​Html5 so as to effectively utilize it for portable provision improvement. Html5 includes details of essential modifying dialects like Javascript, HTML, and CSS; providing designers will all of the properties required creating next generation websites & mobile applications. With HTML5 come a richer style, improved markup, enhanced capabilities, and latest JavaScript APIs, assisting in the design of new apps. Therefore, HTML5 can be referred to as a combination of the features of HTML, JavaScript, & CSS.

However, when we look on another hand mobile technology huge such as for example Apple, Google and Microsoft are typically pushing forward to supply better mobile operating systems. Apple latest iOS 5, Android Ice Cream Sandwich and Microsoft Windows Phone 7.5 (Mango) OS might be the right examples. Present day versatile application engineers have felt the developing request of Html5 as an improvement apparatus. Html5 for sure serves to handle wealthier versatile requirements that can run over all major OS stages.

Html5 is such an innovation which quickly comprehended these necessities of the business sector and began giving a great application application that can work impeccably on all portable stages with the assistance of Html5 versatile development. It has led to the newest revolution with the necessity of cross platform mobile development. HTML5 is not merely utilized in web and mobile website development, but in addition it powered web application. The front-end of each hybrid application is manufactured using native programming languages ​​like java, Objective C, etc. But the back-end part is strictly powered by HTML5 and other web development technologies like JavaScript and CSS.

The amounts of clients utilizing these working frameworks are oriented smart phones are increasing day-in and day-out. Again each distinct has his own particular decision of portable OS and stage. This at last affects the stakeholder who is choosing an answer by means of portable application advancement as outlining an application devoted to one stage will not qualify him to addition major market share. Choosing an app solution that works on all cellular devices is vital, and at once it proves to be expensive and time consuming.

Now, let us know something about Phone Gap. Phone Gap can be a platform centered on HTML5 which allows mobile application developers create native applications with the help of CSS3, HTML5, and JavaScript. The best thing about Phone Gap is that a developer can put it to use as well as other Frameworks in order to create features which can be constructed with Phone Gap alone. With the passage of time, Phone Gap and Senca Touch have grown to be the most demanded frameworks.

jQuery Mobile can be a net framework. It is touch-advanced and utilized for advanced mobile phones and Tablets. Additionally, it is a single graphical user interface that remains exactly the same on all platforms. Due to its lightweight code, mobile application developers prefer it to other frameworks. Various kinds of themes are available which can be customized easily based on the needs of the designer. jQuery enables you to write a single code so as to produce a customizable website application. This makes things simpler for you to do.

Freelance Web Designer | WordPress Developer | Hong Kong