Adobe Flash versus Microsoft Silverlight Comparison ~ Flash Wins for the Short Term
Microsoft launched their first venture into the Silverlight world today with Popfly, which is some kind of mashup thing, but I couldn’t get more information on it because it’s in private beta right now. Although I applaud Microsoft’s efforts to compete with Adobe and their Flash suite, I can’t see this catching on anytime soon. Flash is so ubiquitous that it even pushed QuickTime, Real Player, and windows movie files right out of the web space, with the exception of movie trailers. The only way Silverlight is going to get traction is if it can do all the following things:
- Is easily distributed.
Flash currently has an in-browser installer where you don’t have to restart your browser and can refresh the web page once it’s installed. Silverlight has a downloadable installer, which you have to kick off and then restart your browser. Flash 1 - Microsoft 0 - Is easily developed for.
Currently, flash can integrate with multiple platforms and languages. Silverlight appears to be geared towards .Net developers, but looks like it has the flexibility to connect to multiple other languages and platforms. Flash 2 - Microsoft 1 - Can integrate design objects easily.
The Adobe suite of products, especially CS3, can easily share objects and files between applications (Illustrator, Flash, Dreamweaver, Photoshop, etc.). Silverlight has these options built into it already along with several other tempting products such as ad-insertion and free streaming solutions. Flash 3 - Microsoft 2 - Can be easily indexed.
This is really the kicker that Flash does not do well right now, except for hacks or duplicate efforts. Silverlight is trying to address this problem and I think this might make it the winner in terms of SEO efforts. Flash 3 - Microsoft 3 - Can win over the design community.
This is another key area that Microsoft is going to have to win over. Design and Microsoft are two things that traditionally do not go together at all. Typically, the programmers are over on the .Net side and the designers are over on the Adobe side, typically on a Mac. Flash 4 - Microsoft 3
So at least for the short term, it appears that Flash will continue to dominate the market as designers are comfortable and familiar with the Adobe suite and Adobe is getting better all the time. Also, numerous ad platforms are already set up to run Flash ads and asking them to also ad Silverlight support is going to get REALLY messy as advertisers are going to want guarantees that people will see their ads without having to install new software. So Microsoft will probably develop a cult following from .Net programmers and Microsoft fan boys, but unless they really come up with innovative stuff that is guaranteed to be indexed by search engines and make the design experience much easier, I think ultimately this is a battle they have already lost.
Thoughts?
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I’ve worked a lot with Flash and frankly think the appl sucks as I’m used to the high designer standards of Photoshop and Illustrator. But it does output great stuff and they are making it better all the time on many fronts (despite it’s still-hard-to-use designer interface).
But I’m faced with designing and developing many sites for a client who is a Windows shop using lots of .net. I’m seriously proposing doing the sites in Silverlight, despite my never using it before.
I wonder if it’s a worthwhile way to go.
I’m a .NET developer working on an Actionscript project right now. The difference in development (database integration, framework maturity..) falls, in a BIG way, in Microsoft’s favor.
To my understanding you need an ExpressionWeb app to use Silverlight. Expressions is usable on Windows and Mac, so development can be done either way. It also seems to be ambiguous regarding what type of server it is being hosted on; Apache, Linux and Windows Servers. Does this make a difference?