What's the latest and greatest alternative to Flash? [closed]

Question

I recently accepted a part time gig revamping a set of multimedia/presentations that are used in med education courses. I have been asked to research the future of web and smartphone multimedia platforms. Basically, whats new. Currently, we use flash to create all of our educational multimedia applications but we are starting to develop a new theme and would like to develop apps that are compatible with the PC, apple products and android products.

I am not up to speed on what is currently trending as this is not my profession! My boss asked me to research HTML5, but I having a feeling that is not going to be a solution. Does anyone have any advice on the "new flash" for web and multimedia? Thanks for reading.

Partial

Why would HTML5 not be the solution? Most apps that are moving away from flash are going to either native HTML5 or some generator that creates HTML5. Certainly, the movement away from flash is NOT to some other proprietary technology that Apples devices don't support. – Elianore

Answer 1

As mentioned, using <canvas> with JavaScript can reproduce almost all of the features of Flash like rendering and managing user input (keyboard, mouse & even game pads).

There are various JavaScript libraries (e.g. Pixi.js) that do some of the groundwork for you and there is a section on MDN dedicated to getting you started with game development in JavaScript.

Also worth mentioning is TypeScript which gives you a platform to write AS3-like object-oriented code for your web-based games. It is well worth checking out - it's near the top of my current favourite languages to use.

Andromeda

Answer 2

Most likely the answer you're looking for is the HTML5 stack. This allows for rich animation and manipulation of text and multimedia through Canvas, CSS3 transforms, and JavaScript. HTML5 also has built in support for multimedia through <audio> and <video> tags. Multimedia can also be manipulated and analyzed through new API calls available in JavaScript. There are also a host of JavaScript libraries like RaphaelJS for creation of interactive vector graphics.

http://raphaeljs.com/

Since you are interested in creating multimedia presentations I would recommend checking out HTML5Wow which is essentially a presentation on the capabilities of HTML5, made with HTML5.

http://www.htmlfivewow.com/slide1

There is also capability for 3D animation through CSS 3D transforms, and 3D rendering through WebGL. Check out Google Chrome Experiments for some intense HTML5 demos using WebGL and other HTML5 technologies.

http://www.chromeexperiments.com/

There are also some great demos on HTML5's capabilities by Mr. Doob.

http://mrdoob.com/

Even Adobe acknowledges that HTML5 is the future. They have invested a lot of resources in creating HTML5 manipulation tools, and modifying existing software like DreamWeaver to support HTML5. Take a look at Adobe's new "Edge" software.

http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/edge/

In terms of portability, Google Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Opera, and IE9+ have good support for HTML5. It is also already built into Android, Blackberry, iPad, iPhone, and Windows Phone devices. HTML5 will also have a prominent role in application development on the Windows 8 platform.

http://ie.microsoft.com/testdrive/Graphics/hands-on-css3/

Misesteem

For anyone looking at raphaeljs, that project have been renamed to "snap. svg" and can be found here: snapsvg.io – Yoakum

Answer 3

You can take a look at Silverlight, from Microsoft.

Tracay

Answer 4

Silverlight i doubt will work on ipads and some mobile devices. If we talk about alternative to flash then HTML5 you can look as and HTML5 with canvas tag and good javascript we can make good html angry bird is a great example of that. if you are looking for alternative of flash video then ogg and mp4 is the alternative of the flash. Still development in browsers are going on so we will have more option in future with HTML 5.

Solution come from garsinfotech.com labs.

Holle

Answer 5

HTML5 is the best replacement, if for no other reason than the fact that HTML5 will work on an IPhone (flash was famously banned by Steve Jobs) and the fact that flash won't work on IE10 in Metro-mode on Windows8 either (and nor will Silverlight for that matter).

If you want to be writing modern websites, getting to grips with HTML5 sooner rather is likely to pay off in the long run.

Daddy

Answer 6

HTML5, CSS3 and javascript are definitively comparable with Flash (Comparison of HTML5 and Flash) but Flash is still more widely supported. A notable exception to this is iOS where Flash is not supported at all.

Gan