Hey everyone,

I've been considering developing a small suite of flash-based applications to handle organizing my client/billing and possibly create a support system similar to current ticket systems. My question is, can anybody come up with a reason why this wouldn't be a good idea (mainly from a security POV but I guess also from a speed/usability POV)? I'll be using ssl and xml to handle security and don't plan on storing any senstivie information (such as cc #'s) on the web. I just want to develop a system that looks pretty and is easy to navigate and that my clients can use.

If there are enough reasons for me not to do something like this, it's Ubersmith for me! :)

Thanks, any input or insight would be appreciated!
Jason

I can't think of a bad thing about it... well people can break apart your flash and see how it works / getting data from etc... but surely there are authentication etc on the server.

I think Flash would be a real nice system and probably even faster than traditional html.

I'd say go for it.... but it takes time :)

Originally posted by phobeas
My question is, can anybody come up with a reason why this wouldn't be a good idea Jason [/B]

Yup,

Not everyone has flash installed ( only about 85% last figures I saw ) and may not want to install it just to use a control panel.

IMHO people want a CP to be as simple and quick to use as possible - anything you put in their way to make them wait is gonna have them grinding their teeth :(

wouldn't it get cached?
secondly, I think Flash is like.... compulsory :D

But yeah most loonix puters don't have flash and not so easy for them to install it.... you just never know what type of customers you have :)

when people want support they want quick support, i think the last thing they are going to want is to load flash files or download plugins to their browser to find out how to get their mysql database working or whatever.

Instead of asking what are the disadvantages of flash ask what are the advantages. It might look prettier, although I recon some good html and graphics work would be better but i can't see any other advantage.

I think the only issue here is compatibility. Come on someone who runs a web site (your customers) won't be those 'average ceo' type who haven't heard of Flash. It is a safe bet that they have it already installed (ok arguable!) - so they dont need to download Flash plugin (250K).

Next, the flash itself. Surely this support and billing flash file aren't going to have images, intricate animation and lots of big audio files in it, not like those you see at 2advanced.com :) so it shouldn't be that big.

Let's see average HTML that looks decent or take VBulletin for example... is how big... 50KB ? With 50KB in Flash you can achieve quite a lot.

Once the flash file is downloaded, then you are going to gain speed here as the communication from user's browser (flash) with the server will be minimal and only the *data* itself. You don't download the whole html body tags and those 5K codes to draw your tables pretty. I reckon the result would be much faster using Flash (or Java) once they are downloaded.

To sum up, the advantages of flash would be:
- faster data retrieval once the flash file is downloaded - faster response
- Flash file isn't too big comparable with HTML
- the flash file can be cached whereas most dynamic pages can't be

Disadvantages:
- less compatibility - needs flash plugin
- won't work on text browsers like lynx (needs GUI)
- First time loading might be slow if ppl don't have the plugin
- First time loading might also be slow if your flash file is big (this is not a multimedia showcase :)

But as always I might be wrong as this thing is not an absolute thing, other people have other opinion :beer:

I am not an expert on flash but if you are planning on using it for a ticket system then you are going to need to encorporate all the pages of the ticket system (unless you are just having one flash file per page and then what is the point?). That is without a doubt going to take longer to download. Not sure about you but a 30kb html page takes a lot less time for the browser to process than a 30kb flash file does, and I think you need to download the whole flash file before you can start using it. I really don't accept the speed argument.

And sure the flash file can be cached, but then so can the first page of the ticket system. When the flash file becomes dynamic (it has to get database information from somewhere) that bit can't be cached in the same way the sucessive pages of a normal dynamic page can't be.

Case in point, how many flash support systems have you seen? Of course just because it hastn't been done before dosen't mean it is not a good idea but if often does.

The bits that can't be cached using Flash is considerably much smaller than the whole html / php pages.

Maybe one problem is sometimes when you need to refresh a page with html it's easy but with flash you probably have to have a button to retry the data request in case it times out.

Padders, if you are arguing about speed, ok just assume Flash file is 300K, 6 times bigger than html (50K). So initial loading time is 6x longer.

Then say you login, in html that'll load another 50K, to go to the main area, then you click on a link, takes another 50K and so on you get the idea.

With flash it's just the data that's transferred, I doubt if it's even 1K for each transfer.

I use a Java based banking system and I don't mind waiting the initial loading time (which is quite fast since it's cached). The navigation etc is very responsive when I check my account history etc.

One more thing, even the main HTML if done in PHP sometimes can't be cached, I might be wrong but that's what I observe sometimes - even with two layers of squid cache (ISP and my local gateway).

cheers

Hey guys,

A lot of you have brought up some good points about the advantages (and more importantly the disadvantages) of having flash-based interface modules to manage things such as billing and support. The most significant point that I never really thought about was compatibility.

Actually, compatibility had crossed my mind, but I think that I brushed the issue aside because of my attitute towards my small webhosting venture. I am not really into this market to make a killing (I'm not afraid to admit that I my marketting skills are non-existant). I am just trying to make enough to cover server expenses so that I can continue developing my own personal projects. I have a small handful of clients (all of them pay via paypal, and all of them are great) and I've got a personal repoire with each of them (no none of my clients are friends/family, the relationship came after they signed up for hosting) and I know that they won't have a problem using flash-based anything that I develop. I guess it is because of that (and because of the fact that I am apparently not going to be competing with the big boys of webhosting ever) that I feel comfortable taking unconventional approaches to webhosting support.

That is the only reason I really wanted to create some flash-based applications to handle my small business. My current business methods are not necessarily unique to the industry (accepting only paypal customers, having a small client base, having informal professional relationships with each of my clients, limited growth but expandable) so I find that a lot of tools out there don't really suit what I need.

Seeing as I just keep rambling, I guess I'll conclude with a few questions.

1) Great points about the compatibility disadvantages of a flash-based suite of applications have been made, but I think I'm going to throw caution to the window and develop a system anyways. My only real concern is security. If anyone can find a real security flaw of implementing such a solution, I will probably cease development.

2) Are there any parties (probably only small paypal only hosts) that would be interested in using such a system (free) when I finish?

3) Comment : In my experience, the flash app will get cached unless I set it up not to, but the dynamic data in the flash file gets refreshed each time. No speed advantages with processing the backend files (most likely php based) over just a pure html site, but flash will only receive the actual relevant data (no formatting) which would result in a faster formatting of the data (I think)

4) The flash file size would probably weigh in at about 50k, is that too big? Also it might be a little 'flashy', would that be a problem really?

Thanks for your replies!
Jason

50K is not big. Flashy is good. People like to see nice interface.

Security, if you can get data through https I don't see a problem.

Interested? I would probably give it a try and if I like it.... might even use it, who knows :)