(keitai-l) Re: Flash vs. Java, Round 2

I can certainly see the points made by Bill. That said,

1. Flash is already fragmented - see Flash Lite 1.0, Flash Lite 1.1 and
Flash Lite 2.0. If Macromedia did manage to keep Flash Lite unfragmented, it
would have been an extremely interesting challenger to J2ME. 

2. Don made a very interesting point. Qualcomm/IBM/Insignia all have JVMs
available for BREW as extensions. However the carriers appear to be not that
interested in extensions. I would like to see how the Flash extension pans
out with respect to carriers.

3. Unless Flash is 100% available on 100% handsets, it would be just yet
another mobile development platform. It position is relatively weak due to
the difficulties to monetize on the non-BREW carriers (same problem as
native Symbian apps).

4. Flash Lite is okay for some casual games, but not competitive with the
high end Java/C++ games. The business types generally don't like to program
in Flash - there is still an image issue that Flash is for web banners.
Despite the advances made by Macromedia, debugging/programming in Flash is
still less productive than in Java.

Cheers,
Stephen Cheng
CEO Innaworks
www.innaworks.com - mBooster J2ME optimization suite

> -----Original Message-----
> From: keitai-l-bounce@appelsiini.net [mailto:keitai-l-
> bounce@appelsiini.net] On Behalf Of Don Liberty
> Sent: Monday, 5 December 2005 1:18 p.m.
> To: keitai-l@appelsiini.net
> Subject: (keitai-l) Re: Flash vs. Java, Round 2
> 
> 
> 
> You bring up some very interesting point.  But what about the JSR 226 API
> that allows Java developers to access the native SVG 1.2 engine on
> devices.
> This provides a very strong technology to compete with Flash Lite.
> Qualcomm already ships SVG Tiny on all of it's 3G Chips.  SO they actually
> will have more SVG devices than Flash lite.
> 
> Flash-lite will be a BREW extention and not on the device by default.  SVG
> T will already be on the device.
> 
> Don Liberty
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: keitai-l-bounce@appelsiini.net [mailto:keitai-l-
> bounce@appelsiini.net] On Behalf Of William Volk
> Sent: Friday, December 02, 2005 11:44 PM
> To: Keitai List
> Subject: (keitai-l) Flash vs. Java, Round 2
> 
> Two stories today confirm what I've believed for some time. Given the
> write
> many times, test everywhere nature of J2ME apps, it's only a matter of
> time
> before Macromedia repeats it's capture of client-side programming.
> Last time it was Flash vs. Java Applets. In that case Applets were pretty
> decent, it IS possible to write reliable portable applets. With J2ME
> Midlets
> it's far more difficult to deal with all the differences between handsets.
> Just a matter of time before Macromedia really took advantage of this.
> 
> Story One: MACROMEDIA AND QUALCOMM EXTEND FLASH LITE TO BREW®
> http://brew.qualcomm.com/jsp/brew/en/press_room/press_releases/2005/10_18_
> 05
> a.html
> 
> Macromedia (Nasdaq: MACR) and QUALCOMM Incorporated (Nasdaq: QCOM) today
> announced an agreement under which Macromedia® will create a version of
> Macromedia Flash Lite as an extension for BREW. As a result of this
> agreement, the large BREW developer community and more than two million
> Flash® developers will be able to create rich, engaging mobile content on
> the Flash Platform for the BREW solution, QUALCOMM's established content
> delivery and monetization system.
> 
> Expected to ship next year, this new extension of Flash Lite for BREW will
> help further evolve the wireless value chain worldwide. BREW developers
> will
> realize the benefit of rich mobile experiences and the return on
> investment
> when they add Flash to their applications, while Flash developers will
> have
> a new channel to monetize their mobile work. Subscribers will ultimately
> benefit from a wide array of the richest services and content possible.
> The
> announcement today builds on an existing QUALCOMM and Macromedia
> agreement.
> 
> Story 2: Flash Lite<version 2.0.
> http://www.macromedia.com/devnet/devices/articles/flashlite_v2_preview.htm
> l
> 
> The Flash Lite 1.1 player is based on a subset of the Flash 4 code base,
> which means that the modern dot-syntax and object-oriented­like
> development
> model is not supported. But with the introduction of Flash Lite 2.0, we
> can
> now say goodbye forever to tellTarget() and the older slash-syntax of
> Flash
> 4. Flash Lite 2.0 fully supports ActionScript 2.0 based on the ECMA 262
> standard.
> 
> Developers (like me) can also breathe a sigh of relief for ActionScript
> 2.0
> conventions such as a modern event model (movie clip and object events),
> tab
> index control, shape drawing API, and better SWF compression.
> Video Playback
> 
> Flash Lite 2.0 now supports video playback using the video rendering
> application on the device. This means that any video file that the device
> supports can also be rendered in Flash Lite 2.0. (Typically this includes
> 3GPP and MPEG-4 files.)
> 
> Question is, Will Sun step up to the plate and start to enforce a true
> portable standard for J2ME? In any case, this will get interesting.
> 
> William Volk
> CEO, Bonus Mobile Entertainment
> 858 692 1124
> 
> 
> 
> This mail was sent to address dliberty@opentext.com
> Need archives? How to unsubscribe? http://www.appelsiini.net/keitai-l/
> 
> 
> This mail was sent to address scheng@innaworks.com
> Need archives? How to unsubscribe? http://www.appelsiini.net/keitai-l/