HTML5, Flash, and iOS… Oh my!

Their intent was to talk their clients away from using HTML5 for data visualization projects in favor of the still dominant Flash. They also have a side-comparison to iOS usage—I assume to show that developing iPhone Apps is also not their preference.

What I like about this infographic though is that it shows very well that Flash is far from dead, and it should remain an option to be considered for specific projects with specific audiences. But as with any project you must know Flash’s weaknesses in order to know when to use it and when not to.

The same, of course, can be said for HTML5 and iOS apps.

The web continues to be in turmoil when it comes to standards and best practices (no thanks to Microsoft and Internet Explorer). Flash is a mature, highly developed plugin from an extremely respectable company (Adobe). It works consistently in all desktop browsers if the plugin is installed. It is proprietary, and thus has a very mature product development lifecycle. HTML5 on the other hand is not proprietary, and further more is an interesting conglomeration of technologies (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, SVG). Beyond that, HTML5 is modular. You can use HTML5 that is limited to certain “features” and is 100% backward compatible all the way to IE6 or even Netscape. Or you can use some of HTML5’s new features like video and audio tags or the canvas, etc. These then, would fall short on support in the browsers (at the time of this writing).

iOS is what it is… Apple is a master at marketing and creating desire. I personally think that the App Store is an over-hyped sensation that spurs from a lack of knowledge about how to get “apps” on your phone by any other means (such as saving to homescreen from the Safari browser—See how Basecamp has done theirs…kudos to them). For now, I completely understand the need to be “in the App Store” for the sake of being there. Easy to find you, easy to install your app. But, the iPhone’s market share isn’t ubiquitos even though they command a large share. Using an “HTML5 App” like Basecamp works on both iPhone and Android phones, as well as others.

Honestly, the “should I use this or that” debate is narrow-sighted. If you’re building a robust solution for your clients you need to take all factors into consideration. If you opt for an interative and dynamic Flash element to describe something, then you merely have to determine if providing a non-Flash alternative is also needed. This has been done for years on websites, and is why SwfObject was developed. It allows your HTML to have the alternate non-Flash content be default, but if JavaScript and Flash are available it is seamlessly replaced with the preferred Flash version. Of course, the alternate form is not required if your audience is defined, such as an intranet application where you know the users and what they use.