Flash vs. CSS/HTML

November 10, 2003 | 3 Comments

In his article Flash vs. CSS/HTML Mark Angeletti presents some pros and cons as it relates to Flash vs. CSS based Web design and development.

But I wrote it with the intent of informing novice Flash users about this technology. At the least, this article should allow you to communicate with prospective clients the reasons why a project should or shouldn’t be done in Flash.

I’m not going to debate every point he makes, it would take too long, and for the most part his assertions are fair and he has a seems to know what he is talking about. However, he assumes much and to me he seemed to be saying that Flash is somehow better than CSS/HTML for Web development.

He makes a grave mistake by leaving out the fact a site’s delivery method should be tied to things like its goals and its audience. This is a very common mistake that many Web developers make. We need to stop putting the cart before the horse. Unfortunately this seems to be a very common problem with Flash in particular. One of the reasons I started this site.

Without knowing the particularities of a project you are in no position to place one of these tools above the other. For a content heavy, informational site CSS would most certainly be better. For an entertainment or game driven site Flash might be better.

If you are a novice user of Flash and you’ve read Mark’s piece I suggest you take it with a grain of salt, especially when reading about Flash’s strengths. I want to be very clear on this.

Comparing Flash to CSS and HTML makes very little sense.

They’re both Web development tools and both have strong points and week points. The thing is they aren’t mutually exclusive. You can use Flash in conjunction with CSS very easily. In fact some of the best uses of Flash are when it’s used inside a well designed, CSS/XHTML layout.

This article give you very little to go on when basing your choice of delivery method. Flash can be good for some things but you need to really understand your project and all of it’s goals (user, business, etc.) before you make that decision.

You also would do well to understand all of the tools available to you before you make a decision, much less “communicate with prospective clients the reasons why a project should or shouldn’t be done in Flash.”

The last time I checked you need HTML to deliver Flash. A solid understanding of, at the very least, HTML is a pre-requisite to any Flash development. I would suggest learning as much as you can about CSS and what Web standards based development can do for you before you decide upon Flash for many Web projects.

This isn’t to knock Flash in anyway, only to point out that it’s articles like this help promote the misuse of what is a very powerful, very useful tool.

Filed under: Flash