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Spider
06-04-2009, 02:08 PM
What is the latest on flash sites. Last I heard was that search engines couldn't read them so didn't index them. Has this changed?

Point in question - I have seen a particular flash template that would perfectly suit an idea I have for a website. I don't generally like flash sites, but that is a personal bias. This one was different, though. It was 'static' enough to not trigger my sensibilities and contained just the right amount of "playfullness" that I want. On pulling up the source, I couldn't read any of it, so I presume it is entirely flash.

Can a webpage be written part flash and part html, to gain the advantages of flash but still be indexed by SEs?

vangogh
06-04-2009, 06:25 PM
Adobe is supposed to be working with search engines to help them index Flash pages. I don't believe they are doing a great job at the moment. Ideally they were going to be able to crawl and index content and links, though both would need to be text within the application and not an image displaying text.

Here's a very recent post on the searchability of Flash (http://searchengineland.com/google-io-new-advances-in-the-searchability-of-javascript-and-flash-but-is-it-enough-19881) and Javascript. Scroll a bit to get to the Flash part.

Right now I still wouldn't recommend someone use Flash to build their site if search traffic is important to them. You can still add Flash application to a web page. Flash is always added inside the html of a web page and you can have as much html around the Flash as you want. The issue is really whether or not your content is part of the Flash application or if your Flash application is part of the content.

Is it possible someone could see the Flash template you like and develop it as an html site. It's quite likely that it would be possible.

dwiads
07-12-2009, 05:31 AM
Yeah I agree. Flash still hard to b index by search engine. but if web designer want to crate header with flash. i think it still good.

but I still cannot recommend design website 100% with flash. worst than that. I seen website using flash has only 1 url. what I mean, mostly html page if we click on page, the url will change. but some flash page, no matter we click on the link, the url never change..

vangogh
07-12-2009, 12:53 PM
I still cannot recommend design website 100% with flash

That's what I'd say too. Flash is fine as part of a page, but for now there are still problems associated with an all Flash site, where all of your content is inside the Flash application. The situation may change in the future, but right now I think most sites will do better if they aren't built entirely in Flash.

billbenson
07-13-2009, 02:53 PM
Remember as well that movement can be annoying. I was on a site last night and wanted to read it. The movement in the flash header was enough to make me scroll down so I didn't see it. It wasn't that much movement but it annoyed me. Had it been a short page and couldn't scroll down I would have left. AND I wanted to read the content.

Gotta be careful.

vangogh
07-13-2009, 03:32 PM
I get annoyed with too much movement on the page too, except where it makes sense. The animation is supposed to attract your attention and it certainly does. The problem too often is it pulls your attention so much to the point where you have a hard time focusing on anything else on the page.

Generally I prefer slower more gradual animation and once the header has gone through it's animation once it should stop and become a static image.

I've left many a page because of repeating animation.

Bill there are plugins and extensions to block Flash. I use one for Safari where I have to click any Flash on the page before it will run. Firefox has similar extensions, though I don't currently use one there.

billbenson
07-14-2009, 12:16 AM
I haven't used them VG, in part because I want to see what others do for site design. It may be something I want to see, and if not, I click a mean back button. Like you said, their are good uses for Flash as well, and I want to see those.

vangogh
07-14-2009, 12:24 AM
That's why I didn't install anything on Firefox. I want to see what other people do and I really don't mind seeing ads as long as they aren't too much. I forget what made me install the plugin on Safari. I think I was getting tired of a few sites I visit always autoloading some Flash, which was making it hard for me to read the content. ESPN was one of the sites. It seems like every article I click into I'd start reading and then the video would load temporarily moving the content around. A few other sites did the same.

With the plugin the space is still filled so I can see the layout. When I want to see the Flash itself it's just an extra click.

The other issue is browsers still tend to slow down a lot when they have to load Flash over and over again. Firefox was always hanging on me and the culprit was almost always Flash using up too much memory. Blocking it made the browser faster and more responsive.

billbenson
07-14-2009, 01:16 AM
Your example of flash being a resource hog actually changed the way I browse. I used to have yahoo and cnn up all the time. I don't anymore for the exact reason you describe.

I noticed a vast improvement in resource management when I went to Linux as well. I have yet to "have" to reboot because the computer was slowing to a crawl or had a coronary. Happened all the time in Windows.

vangogh
07-14-2009, 11:35 AM
I think the freezing has been a little less on my Mac than when I was on Windows, but it seems to be more of a browser thing than an OS thing. Blocking Flash really did improve the slow downs. I guess if you're not having any problems on Linux you wouldn't need any of these extensions.

billbenson
07-14-2009, 01:50 PM
The Linus install is 64 bit as well as most of the applications I'm using. That may be helping as well. I don't know if MAC is 64 bit and more importantly if the applications are. Thats one thing you don't see in windows. Even if the os is 64 bit, most software is 32 bit which defeats the purpose.

vangogh
07-14-2009, 02:07 PM
The 64 bit might be the key. I think the Mac is 64 bit capable, but maybe not all the software is. I really should check, huh? Mac OS X does sit on top of FreeBSD so it does have *nix under the hood.