Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: dial up, flash, flex, framework, RSL, size, widgets
I have been looking into flash and flex for a few months now. I am really impressed with how fast i can assemble application or a widget with the framework and CS3. It is super fast and easy. But there are no free lunches, so what’s the cost?
Aside from the cost of the software, there are more detrimental set backs. The one i’m referring to is the size. For lucky broadband users, they might not notice the increase in sizes of webpages. But with, so many dial up users (close to 50%), developers should really take size into consideration.
Flex is a Fatty. There is no nice way of putting it. There are a few tricks to eliminate some of the excess baggage though. Using modules and caching are the key ones that I will look into.
Modules
Modules, modules, modules. Load them only when needed, instead of having one gigantic file. Use the module loader tools available. Link here
Caching
Caching uses cached and signed libraries (RSL, runtime shared library) in the client’s flash player to greatly reduce the size of the app. The main library to note is the flex framework. An empty flex application is 140kB of data. The average flash ads you see is around 30kB. By using the flash player’s cache, you can really save plenty. This is a great move by Adobe. It sure did a solid for developers. There are a few problems with this solution
1) only later flash players will support this, v 9.0.115 or later.
2) http connections are needed to access the files.
I don’t want to be serving flash ads that are 350kB in size. Publishers don’t want to have a loading window and waste valuable ad viewing time. Users with dial up won’t wait 7+ secs to view an ad. Trouble. I guess the only solution (where i’m in control) is to test for clients’ connection speed to determine what to load and to test for flash player version. Or maybe migrating parts of the flex framework to flash? That would really kill the simplicity value of flex.
Aside, here is a great site that analyzes your website, break it down, and tells you how much dial up users suffer. Link.
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