Microsoft is shifting its strategy on Silverlight. It's coming out in support of HTML 5, but maintains that it will still support Silverlight—especially it's "streaming media" capabilities.
Is HTML 5 ready for prime time? Thoughts?
Microsoft is shifting its strategy on Silverlight. It's coming out in support of HTML 5, but maintains that it will still support Silverlight—especially it's "streaming media" capabilities.
Is HTML 5 ready for prime time? Thoughts?
Yes. It's also taking out a dent on Flash. When you see Adobe, Apple, Microsoft, and Google all coalescing around a technology it will happen whether it is ready or not. Plus you have the entire tech chain from producer to consumer involved in that group.
ReplyDeleteHTML 5 is definitely not ready for prime time. There are still significant adoption hurdles to be overcome as well as the evidence that we will have true compatible across all major browsers. Significant progress has been made and will continue to be made over the ensuing years, but using HTML 5 for your application you would have significant less of an audience today then you do with Silverlight (less than 60% of installed browsers support some form of HTML 5 today).
ReplyDeleteAll that said it is ridiculous that our industry continues to buy into the single solution for everything proposition. If history has taught us anything it is that in software there will be room for multiple solutions and perhaps that it is ideal that there are options. If mobile has taught us anything over the last three years with the advent of Android and iOS it is that native apps still provide a superior experience. There are those who maintain that HTML 5 capabilities will make those differences go away. Perhaps - but lets see some evidence before we coronate and king HTML 5 as the last solution we will ever need.
Silverlight is popular for streaming video applications. The NFL, Olympics and Netflix are all customers. Those can never be on HTML 5, period. Why? HTML5 doesn't have DRM.
ReplyDeleteAlso, Silverlight and Flash provide the same experience regardless of the browser. HTML (regardless of the version) has never done the same.
There are also a multitude of things that HTML5 simply can't do, too many to mention here. Plugins aren't going away any time soon.
HTML5 as a concept is definitely moving the right direction. We're actively using portions of it as it makes sense to us for the user experience. Same can be said for CSS3. You just need to take a measured, thoughtful approach to implementation.
ReplyDeleteThe thing about HTML5 is you have to consider each feature separately. For example, contenteditable is fully supported by IE6,7,8, Firefox, Safari, and Chrome. Canvas is supported in all modern browsers (IE9, Firefox, Safari, Chrome). WebGL is in the beta builds of all modern browsers but IE9. Grouping all the "HTML5" technologies into a single buzzword and that putting it up against silverlight or flash won't produce a clear vision of what's happening.
ReplyDeleteAre the technologies of HTML5 replacing the need for browser plugins? Most definitely, though the plugins still have their narrowing niches. But having come from an Actionscript/Flash background I find I can build applications much faster in the browser's native environment - HTML5.
Are these features ready for primetime? Well, all modern browsers support the following already:
canvas
font-face
audio
video
rgba
design enhancements (border-radius, box shadow)
CSS3 animation
CSS3 transforms
geolocation
local/session storage
SVG
web sockets
history management
etc
If you're building a web application that needs features like these, it makes sense to build using HTML5 technologies and have it work on all modern desktop browsers and mobile platforms. Then you simply add a temporary "gradeful degradation" fallback for legacy browsers if you choose to support them. I say temporary because all new work on browsers (even Microsoft's) is focused on adding more and more HTML5 support. But anyway, the point is the majority of HTML5 features are ready for primetime. If we're not already using them, we're already behind.
I have passed something?
ReplyDeleteIt is my hope that ALL the Church websites (especially FamilySearch and its variants) will be converted in HTML5 so that I can most productively utilize my iPad during Church meetings. It seems that many of the new beta sites or FamilySearch sites are still relying upon Flash for many tutorials and video presentations.
ReplyDelete