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The slow death of html-integrated Flash
Currently, Apple is under a lot of pressure to add Flash to the iPhone and iPad. Since, according to Adobe (http://www.adobe.com/products/player_census/flashplayer/), 99% of internet-enabled PC's have Flash installed, it's fair to say that Flash is currently a well-adopted platform. And I guess that about 70% of the online video-content is Flash. But, no Flash for iPad. It's a CPU hog and old technology, according to Steve (http://www.pcworld.com/ar...obs_bad_mouths_flash.html). Is he right? Well... a bit.
The problem here isn't Flash, or at least wasn't. 1) It's the lack of Flash-like features in native browser technologies such as HTML that should have been there. 2) It's the fact that HTML isn't a very good RIA-platform.
Why is YouTube using Flash for displaying movies? Because HTML didn't support it natively. Why is it that a lot of RIA apps are built in Flash or Silverlight? Because it's much easier to do than a RIA app in HTML and therefore you get better results. If you don't believe me, take a look at the Silverlight-version beta of Bing Maps. It's not a coincidence either that Google Street View is Flash. Ever tried building something like that in HTML?
I see a lot of change in the RIA world. HTML 5 supports video and a canvas, making it a lot easier to create animation, transitions, and video-based websites and thus deprecating the use of Flash for a lot of cases in websites that use Flash for that right now. But, the dark side of it is that it's a very premature technology. Not all browsers support it. Developers around the world still need to understand how to work with it. HTML 5 isn't done yet. And most importantly: it won't support all RIA cases.
With these things in mind, I think the following will happen in the next 3 to 5 years: HTML 5 will replace flash for video in the browser and cases where Flash was used for fluid animation and font embedding. Technologies such as Flash and Silverlight will be used more and more outside the browser (Adobe Air for example) or standalone in the browser for standalone connected applications instead of integration with HTML.
And for what it’s worth: Although it has some implications, overall, I think that’s a good thing.
The problem here isn't Flash, or at least wasn't. 1) It's the lack of Flash-like features in native browser technologies such as HTML that should have been there. 2) It's the fact that HTML isn't a very good RIA-platform.
Why is YouTube using Flash for displaying movies? Because HTML didn't support it natively. Why is it that a lot of RIA apps are built in Flash or Silverlight? Because it's much easier to do than a RIA app in HTML and therefore you get better results. If you don't believe me, take a look at the Silverlight-version beta of Bing Maps. It's not a coincidence either that Google Street View is Flash. Ever tried building something like that in HTML?
I see a lot of change in the RIA world. HTML 5 supports video and a canvas, making it a lot easier to create animation, transitions, and video-based websites and thus deprecating the use of Flash for a lot of cases in websites that use Flash for that right now. But, the dark side of it is that it's a very premature technology. Not all browsers support it. Developers around the world still need to understand how to work with it. HTML 5 isn't done yet. And most importantly: it won't support all RIA cases.
With these things in mind, I think the following will happen in the next 3 to 5 years: HTML 5 will replace flash for video in the browser and cases where Flash was used for fluid animation and font embedding. Technologies such as Flash and Silverlight will be used more and more outside the browser (Adobe Air for example) or standalone in the browser for standalone connected applications instead of integration with HTML.
And for what it’s worth: Although it has some implications, overall, I think that’s a good thing.
Quality vs. Functionality
Building software on a budget is never an ideal situation. You are forced to make a trade-off between quality and functionality. You cannot have both or you will go over budget.
Most of the time, quality is forgotten and the budget is used for more functionality. The problem with this approach is that more functionality does not always helps you get the job done better. Roughly 80% of the time, you are using 20% of the functionality. Another problem is that forgetting quality almost always leads to going over budget, because buggy software needs to be fixed.
You should find and build that 20% core functionality first and make sure it meets your quality criteria. It will keep you within budget and won’t clutter future release schedules with bug fixing old releases.
Most of the time, quality is forgotten and the budget is used for more functionality. The problem with this approach is that more functionality does not always helps you get the job done better. Roughly 80% of the time, you are using 20% of the functionality. Another problem is that forgetting quality almost always leads to going over budget, because buggy software needs to be fixed.
You should find and build that 20% core functionality first and make sure it meets your quality criteria. It will keep you within budget and won’t clutter future release schedules with bug fixing old releases.
Don't forget the process
A lot of line-of-business software automates a previously physical process. For example: project planning used to be a process on the white board and paper schedules, but nowadays this is done with software. Planning a project can therefor be done faster, cheaper and better.
An anti-pattern of line-of-business software development is developing unneeded software. It seems like a great idea and software is used to spawn the new business opportunity. The process and business case are forgotten. The risk here is that the software won't match your expectations because there is no cohesion between the software and the underlying process.
So, if you want to be safe: set up a business case, define the goals, define the process and be sure it works. Use software to support the process instead of being the process and dodge a lot of frustrations.
An anti-pattern of line-of-business software development is developing unneeded software. It seems like a great idea and software is used to spawn the new business opportunity. The process and business case are forgotten. The risk here is that the software won't match your expectations because there is no cohesion between the software and the underlying process.
So, if you want to be safe: set up a business case, define the goals, define the process and be sure it works. Use software to support the process instead of being the process and dodge a lot of frustrations.
Problems migrating a VM from Virtual Server to Hyper-V
If you are migrating a VM from Virtual Server to a Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V environment, there is a point where you want to install the virtual guest services. It's like the VM Additions, but with more features. It adds speed, mouse support over RDP-sessions and some management options.
But, when I wanted to do just that, there was a problem. I got strange errors (Error 32000) that stated that the virtual guest services couldn't be installed and in the event log of the guest I got errors that stated that a SCSI device "disappeared from the system". Wait, what?
This is the point I found out that my VM still had the old VM additions of Virtual Server installed. It could be the problem. Maybe there's some interference between VM additions and virtual guest services. But when you try to remove the VM addtions, you get errors that the guest OS is not a supported OS. That is a strange error, considering that the additions are in fact already installed and that you just want to remove 'em.
Well, I did some Googling and found the solution. The trick was to mount the VHD's in a Virtual PC VM. This gives you the opportunity to uninstall the VM Additions without errors. The resulted VHD's can then be remounted on the Hyper-V VM and, hurray(!!), the virtual guest services installed without any problems.
But, when I wanted to do just that, there was a problem. I got strange errors (Error 32000) that stated that the virtual guest services couldn't be installed and in the event log of the guest I got errors that stated that a SCSI device "disappeared from the system". Wait, what?
This is the point I found out that my VM still had the old VM additions of Virtual Server installed. It could be the problem. Maybe there's some interference between VM additions and virtual guest services. But when you try to remove the VM addtions, you get errors that the guest OS is not a supported OS. That is a strange error, considering that the additions are in fact already installed and that you just want to remove 'em.
Well, I did some Googling and found the solution. The trick was to mount the VHD's in a Virtual PC VM. This gives you the opportunity to uninstall the VM Additions without errors. The resulted VHD's can then be remounted on the Hyper-V VM and, hurray(!!), the virtual guest services installed without any problems.
TechEd 2008 Developers: An introduction
This week is Microsoft's TechEd 2008 Developers in Barcelona and gladly my employer gave me a change to go visit it. My goal was to write a blog post about it every day, but frankly the schedule is tight and Barcelona beautiful. That means that afterwards I don't go looking for an internet cafe to do my blogging. Instead, me and some of my colleagues go looking for a nice restaurant and go to bed early, because the sessions begin early in the morning again.
Like I did with the DevDays, I will be addressing some of the sessions I attended, but since my time is limited, I won't be able to do that this week. Instead, some visual impressions of the past days:
Waiting for the Keynote speech to start
Jason Zander (General Manager Visual Studio) talks about Visual Studio 2010 and what developing for Windows 7 means.
Waiting outside before the sessions begin. In the afternoon It is about 20 degrees celcius in Barcelona.
Barcelona Bonus Photo
The columbus statue near the busy street La Rambla. One of the many beautiful things in Barcelona.
Like I did with the DevDays, I will be addressing some of the sessions I attended, but since my time is limited, I won't be able to do that this week. Instead, some visual impressions of the past days:
Waiting for the Keynote speech to start
Jason Zander (General Manager Visual Studio) talks about Visual Studio 2010 and what developing for Windows 7 means.
Waiting outside before the sessions begin. In the afternoon It is about 20 degrees celcius in Barcelona.
Barcelona Bonus Photo
The columbus statue near the busy street La Rambla. One of the many beautiful things in Barcelona.