Internet Consulting, Web Hosting, and Website Design: LLT Net Services

Flash is a vector animation software program created by Macromedia. Flash is now used extensively on the web mainly as animated advertising banners but also as website navigation elements and sometimes for entire websites.

As with most everything there are pros and cons to using Flash animation.

Pros:

Smaller file size - Flash files are smaller than other graphic formats so they load faster, even for those using a dial-up connection.

Flexibility - There's not much you can't do visually with Flash especially in the areas of animation, navigation and visitor interaction.

Embedding media - Flash gives you the ability to embed different audio and video file formats into your Flash animation

Free player - The required Flash Player is free to download and installs quickly and easily.

Integrates with HTML - Can be used as site navigation along with HTML. Can easily be placed on the page as an advertising banner or animated presentation.

Cross browser compatibility - Most web browsers support Flash and it will always render correctly because of the Flash Player requirement.

Cons:

Flash Player required - The visitor MUST have the Flash Player installed or they will not be able to view your Flash animation.

Search engines cannot index Flash - Since Flash is animation the search engines cannot index the information as it does with an html page. This can be especially detrimental to websites which are solely created using Flash.

Can be annoying - Too much animation can annoy your visitors. Animation of any kind should always be used sparingly.

Expensive - Time consuming and expensive to create.

We strongly discourage our clients from depending too heavily on Flash and we no longer create all Flash sites. For more information on Flash or to discuss a project using Flash please feel free to contact me.

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