Most of the early content developers and e Learning adapters had a hard time struggling with multimedia content. The files were heavy, streaming was slow and sluggish and on the user side the dial-up Internet speeds compounded the misery. To depict a screen transition would need the skills of the best graphics developers to reduce loading time and hence the file size. But all of us were patiently waiting for the inevitable. And the answer lay in the Flash versions introduced around the turn of the century. Flash made it possible to create multimedia rich content that could be run through web sites. It was an elixir for designers. It still used vector graphics to enable strong control over display. However there were some compromises when compared a 3DMax or Photoshop.

As they say “you can’t have your cake and eat it too”. Content organizations keep taking to Flash in hordes. This has probably been one of the reasons for the strides made by Flash since it’s initial days. It has now moved beyond a multimedia tool. Flash through it’s scripting tool, Action Script (popularly known as AS1 or AS2 or AS3 depending on versions), has created a niche for itself in managing and integrating content development. AS2 was a revolution even for application developers. Entry level content management systems and learner management tools became easy to develop and implement. Small and medium sized organizations need not spend precious dollars on licensing complex applications. However larger deployments have started moving to Flash too. Reason is the ease with which it handles large data chunks through XML. Flash has set the expectations for the future releases to keep mapping the changing web development needs.

(Author: Vinay Gupta)