Scratch

veggieman001 wrote:

midnightleopard wrote:

**FLASH IS AN ABOMINATION**
Where do I begin???
It is slow
It lags
It makes developers pay an $800 fine to a private company
It's losing support

HTML5 with Canvas is the future. It doesn't lag, it's open source and it's free as anything.
There is one problem with Canvas though, collision detection is nearly impossible with image sprites. Besides that,
Flash was a mistake

I don't really feel that it's a mistake. Flash can be a lot easier for children to use because it's less glitchy and more supported through plugins than HTML5 is, especially with the oh-so-common Internet Explorer.

Please don't consider this spam, it's true.

Before the decision of platform for Scratch 2.0, I have sort of tried to convince the team of moving on to newer web technologies. Some agreed, some did not. That's how discussion works.

I also believe that choosing Flash might not have been the best choice. It has some clear advantages over javascript+html (I'm intentionally not using the term html5 here, more on that lower down). Flash is, for example, much more capable of heavy graphics processing. And Scratch is a very visual environment. But Flash is indeed fading away, as web browsers become more and more capable of what Flash used to do.

"html5" is often generalized too much. People use it as a term to collect all interactive web applications made entirely in html and javascript, then claiming it's a very new technology. It's not. "html5" really is just a new standard, and just adds a few useful elements (like <audio>, <video> and <canvas>) to the existing html 4 standard. *that* is indeed new, and not very well supported.

But interactive web applications don't need html5 to work. The web has been moving away from Scratch, because javascript engines are becoming much more capable, things like jQuery make development so much easier than before, and because people realize this is the way to go. And html and javascript are very, very well supported. They don't depend on any private company for their existance. Every cellphone is capable of rendering html these days - and a lot of them can handle interactive webapps.

A long time ago, I made an environment that allowed you to drag and drop scripts looking exactly like Scratch, entirely in javascript and html (4!). (video) . That was one and a half year ago. Knowing how long development would take, I still think they should have chosen HTML5. And yes, now they'll be one of the last applications coming out still using flash.

However, moving from flash to javascript isn't a huge move compared to squeak -> flash. There's still hope 

robinp wrote:

Flash will be still suporting compters but Flash will be completaly dead once windows 8 comes out because windows 8 will NOT support flash nor java. >

from http://dailycaller.com/2011/09/16/microsoft-cuts-flash-support-for-windows-8-metro-version/#ixzz1e0tatkGA
Flash will still be supported in the Windows 8 desktop interface and the desktop version of IE.

JSO wrote:

I also believe that choosing Flash might not have been the best choice. It has some clear advantages over javascript+html (I'm intentionally not using the term html5 here, more on that lower down). Flash is, for example, much more capable of heavy graphics processing. And Scratch is a very visual environment. But Flash is indeed fading away, as web browsers become more and more capable of what Flash used to do.

NOT TRUE.
Canvas handles binary data like a pro. Flash crashes when you have to much.

JSO wrote:

However, moving from flash to javascript isn't a huge move compared to squeak -> flash. There's still hope

They are actually porting squeak to flash.

midnightleopard wrote:

They are actually porting squeak to flash.

No, they are rewriting Scratch in Flash.

cocolover26 wrote:

I don't believe you.
Anyway, I am more familiar with Javascript than Flash.
I am more familiar with HTML than Actionscript.

Actionscript and JavaScript are identical. I actually use flash scripting tutorials to help with JavaScript / Canvas games

Daffy22 wrote:

midnightleopard wrote:

veggieman001 wrote:

I don't really feel that it's a mistake. Flash can be a lot easier for children to use because it's less glitchy and more supported through plugins than HTML5 is, especially with the oh-so-common Internet Explorer.

Flash is much more glitchy. Internet Explorer also falls under the category of Abomination, so people should leave internet explorer out of the question. Compatibility with IE isn't important, if anything, purposely make websites that don't work with IE. That will get more people to delete it.

Dont mean to go off topic but whats wrong with IE? I quite like IE 9

And also Flash can put apps in the App Store, can make desktop apps, is GUI-based rather than text-based, and is among my favorite methods of programming.  And can HTML5 do animation?  Just wondering.

maxskywalker wrote:

Can HTML5 do animation? Just wondering.

Definitly. There are Flash emulators written in JavaScript. 

Daffy22 wrote:

Dont mean to go off topic but whats wrong with IE? I quite like IE 9

You need all sorts of special headers to make things work properly. It does not have as many JavaScript objects as other browsers and requires workarounds specific to IE. I do like that it is implementing W3C standards for CSS faster than other browsers though (round borders, gradients, etc.)

Laternenpfahl wrote:

Flash is dead. Lion doesn't support flash

Actually it does, its just not included with it. Just go to adobe.com and install.

midnightleopard wrote:

**FLASH IS AN ABOMINATION**
Where do I begin???
It is slow
It lags
It makes developers pay an $800 fine to a private company
It's losing support

HTML5 with Canvas is the future. It doesn't lag, it's open source and it's free as anything.
There is one problem with Canvas though, collision detection is nearly impossible with image sprites. Besides that,
Flash was a mistake

When someone can make any of these games in HTML, then I might believe that.  In addition, HTML5 is still not very well supported in many browsers, and Flash development often goes much quicker, and animation is also richer with less effort.  Furthermore, HTML5 is purely web-based, while Flash can create both web and desktop applications using Adobe AIR.  In this way, it is possible to program the online Scratch 2.0 project maker in the same way as the downloadable version, which will yield several advantages, including the fact that bug fixes and improvements will be common between the online and offline programs (besides, of course, the obvious disadvantage of being forced to learn a new language).  I believe that the term 'HTML5' is often used to much to mean more than it is.  While it is a very useful tool, it does not have the power to create many of the programs that I have used.  As a conclusion, from what I have seen, the MIT Lifelong Kindergarten Group seems to be focusing mainly on software languages rather than web, which gives them another reason to use Flash over HTML, CSS, and JS.  While I do respect the power of HTML, HTML5 is still not widely supported in many forms.  I will admit that I will likely be focusing on HTML5 in the future.