Flash Vs. Usability
Author: Theo Aartsma
08-11-2005
It is a known fact that Macromedia Flash gives usability experts a hard time. Or better yet, the other way around. In this article I will explore the advantages and disadvantages of Flash in the world of webdesign when it comes to usability.
Flash is improving. I think you can almost say that it can do just about anything a html browser can do, and on some grounds maybe even a bit more. With every new version they are getting more close to the approval of usability experts. Some of the good things they have introduced over the past years are the use of components (especially when it comes to using standard GUI), tab-indexing, back-button browser compatibility & some other minor adjustments.
But it’s not good enough. There still needs to happen more before they can be called a true competitor. Lets compare it with the situation of html. The first thing that is leading to major problems is the lack of good functions for blind people. These people need special software which reads the texts on the page out to them. For html these pieces of software exist, for Flash they don’t. When a blind user enters a flash page with this software, the software won’t read anything, end therefore the user will think the page is blank. To improve this Macromedia will have to start working with these software companies to reach a format in which Flash websites can also be read. Another solutions to this problem would be to make their own software for this and build it into the Flash Player.
Another problem can be found when we follow people who are visually impaired. They can read the computer screen, but only if the letters are big and have a high contrast. These people have the best experience when there is nothing on the website but a white background with big black letters on the foreground. For html you can create a structure with the tags for headers and inbetween there can be text with the paragrapgh tag. With a stylesheet you can remove everything but these paragraphs and headers and resize them. Leaving a white website with black lettering. Flash doesn’t have such a solution yet. Although it now is possible to work with stylesheets, and to remove items on the stage, it will take a certain amount of extra effort. And time is money so it would be better to automate this proces more (especially counts for the items you have to remove with scripting).
Next to these problems, you have the people with lack of movement in the arms or with RSI. They often can’t use a mouse to navigate a website, and are dependant of the keyboard for this. Macromedia Flash has some great features when it comes to keyboard usage. But as with the previous problem they are often to expensive to be implemented next to a normal navigation. They tend to need a lot of extra scripting and functional design work. Once again it would be a great feature if Flash would for example automatically mimic the keyboard functions of the current browser, in which the Flash movie is being played. This way a user wouldn’t even know they are on a Flash website. But on the contrary there has to be said that flash is on the right track when it comes to keyboard usage. They have recently implemented the tab-index feature, which is a huge step forward.
Next to these problems there are also some advantages that, I think, need to be addressed. And more of these come along with every new version of Flash. To sum up some of the most usefull: first there is the user definable changes of brightness and contrast on the fly. The flash developer can very easily put in a function with which users can set there own level of brightness and contrast. Secondly animation/visualisation posibillities to explain things to less advanced users (elderly, or very young children). Third easy audio implentation with al lot of features. For a blind user this will mean that he will be hearing somebody else his voice (other than the software voice) for a change, maybe even with appropriate ambiance and sfx sound. This could very well enrich the experience of such users.
And to take al little look at the future, for example the new functions with webcam registration points. Flash 8 makes it possible to register coordinates from a webcam and take action upon that. That is bound to help some people. In the future this could for example help people navigate a website with their feet.
A lot can already be done. And I see a bright future for Flash when it comes to usability, even higher than that of normal html. But for now my conclusion will have to be that it is still not good enough for heavy usability use. This mainly lies in the fact that it still takes to much work and work-arounds to be effective. In the future there needs to be more automation. But I believe and hope that they are working hard to improve this.
July 26th, 2007 - 15:04
This is exactly what I expected to find out after reading the title Flash Vs. Usability. Thanks for informative article