Flash Considerations
Flash can add fun and functionality to a web site. It can, also, add irritating, bandwidth wasting eye candy and hurt a site's search engine placement. Which of these possibilities occurs depends on the way Flash is used to address a site's purpose, where it is placed on a page, and how it helps visitors accomplish a web site task. In other words, it needs to be an integrated part of a site's design, not an add on.
The combined size of the two Flash navigation files below is 13 KB _ the swinging text file is twice the size of the 4 button rollover file.They are links to other pages that show examples of Flash in use.
Beneficial uses:
- Slide show movie to display a number of products or scenes.
- Interactive educational media.
- Games - learning or just fun. (check the fly tying Flash Lessons link at left)
- Convert AVI or Quicktime movies to Flash - usually smaller file size + can be interactive (for example the deer movie and Glacier NP peaks movie links at left show file size savings).
- Navigation systems that are interactive and small file size (links at left).
- Visual display to draw attention to section of a page.
- Add interest for your audience - consider age and purpose of your visitors (follow link on left to see Flash on a young students site).
Considerations:
- Careful placement on a web page ( most search engines do not yet inventory content of a Flash movie).
- What does Flash do better than html and JavaScript?
- Does motion or sound irritate a visitor - be reasonable and give visitor control of sound. ( An example of what you might not want to do -the bottom navigation button on the left is distracting to me as I try to proofread this section of the page.)