.NET magazine reports this month that Adobe has released a "Flash-to-web-standards converter" called Wallaby, that basically takes your FLA file and spits out standards compliant HTML5 with accompanying JavaScript.
I must say I was waiting for Adobe to make a move like this ever since Apple got the mardies and decided to not support the Flash Player on its mobile devices. But I thought it might be a feature of CS6, I didn't expect it to be a free Adobe AIR app that I could download today.
.NET quotes senior product manager at Flash Professional as saying "Wallaby's initial focus is on converting banner ads and simple animations to HTML5, to cater for iOS, but that future development will be driven by consumer requirements..." buy .NET for more info.
So, while not expecting great shakes for some of my more advanced Flash work, I can't wait to see what it can do... I'm going to have a play.
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I'm pretty sure this will always be far from perfect. For the hassles and time of trying to design FLAs so that they're compatible with Wallaby, you might-aswell develop the application natively in the first place, I think...
ReplyDeleteHaha, you could be right James. One thing is clear however, there will be a gap in the market for an HTML5 authoring tool that rivals Flash's power and sophistication.
ReplyDeleteIf I were Adobe I would be pulling out all the stops to make sure Flash is *the* authoring tool for online interactivity of any kind - and that would include output for HTML5 from within Flash, even if you do, as you say, do it natively (rather than conversion), but helped by Flash's massive toolset and mature workflow.
Picture a future release of Flash that allows native development of AS2, AS3, Lite and HTML5 apps.