Goodbye To Flash Hello To Faster Loading Speeds For Websites

Adobe Flash was originally the medium of choice for professional web designers because the self-contained files that could be exported from it were the primary means of presenting visually and functionally elaborate web pages. Since Flash provided artistic tools similar to dedicated image software such as PhotoShop and Illustrator, web designers were allowed a greater level of sophistication than what would have been available at the time through the basic HTML, CSS, and JavaScript languages.

In the years since, however, exported Flash media files fell completely out of favor because they required lengthy loading processes before viewers' web browsers could even begin to display their contents. All of the visual assets and interactivity offered by Flash files were stored within them and had to be loaded all at once, and the file sizes themselves were often high enough that they were a strain on many users with lower connection speeds.

In stark contrast, modern web design relies on having users' browsers directly recreate visual designs through stretches of code that would be loaded by any web browser across a wide range of devices and platforms very quickly. Not only have HTML and other baseline languages expanded the scope of their possible functionality, but they also can receive dedicated expansions such as JavaScript libraries that allow designers to quite easily accomplish very specific and elaborate functions.

Since modern SEO renders websites' positions in SERPs partially dependent on them having pages that can easily be loaded, the advent of CSS-based animation has essentially rendered Flash files obsolete and potential liabilities to any serious websites that would depend on loading them. In July 2017, Adobe announced in a blog post that it will have stopped providing updates to the Flash Player by the start of the year 2021. While most Internet readers would approve of the dissipation of the Flash Player from the broader Internet experience because of its occasionally ungainly performance, some designers lament the shift away from the creative Flash program's toolset because it offered a visual method of allowing a designer to apply their artistic talents with fewer mechanical restrictions. For more information click here https://www.reddit.com/r/web_design/comments/ctkkzk/adobe_officially_announces_its_plans_kill_flash/.