[Sigia-l] The Engagement Platform: The future of app design according to Adobe

[Listera]

> Flash studio is not being completely embedded into Flex.

Correct. This is a shortcoming. In fact, in MS Expression it's all in one
place. MM approach has been to suggest that designers will create the
animations/skins/fancy behaviors in Flash and developers will just import
them into Flex to wire them up for further connectivity. Some of us have
been telling MM during the Flex beta period that this is ultimately a broken
approach. At that time MM suggested that component "skinning" will be made
much more "visual."

> They said it will have a lot of it, but nothing that will allow you to create
> the animations that are so easily done through the timeline today.

MM wanted to specifically exclude anything timeline-related from Flex. I
don't disagree with them. Developers are uneasy with the whole timeline
paradigm and Flex, according to MM, is primarily a developer tool.

Personally, I don't like the timeline. Certainly not the way Flash/Director
has handled it. It clumsy beyond belief and falls apart on long/large
projects. Animation is event-driven. I'd much rather have even-driven,
object oriented UIs. Where's mTropolis when you need it!
  
> Why shouldn't I be able to use Fireworks (or PHotoShop) in this iDE
> environment for example?

Photoshop doesn't understand much about non-bitmapped objects so that'd be
problematic, but I expect Illustrator to gain a lot of that functionality.
At one time Adobe saw Illustrator in that role for SVG. There's a bit of
Flash functionality in Fireworks but obviously nothing to write home about.

> What happens if my application actually is about video, or requires a video
> component? I have to move ina nd out of the IDE, thus manking it not so I as a
> DE goes. ;)

This *is* precisely the issue The Engagement Platform is supposed to solve.
  
> BTW, i'm less worried about developers just doing our design as I am
> about business folks. That's who they seem to think is going to do our
> jobs. That is quite disturbing.

I am a patient person and have a long-term view on this. Anything that
impedes the tyranny of the IT dept is good in my book. So, in that sense,
having business as contributors to the design/dev process and dilutors of
the IT tyranny is welcome. Yes, we will go through a period where promises
will be made such that if you are a business analyst capable of using Excel
or PowerPoint, heck, you can jump right in and "design." Like I said, stuff
happens.

When that misguided wave subsides hopefully we'll come back to Designers as
the sole, legitimate solvers of our
strategic/architectural/interface/interaction problems. And, at that time,
Designers will have these powerful tools to express their intent (functional
prototype) without the IT tyrants.

----
Ziya

"Innovate as a last resort."