[Geowanking] the iPhone discussion

[Richard Fairhurst]

Anselm Hook <anselm at gmail.com> wrote:

> gee i wouldn't mind being able to write native apps...  video-game  
> like
> interfaces and the like... things where the interface performance is
> important...
>
> using javascript is really like stepping 10 years into the past...

I always feel a bit like the proverbial black sheep in the open  
source community whenever I mention this, but: Flash.

It's fairly inconceivable that the iPhone browser will ship without  
SWF support - people will want to use YouTube, and a zillion other  
sites. SWF gives you the interface performance while involving less  
"coping with IE" headaches than AJAX. (I've just finished v0.1 of an  
newbie-friendly Openstreetmap editor, built entirely with Ming, and  
am generally optimistic about the responsiveness of its interface.)

In the past, open source folks have had serious reservations about  
Flash, and perhaps not without reason. But with Ming and MTASC on the  
authoring side, and the fast-advancing Gnash on the playback side,  
it's definitely worth consideration.

cheers
Richard