Adobe is on a fasttrack, signs of an Agile approach to development similar to Google. Here are 4 announcements indicative of that fast turnaround approach:
1)after just releasing Flash Player 10.2, Flash Player 10.3 is in beta with a number of refinements for cloud service use and user configuration of the player;
2)after promising in the late Fall better measures for social media usage, Adobe’s Omniture subsidiary is promising social media software for Q3 2011;
3)a tighter tie in of new Acrobat X with the online Acrobat.com services;
4)and the biggest announcement, Wallaby, an Air app that automatically translates Flash projects to HTML5 code.
Clearly Wallaby is a response to Steve Jobs declaration that Flash is “programma no grata” on all iOS devices – Touch, iPhone and iPad. However, the emergence of Android as the major player in smartphone and fast growing in tablets along with a similarly Flash-supportive RIM for its smartphones and tablet – this means that the prosperity and survival of native Flash is still an open question but not as dire s one might presume.
Performance benchmarks and feature differences between Flash and HTML5 will shape the well-being of Flash significantly. For example, right now Flash’s feature set dominates the HTML5+CSS3+SVG combined feature set. Benchmarks of native Flash versus Flash translated to HTML5 will likely appear shortly helping to clarify the scene. But again, this is fast turnaround from the announcement of Adobe’s intention to develop such software last Summer.
Hmmm, now what major major major software developer is still on 2 year and sometimes++ software development cycles?