Flex Roadmap is Extremely Disappointing

KirkMower · ‎02-23-2014

http://blogs.esri.com/esri/arcgis/2014/02/21/esris-roadmap-for-web-developers/

...and baffling considering that the best ArcGIS Server applications have been built with it. I am very angry about this, but I am only person. Everyone here should comment above.

RobertScheitlin__GISP · ‎02-25-2014

Dave,

That said, as with all changes, I tend to wait out the initial whirlwind with these things, let the dust settle, and make an informed decision.

That's the thing... The dust is settling. Microsoft Internet Explorer has been the major hold back and now they are starting to grasp HTML5.

As I mentioned I am not real excited about this but the Army taught me to be flexible. I have been dabbling in the JavaScript API for a while now as I know this day would come.

raffia · ‎02-25-2014

Dave,

That's the thing... The dust is settling. Microsoft Internet Explorer has been the major hold back and now they are starting to grasp HTML5.

As I mentioned I am not real excited about this but the Army taught me to be flexible. I have been dabbling in the JavaScript API for a while now as I know this day would come.

Robert, what is your impression so far? For a typical app for JS and FB, is JS faster given all other parameters stay constant?

Thanks

BjornSvensson · ‎02-25-2014

About Javasctipt, I have a basic question, as I understand, all the code is executed on the client side

Yes, but this is no different than a flash application.

RobertScheitlin__GISP · ‎02-25-2014

Raffi,

Developing apps is painfully slow for me as I am just learning. but the one thing I can say is that if you are working with a lot of graphics the JS API is much quicker and better at handling 1000s of graphics. One of the real hard things for me so far has been my lack of enough knowledge to put together a dojo dialog widget that has an item renderer (or the JS equivalent). But I plan on spending some time with the JS API developers as the Dev Summit and get that part under my belt hopefully. I plan on continuing my Flex Development for a long time yet. What I have been trying do do in my spare time is taking smaller Flex API apps and attempting to duplicate all the functionality in a JS app.

raffia · ‎02-25-2014

Yes, but this is no different than a flash application.

Well am sure there is a way around everything these days, I was referring to how easy it is to trace JS code just by viewing the source of the html doc. We protected the swf from decoding using a commercial software and I couldn't decode the final swf using a variety of ways, am sure there is a way, it just seems to be that much difficult from JS code.

raffia · ‎02-25-2014

Raffi,

Developing app is painfully slow for me as I am just leaning. but the one thing I can say is that if you are working with a lot of graphics the JS API is much quicker and better at handling 1000s of graphics. One of the real hard things for me so far has been my lack of enough knowledge to put together a dojo dialog widget that has an item renderer (or the JS equivalent). But I plan on spending some time with the JS API developers as the Dev Summit and get that part under my belt hopefully. I plan on continuing my Flex Development for a long time yet. What I have been trying do do in my spare time is taking smaller Flex API apps and attempting to duplicate all the functionality in a JS app.

Thanks Robert;

The handling of loads of graphics was very important as FB really slowed with over 200 points or more.

I totally understand ESRI's decision here, it was coming and I think the first clue was iOS's lack of support for flash. Maybe just the timing could have been better by either making this announcement with the release of the 3.0 API or make the announcement now as they did but pull the plug with the last release of a 4.x API.

PaulHastings1 · ‎02-26-2014

i'm not really sure JS/HTML5 has "won" anything yet. and pretty sure ms & IE hasn't been holding it back especially in the mobile space. the largest mobile apps are all pretty much native (facebook--recall that facebook made a big stink when it dumped HTML5 for native, twitter & hey even gmail). pretty sure few cared what ms & IE were doing. also, i think HTML5 is not even a small blip in the iOS citadel (though i'm less familiar w/apple than android, so somebody correct if i'm wrong).

i guess we'll have to wait & see what JS API version 4 looks like.

i really do wish ESRI would open source the flex bits especially in light of apache flex & flexJS. let the community keep pace w/server developments.

RobertScheitlin__GISP · ‎02-26-2014

Funny, I don't remember anyone saying that HTML5 has won. When I as mentioning IE as holding back HTML5, it was more to imply as far as a so called modern browser their failure to adopt of the standards was not helping. Nothing is going to beat native but that is one of the main points of HTML5 is for developers not to have to develop several version of an app for each device platform. flexJS is a great move in a good direction but it is not even in Alpha yet. I am enjoying the work the Apache Flex team is doing and Flex as a language is going to be around for many more years.

PaulHastings1 · ‎02-26-2014

you "implied" as much 😉

yes flexJS is pre-alpha but by the same token HTML5's not a standard. and heaven help us if the browser vendors go nuts again and "standards" based development starts emphasizing the "plural" again.

and sorry, no, HTML5 doesn't yet ensure 100% device-neutral apps, its all up to what that particular device's browser/version supports. not every bit of HTML5 is universally supported--though truthfully i'm not exactly sure what parts of the HTML5 not-yet-a-spec spec would be important to our little niche. maybe this is a place to start looking?

http://html5test.com/index.html

and since you seem to be talking timeliness, AIR comes close to that goal right now, at least its fairly painless to aim at different devices.

KomanDiabate · ‎02-27-2014

HTML5 has not won yet, maybe one day but we don't know that yet, cause no one can predict the future, rite.

Check the link below and see what Mark Zuckerber from facebook quoted about HTML5.
"Mark Zuckerberg: Our Biggest Mistake Was Betting Too Much On HTML5"

http://techcrunch.com/2012/09/11/mark-zuckerberg-our-biggest-mistake-with-mobile-was-betting-too-muc...