Andrew Shorten @ Adobe

We announced some pretty significant new numbers in relation to adoption of the Flash Platform today – the full press release can be found on our website, but here are the all important stats:

55% of computers already have Flash Player 10

“Adobe Flash Player 10 was installed on more than 55 percent of computers worldwide in just the first two months of its release.” For more information see the published penetration statistics here.

Over 100 million installations of AIR

“In less than one year after its initial release, there have been more than 100 million installations of Adobe AIR.”

1 million downloads of developer SDKs and tools

“In the last 12 months, there have been over 1 million downloads of the AIR software development kit (SDK), the free open source Flex framework and Adobe Flex® Builder™ by developers.”

80% of online videos viewed using Flash

“Adobe Flash Player content reaches over 98 percent of Internet-enabled desktops, and over 80 percent of online videos worldwide are viewed using Adobe Flash technology.”

Today saw the release of a new desktop Twitter client – *chirp. It’s not like we needed another desktop client for Twitter, what with TweetDeck, DestroyTwitter, Spaz, Twhirl and others already available, but the unique feature of this new application is that it runs on Windows Vista only

Whilst there are undoubtedly many use-cases for building native OS desktop applications, I’m not sure that a Twitter client demands it, even if the animations are ‘beautiful’ (I don’t know if they are, as I can’t run the application here on Mac OS X).

Looking at this from both an application developer and end-user perspective, it seems pretty clear why AIR offers such a compelling solution. Take a look at my experience at trying to acquire a Twitter desktop application from the web:

*chirp – what do I do with this?

DestroyTwitter (built on Adobe AIR) – badge-based installer works on Mac, Windows and Linux.

Bottom line: if you want to reach the maximum potential audience for your application, build it on Adobe AIR.

This is 5th and final part in a series of posts publishing extracts from a forthcoming Adobe whitepaper – see the first entry in the series for background information and links to the other posts in the series.

Discussing the opportunities for RIAs in the enterprise is all well and good, but the real test is whether they are being successfully deployed and whether they are delivering upon their promise. From a technology selection standpoint, it’s also critical for Adobe to be able to demonstrate the use of the Flash Platform in this context, so that enterprises can have confidence in choosing our tools and technologies to build RIAs.

For me, the inclusion of case studies in the whitepaper was critical so as to highlight what has been achieved by our customers in the relatively short time since the release of Flex 3 and Adobe AIR, key components of the Flash Platform.

As well as highlighting the business benefits from deploying a Rich Internet Application, each case study demonstrates how the Flash Platform integrates with existing infrastructure – in the case of the decision support tool developed by Keytree, integration is with SAP’s R/3 platform; LMG’s Self Serve application aggregates large volumes of data from a custom back-end, whilst Model Metrics’ application extends Salesforce.com to provide a sophisticated and customised view of data.

A quick overview of each enterprise RIA is show below, but you can also download the complete whitepaper, entitled “The business benefits of rich Internet applications for enterprises” to get more information. For more case studies you might also like to review the customer success stories on Adobe.com for AIR and Flex.

If you are working on an enterprise RIA and would like to showcase it here, or would like to contribute to future discussions on the use of RIAs in an enterprise environment please contact me.

iApprove, developed by Keytree

“As a ‘one stop shop’ for approval-based decision-making, iApprove provides context for decisions throughout the enterprise structure. All types of decision-makers from floor managers to senior management and top level executives can see the details they need in one place at any time. Decisions on invoice approvals, leave requests, expenses submissions, and procurement orders can be made immediately through a single application.

Flex and Adobe AIR combine to provide high performance access to multiple back-end ERP systems, a highly flexible and intuitive UI, and easy deployment.”

Self Serve, developed by Loyalty Management Group

“Self Serve provides analysis of Sainsbury’s till figures overlaid with Nectar customer data direct to Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) companies such as Nestle and Birds Eye via an Internet-based application, and offers the fastest turnaround and most comprehensive breadth of shopping data available in the industry. It has access to analysis drawn from 100 percent of Nectar customer data, allowing users to analyse the hundreds of millions of transactions made by half of UK households annually. The tool provides access to trend data only – no individual customer details are released.

Self Serve provides analysts with new insights into the data, helps them identify trends, an enables them to build sophisticated reports in minutes. Retail buyers can now view the entire relationship between customers and the purchases that they make, enabling them to see how well products have sold. When negotiating they can see all the relevant business data from other suppliers, helping them put the best possible contracts in place for their business.

For LMG, basing Self Serve on the Adobe Flash platform has provided the flexibility to rapidly meet the needs of other clients with loyalty programs in place.”

Pharmo2Go, developed by Model Metrics

“As a leading Salesforce.com integration partner, Model Metrics is regularly commissioned to extend the Salesforce.com platform for its customers. Many customers engage Model Metrics to create a customized user interface tailored to their specific needs (such as inclusion of company branding), or to provide more sophisticated graphical richness to their Salesforce.com implementations.

Model Metrics decided to use an RIA platform to provide their users with rich, expressive, and intuitive interactions and allow them to work when disconnected from the network. The company needed technology to develop and maintain code as an ISV as well as meet the specific custom project needs of their clients.

To meet the demands of a high volume transaction environment, Model Metrics chose Adobe Flex and Adobe AIR, which enable the company to push data to the client. The clients use a local datastore, SQLite, to handle any data calls and queries. The technology choice was also driven by the need to address multiple platforms and browsers, work offline as well as online, and provide a rich and intuitive UI.”

After the success of last year’s Flex Camp in London, it’s great the we’re once again able to work with the community to put on another camp – this time, the focus is on everything creative and expressive related to the Flash Platform.

If you’re interested in learning about the latest features in Flash Player 10, Flash Professional CS4 and forthcoming developments for the Flash Platform then you should sign-up for Flash Camp London, taking place on the 26th February from 1pm – 8pm.

Featuring both Adobe speakers, including Mike Chambers, Lee Brimelow and Serge Jespers, along with a host of well-respected names from the Flash community, Flash Camp should have something for everyone.

For more details and to register check out the Flash Camp site.

This is part 4 in a series of posts publishing extracts from a forthcoming Adobe whitepaper – see the first entry in the series for background information and links to the other posts in the series.

Adobe has engaged with many customers as they consider adoption and deployment of their first Rich Internet Application; over the years we’ve published a variety of best-practice documents and worked with partners and developers to share their experiences on the Adobe Developer Center. Notable resources would include this article on Flex development best practices, the Flex Interface guide (download) and the contribution of the Cairngorm RIA micro-architecture to the open source community (see this article for an introduction to Cairngorm).

The excerpt from the whitepaper below outlines a high-level set of best practices that should be considered at the outset of a project, based upon some of the common mistakes that are made when undertaking a RIA project.

Whilst some of these best practices might seem obvious, they are easily forgotten or ignored in the rush to implement technology that is both new and exciting; we’ve certainly seen a number of projects whereby failure to follow these guidelines has resulted in a less than optimal user experience or an increase in development costs so as to correct issues, so they are worth keeping in mind.

In the next and final part of the series we’ll take a look at the three Enterprise RIAs that are featured in the whitepaper – an Editorial Commisssioning System used at News International (developed by Keytree), a retail analytics tool built by LMG (who operate the Nectar loyalty scheme in the UK) and an AIR application built by ModelMetrics that provides tight integration into Salesforce.com. We’ll also publish the final version of the whitepaper for download.

RIA development and delivery considerations

To make the most of RIAs in the enterprise, there are several important guidelines to consider.

Enterprise RIAs need a good architecture and sound design principles. In addition, the delivery process must be aligned to the roles and processes of the IT organization, including web content and application providers.

Hence the successful implementation of an RIA depends on many of the same requirements for delivering any successful corporate application:

• clear vision of the application goals and requirements aligned to a desired business outcome
• flexible and agile methodologies that promote short release cycles and interactive participation with all relevant stakeholders, especially the end customer
• good supporting tools that promote team collaboration and communication
• reasonably skilled resources, possessing a positive attitude and a willingness to learn
• strong user interaction and a clear separation of concerns with a robust governance model
• commitment, vision, and support from key stakeholders and management boards
• robust monitoring and analytics with sophisticated reporting facilities to ensure maximum effectiveness and productivity from the application and the delivery process
• integrated quality assurance for all phases of the delivery process

Although RIA-specific methodologies have yet to be standardized across the industry, there are areas where reuse of existing practices makes sense. Because RIAs are Internet–based applications that draw on existing web technologies and programming skills, many of the current web application design and usage patterns remain applicable, as do common fixes for known issues.

In essence, RIAs are client/server applications where the client can be deployed anywhere while the data stays on the server. Once again, existing design and coding patterns such as Model View Controller (MVC) can be applied. The process of gathering user requirements differs little from what is done today; however the tools for designing the UI are more flexible and sophisticated, making it easier to match user expectations to the requirements gathered.

Adobe has also codified years of experience and research in building expressive interactive applications and content in Cairngorm, a reference framework for RIA solutions to support clients in delivering effective RIAs.

Agile development methodologies are important to delivering timely and focused RIA solutions, but their use can lead to the reinvention of functionally similar components. So while there are significant advantages to using agile methodologies, they should be used within the context of a larger scope. It is important that RIA components and solutions are developed with a view of the potential for larger connected applications and solution strategies.

The move from linear development to state development is one aspect of development that becomes more important in delivering RIAs. If a user rearranges the UI of an RIA, the various components that make up the UI are still aware of each other and their interdependencies. Therefore understanding and applying state development patterns is vital to ensure that when components are added, deleted, or modified, the RIA does not break and fail.

Because RIAs place an increased emphasis on the UI, every opportunity to get better feedback from users, especially during the design and development process, should be seized.

User-driven best practices

From years experience working with clients, Adobe has assembled a set of best practices for enterprise RIA development:

• Think about the business problem that you are trying to solve, the business services that you want to deliver, or the business outcome that you want to achieve and make sure that your RIA design and delivery process is aligned to these goals.
• Keep your first RIA in the enterprise simple. Though you have the capability to use rich and expressive graphical animation or video, you do not always have to take advantage of it and overcomplicate things. Remember your audience and do not try to do much all at once. If your users prefer to work with a spreadsheet style report rather than a 3D pie chart, give them the spreadsheet approach. Use RIA technology to get information to them faster without changing how they work unnecessarily. Focus first on solving business problems with RIA, not on making a more impressive UI just because you can.
• Ensure that the application that you choose is suitable for implementation as an RIA. As noted previously, enterprise RIAs are proving to be best for data entry and where you have higher performance requirements than a traditional HTML-based system. If you need to show thousands of items, a RIA is much better than a traditional web-based application.
• Do not undertake an RIA project without having the right technical resources in place. This might sound self-evident but it is easy to overcommit.
• To maximize the usefulness of the UI, it is important to have properly trained GUI designers or developers with GUI flair. Using design teams to help design the application will ensure that any graphical elements you do implement will work properly rather than become noise.
• It is important to get a prototype application working end to end as soon as possible. This will help you to identify any integration challenges as early as possible so that they can be resolved in parallel with other development.
• Services-based architectures will make it easier to plug in the RIAs you create and then replace them down the line.
• Blend, don’t replace. There is little to be gained by spending time re-engineering or redesigning components that work well. For example, it rarely makes sense to start building an RIA to replace existing reporting tools that generate reports. Begin by blending new components in with existing solutions, rather than tackling a big design and build phase.
• Establish a steering committee to oversee RIA development. If an enterprise is going to embrace RIA across multiple systems, an overarching body that mandates the look and feel of RIAs will ensure consistency across different development groups around the company.

The users will ultimately determine if an RIA succeeds or fails. For them, the interest is in what the RIA allows them to achieve. Ease of use and stability of the application are two key factors in user acceptance, and RIAs have inherent advantages in both of these areas.