Thursday, July 27, 2006

Why all the Flash based documentation? It's about languages ...

I’ve been a bit annoyed by all the Flash based software documentation I come across. I like the speed, convenience and portability of reading. I couldn’t figure out why these small demos were taking over the world…

Until I visited the BlogJet site (my Windows blogging client, alas, there’s nothing this good on the OS X side) and noticed the developers were Russian. Then I tried the Flash demo and learned something important quickly.

A lot of my favourite applications are developed by small companies with few or no employees who can write good English language documentation. It’s far cheaper and easier for these companies to illustrate key issues using a compact and fast Flash demo.

Reading and typing were very important when I was growing up. They’ll probably still be important 10 years from now … On the other hand —– 40 years from now? Who can say. Besides, not everyone thinks in words

 

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