More streaming / preloading issues... are they becoming obsolete?

I mean: probably all of you create sites that need to be seen today, so you really need to be very careful about your audience and internet connections.

However, since I am a teacher and designer wannabe, the pace I make sites is so slow that when I make a site I want it to be still kicking for a long time...

Having in mind that broadband is entering society at full speed, wouldn't it be a good idea to start creating entsites without having in mind how much kbs need to be downloaded?

Regards,
David

I think that it is true that the broadband explosion is just getting going and within 2-4 years, broadband access will be the norm as opposed to now where it is the exception.

When I first came here in September, everyone was OBSESSED with preloading - the average preloader I saw was 300+K.

Nowadays, the number of Preloader questions has dropped dramatically - either everyone has learned it - or we as a developing community are getting better - I think the average preload I see these days is under 200K.

Everybody preloads - Eric Jordan to Praystation. The difference is "how" they preload and "how much" they preload. They disguise the preloading and work pauses into the site to give things time to load. Also, their sites and pretty lean - under 200K for 2advanced.com's initial load. My own site has gone from preloading 187K, to 108K, to 67K as I have learned things about how to design in Flash.

What is dissapointing and somewhat sad is the Ultrashock intro that preloads 309K! You would think that with all that talent...

Flash is only the beginning... :)

I can see where you guys are coming from, but I think that it'll be a while before we can go hog-wild with our filesizes yet. I mean, apart from wanting to reach the largest possible audience (once broadband does become an absolute standard, there will still be people with modem connections... and analogue televisions, and 8-track casette players. ;)), even a T1 or T3 connection can have hiccups that will result in poor playback if you don't stream your movie intelligently.

In addition, you have to realize that there are a whole bunch of wireless connections to the Internet and so forth which will soon be crucial markets, and by far lack the bandwidth afforded to the home user.

All that having been said, I don't believe there is anything wrong as a designer to establish certain conditions for viewing your work, so long as you are trying to reach a specific audience.

All that having been said, I don't believe there is anything wrong as a designer to establish certain conditions for viewing your work, so long as you are trying to reach a specific audience

That's my point... I am not dependant on a salary from my designs (If I did I'd be in deep trouble! :D ) so I basically can establish the conditions I wish. I mean, people here in FK are probably gonna be the only ones that see my work appart from my family and friends, so I can simply say in a SC: beware, this is a 600 kbs download! And if people want to see my site, they will...
I am not trying to capture a huge audience, only to create an experimental entsite... from that position, I believe I can look at tomorrow. (BTW, my internet connections are pathetic, so I am the first with problems in order to see my own work in the net! :D )

Regards,

It could be a good idea to make a slighly altered version for the slower modems. 90% still are on 56 or below. So don't go crazy yet. I would make everything you want on the site, then remove some un-importaint features to make the low-bandwidth part. this does wonders for load times. also stick to AS more than tweening if you can. you can cut your load time in half, twice!

Dear Phooka.

me myself have a lan connection and i can asure you that it
not difficult to create an swf that even slows down on my pc.
i see sites like that every day so my guess is you are still
limited even if it's only for us and friends.
also you can have broadband but the pc it's on might not be able to cope with the information
some of the flash sites i see take up all my cpu space.
my cpu is 550. so that means that cpu's under that aren't able to display that flashmovie properly.

cheers eddie

1st off, you need preloaders if you have a big site. Most non-Americans think you don't because most non-americans have cable. But still about 90% of people with the internet in the US have 56k or less. My uncle is the president of the Ohio accountants foundry, and he only has 56k. There is lots of people like that who would be very likely to buy a site and only have 56k. So make sure it preloads and looks good for them too.

2nd. If you know how to use them, preloaders are easy to use. I find that the trick is to make the preloader part of the intro. Make a 5 or 10 second loop with lots of stuff in it. Almost like a pre-intro. Ad some quotes or poetry like lines and a few interesting simple animations. It will keep the viewer entertained and therefore it will also seem to load quicker than if they are staring at white text on a black bg saying "loading...please wait"

The 60 seconds to start a computer seems to take forever because it's boring, but watch 60 seconds of television and it seems to fly. Time is all relative, so take advantage of that in preloaders and make them enhance your site instead of taking away from the quality.

I've said this once, i'll say it again.

It doesnt matter how much KB it takes, it is what you do with it that counts. Even with the highspeed connections, we all need to learn how to optimize the size. Sure, we can be more lenient and add more spunk to it. Think of it as a bonus. I think broadband more of a way that flash sites can become more like 'normal' sites. If you have a big inital load, you'll just see the preloader again. If you have sites like now with broadband, no preloaders are needed. It all depends on what you do with the size.

Yeah but the high technology you use today may be obsolete tommorrow
Why not do all your sites using full screen streaming video considering that everyone will have fiber optics connections in the future? It's kind of like 30 years ago saying "why not do all of our videos using Beta since it's a superior video format and surely the industry will recognize that and everyone will be using it in the future!" or "Laser Discs are it!" Sure Thomas Edison Victrolas were built to last but that doesn't mean anybody's still using them today. At the rate technologies change you can't depend on anything being the same a few years from now. Building sites that only 5% of internet users can view is certainly not going to make a name for yourself.

This is a very important subject. Sorry to the people who have seen me say this before (third time), Flash was not meant to be used with preloaders, it was meant to stream.

Preloaders, defeat the whole purpose of why Flash was designed!!!

Quote:

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Originally posted by a_slosh
This is a very important subject. Sorry to the people who have seen me say this before (third time), Flash was not meant to be used with preloaders, it was meant to stream.

Preloaders, defeat the whole purpose of why Flash was designed!!!

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What do you mean? If flash was not intended to be used with preloaders, why if(_framesloaded>...) was added to the AS code? :D :D :D

Flash is not a "God" in itself. Is a wonderful tool, and tools can be used in a multiplicity of areas and in different ways! :D

Regards,

Quote:

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Originally posted by phooka

Quote:

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Originally posted by a_slosh
This is a very important subject. Sorry to the people who have seen me say this before (third time), Flash was not meant to be used with preloaders, it was meant to stream.

Preloaders, defeat the whole purpose of why Flash was designed!!!

---

What do you mean? If flash was not intended to be used with preloaders, why if(_framesloaded>...) was added to the AS code? :D :D :D

Flash is not a "God" in itself. Is a wonderful tool, and tools can be used in a multiplicity of areas and in different ways! :D

Regards,

---

eeeeeeeeeeeeeehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
maybe this is a good comparisson.

you car was made to drive faster than 80 miles an hour but
yuo're not supposed to drive any faster

we probably found out ourselfs how to create preloaders with it.the if frame is loaded can be used for a lot of things like a popup message or music starting or a pause in the animation etc.

:p Eddie