Adobe AIR is dead… long live Adobe AIR.
July 15th, 2009 Posted in Adobe AIRI’ve read a couple of posts today about Adobe AIR suggesting that the honeymoon period for Adobe AIR is over. Sarah Perez Over at ReadWriteWeb asks “Are you over AIR Applications?” citing AIR apps like TweetDeck, Seesmic and DeskTube as apps that have no good reason to be desktop apps saying “there’s no reason why these apps couldn’t just run in a browser instead”. Im not going to jump to the defence of AIR here, she’s right.
But what did people think? You have a couple of million web developers who all of a sudden can start installing their webservice consuming widgets and maybe use the file system. It was a revolution, but I agree that its over now. However, contrary to Sarah’s opinion I dont think AIR is no more. This first rush of fancy widgets was bound to happen and to be honest was never really about the users it was about the developers!
What AIR is about is desktop applications, it is not about website widgets that you can install. Adobe Platform Evangelist Ryan Stewart has made a valiant effort at defending his companies interests, but the two main points he uses are the same ones we were hearing when Adobe AIR was being marketed: “Web developers can leverage their skills” and “hey you can get at the file system” (not direct quotes).
Fear not the Ryan, Adobe AIR isn’t over, its maturing. These typical “selling points” of AIR seem more targetted at developers still. I think the massive avalanche of apps made by hobbyist developers has proven that you’ve won that battle now Adobe.
AIR is about rapidly making grown up, feature rich, engaging desktop applications. Being web aware shouldnt be “THE” selling point, its only a strength. The marketing effort should now be focused on the people with the money who can hire those hobbyist developers to make the next generation of desktop experiences.
I’m lucky enough to be involved in the making of an AIR app that strikes a good balance between web and offline. The BBC iPlayer desktop is all about the offline experience. Naturally, you need a network connection to download the content – and the website is all about discovering new content. The two sit next to each other neither trying to do the job the other is so great at doing (and its set to get better still in the future – sorry no spoilers would be more than my job is worth!).
There will always be developers who jump from one “next big thing” to next and inevitably there will be some good work done and happy users to boot. Its whether the move is made from developer novelty toy to serious commercial contender that will be key for Adobe AIR – there are plenty of signs that this is happening and lots more potential for growth, but whether Adobe AIR can shake off any negative connotations and go from strength to strength remains to be seen.
3 Responses to “Adobe AIR is dead… long live Adobe AIR.”
By mh on Jul 15, 2009
I think AIR will come into its own when its used away from an environment where you find a browser but still want to be connected to the cloud.
It will be about small screens and low powered devices, where a browser would normally take up too much screen estate or slow things down too much. AIR on devices makes a lot more sense to me.
By RefreshingApps on Jul 15, 2009
I have posted a reply to the ReadWriteWeb article over at RefreshingApps.com:
http://refreshingapps.com/news/article/response_to_readwriteweb_article_on_air/
By Walter Bese on Dec 15, 2009
I think that some features, like using multiple native windows, having access to he taskbar/deck/whaterver-you-call-it and, last but not least, the whole filesystem and network access thingy (dont forget about XSS and crossdomain.xml) could lead to the survival of the AIR-spirit. It will take some time and I dont think its clear that Adobe will win (there are plenty of other promising approaches). Especially the development policies of Adobe seem to slow down acceptance. I think one thing, that really is more than an annoyance is the up-front decision wheter it will be for Desktop or for the web. An director-like publish scheme (someone remeber that tool?) would have made the AIR-spirit way more popular in less time.