Flex 25 Jan 2007 07:03 pm
The “Rich” in RIA
If you are reading this blog, you are probably a fan of RIA just like myself, but have you ever put much thoughts into what makes a RIA “rich”? The word “rich” is a broad term, but the key idea is that it describes the user experience, from the users’ perspective. In this context, I think the word “rich” can be roughly divided into “rich UI” and “rich communications”.
Rich UI is a highly sought-after attribute for the customer facing web applications. Take the mapping application for example, the market was dominated by incumbents like MapQuest and Yahoo for years. When Google Maps came out, the simple yet powerful UI made a huge difference. That explains why online stores like Ericsson was so quick to adopt Flex.
Personally, I’m more intereted in bringing RIA into the enterprise. However, that’s where rich UI falls short. It’s a considerable risk for any in-house development shops to bring in a new technology like Flex. A pretty GUI is simply not enough to convince most IT managers. IMO, “rich communication” is where RIA realizes its value in the enterprise. Rich communication comes in many forms, such as rich media streaming offered by Flash Media Server, or realtime data synchronization powered by the Flex Data Services. The Flash/Flex platform would actually help IT shops reduce project risks due to its native support for rich communication and the OS neutrality.
Enterprise RIA is a really interesting topic for me and you can expect to see more posts on it in the future. If you are working on projects in this area, feel free to contact me. It’s always a pleasure to chat with someone working on the front line.
Need to bring your Flex project up to speed? Zee Yang is a freelance Flex developer with deep understanding of architecture and user experience. You can reach him at zee.yang@gmail.com.
on 16 Mar 2007 at 8:30 am 1.Tungsten said …
Another home for Flex RIA technology in the enterprise is for rapid development. I have been using it for a project to prototype the interface to a data analytics project. Thus far the reception has been great and there is a fair chance that Flash/Flex will be chosen as the technology for the “real” RIA.