As more and more people use their mobile devices for going online, they become more common to the annoyance when they see a website requires browser technologies that aren't supported by their device. When this happens, they may see a blank space that is a missing part of a page's content.
"Often, users are faced with the fact that the sites on the internet using technology that are incompatible with their devices. Visiting such these pages, they do not see anything but a blank screen, or can not use part of the contents of the site. Starting today, we will identify these web resources using a special algorithm and mark them when searching on mobile devices," said Google.
The main culprit for this problem is Adobe Flash, a multimedia platform that is once popular for websites to add streamed video or audio players, advertisement and interactive multimedia content. On mobile devices' operating systems,
Flash exists Android (since version 2.2), Pocket PC/Windows CE, QNX, Symbian, Palm OS, and webOS (since version 2.0). However, iOS isn't supporting Flash and so as Android since version 4.1.
Google continued to "fight" against Flash websites by releasing a new algorithm to detect web pages. When Google indicates that a page have. or is built by Flash, it will warn its users by saying something like this:
Google wants to make sure that its users have the best experience possible using its search app on their smartphones. Google explained how developers can create a website that works best on any smartphone or tablet. The company recommends using HTML5, which is supported by all devices, and offers a guide for building a responsive web design.
HTML5 is a great alternative to Flash because it's universally supported, and sometimes exclusively, by all devices. To help webmasters build websites that work on all types of devices regardless of the type of content they wish to serve, Google announced two resources:
- Web Fundamentals: a curated source for modern best practices.
- Web Starter Kit: a starter framework supporting the Web Fundamentals best practices out of the box.
By following the best practices described, developers can build a responsive web design, which has long been Google's recommendation for search-friendly sites. Google finally warns developers not to block its web-crawling bots, suggesting this may be another way to get blacklisted in mobile search.
Google's more to exclude Flash has been long predicted. In April 2010, Apple's co-founder and the late Steve Jobs, published an open letter explaining why Apple wouldn't allow Flash on the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad. This moment was regarded as the beginning of the end for Adobe Flash's future on mobile.
In the letter he cited the rapid energy consumption, poor performance on mobile devices, abysmal security, lack of touch support, and desire to avoid "a third party layer of software coming between the platform and the developer".
Since the release of iOS SDK 4.0, Apple tried to dismiss Flash technology in favor of the standard HTML5. In 2012, Adobe officially announced that it would stop developing Flash-player for smartphone browsers. This decision was influenced by several factors: the growing popularity of HTML5, the fragmentation of Android hardware and, of course, the position of Apple, which first refused Flash technology in the Safari browser on the iPhone and iPad.
Since then, Adobe is reaffirming its commitment to "aggressively contribute" to HTML5 future without browser plugins. For years, Adobe and Flash seemed to compete with the Open Web. Until recently, Adobe was clearly winning. The free (closed source) Flash plugin was installed in nearly every desktop browser and was the de facto standard for web video and multimedia. And then came the time when Adobe's goal was to make Flash just as ubiquitous on mobile devices. When Apple rejected Flash, it has its dream destroyed. And Adobe finally embraced HTML5 and the Open Web.
Flash was perfect in its time. There weren't any competitors and HTML5 was still in its infancy. Apple's move to HTML5 was considered a giant leap because the company depended on web standards that was in a totally different league with the popular Flash in terms functionality, ease of development and ubiquity.
In today's world, HTML5 had matured. With CSS3 and JavaScript, websites would be stable in every browser on every platform. However, even the mature HTML5 and WebKit lacked key functionality that Flash could provide. Compared to Flash, HTML5 still had a few big drawbacks.
While Flash mobile might soon see its doom, Adobe went busy contributing in the shortcomings of HTML5 and web browsers in order to stay relevant in the mobile industry.
