Flash in Local Gov Websites

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Friday, August 15. 2008

Flash in Local Gov Websites

One of the projects I assign my students is a report on a Web mapping format. They detail its structure, how it's used and demo an app that uses it. The Flash implementations they've found have always been in newspapers or other publicly facing sites and the apps were rather "simple."

So, I was pleased to see the local paper touting an update to the Morris County, NJ mapping site. While the article doesn't mention any technology, the client side is Flash; I can't be sure of the back end. It's a quite complex app, the kind I've not seen implemented in Flash. It must be pretty slick; it was named site of the day by Adobe earlier this year. Do be warned: you may need to read the help to use the site!

Posted by Adena Schutzberg at 07:51 | Comments (8) | Trackbacks (0)

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You are looking at an ESRI ArcGIS Server application.

#1 James Fee (Link) on 2008-08-15 08:48 (Reply)

Cool. Is there a trick to determining that?

#2 Adena Schutzberg (Link) on 2008-08-15 09:48 (Reply)

I can tell because of how it looks (what a loser I must be) and operates, but the Google also leads you here: http://resources.esri.com/showcase/index.cfm?fa=showcase&StartRow=1

#2.1 James Fee (Link) on 2008-08-15 10:17 (Reply)

Backlinks; never thought of that! Thanks.

#2.1.1 Adena Schutzberg (Link) on 2008-08-15 10:28 (Reply)

James does raise an appropriate question in his related blog "...is this the kind of GIS web map site that should be the public face of a county?" (James Fee GIS Blog 8/15/08)

And I have to answer that, for Midland County, TX, which is my area of GIS responsibility, I could never serve such a wonderfully complex project to my public and expect it to be navigated. We have confined our admittedly data-rich public interactive mapping to a relatively simple IMS format and have chosen to make shp and dwg files of our datasets available for download for those (mainly engineering firms) that are GIS and CAD-literate. That compromise sees to work well for us.

At the end of the day, I want our web product to be useful and used by anyone who has internet access. (But I greatly admire Morris Co's expertise with ArcGIS Server!!)

Adena, James, great commentary from you both, and thanks for the insight about the site and its inner workings.

#2.1.1.1 Bill Hodge (Link) on 2008-08-15 15:15 (Reply)

And then I ask -- how is this mapping application read by screen readers for 508 compliance?

There's still little hope for any Flash app to become as helpful toward anyone with disabilities -- though, one would have to understand the technologies involved and where such an application is intended (audience), to understand the needs for accessibility on a government server. Flash will always fail versus other technologies that do have an opportunity to address such an issue.

Apps that still contain an incredible amount of Javascript in their API's, for example, still have the capability to be read by a screen-reader -- because the maps themselves can still be implemented in a semantic way within the web documents they are built from. In other words -- each document key still has valuable meaning to a reader -- though, often times the readers do have to catch-up with some ingenuity coming from those developing the mapping app.

To a certain end-audience -- Flash is wonderful and useful. I have to frown on its use via a government server that is required by mandate to supply 508 compliance.

My explanation and philosophy may seem a little bit convoluted -- and I'm sure there will be those who'll argue alternative points. But, that's the nature of this little thing we call technology.

#3 Daniel (Link) on 2008-08-15 19:55 (Reply)

This isn't a Flash application, per se, it is a Flex application—and the difference is significant. The Flex framework provides a great many improvements that a) make development much faster and easier—especially for folks who prefer to AVOID using Flash CS3 (or previous); b) makes it easy to address most of the issues that have challenged (plagued) anything Flash-related in the past (history, accessibility, etc.).

In fact, a Flex application can provide one of the most meaningful experiences for a person using a screen-reader, without impacting the experience of users who are not. This capability has been present for over two years now—out of the box (with one line of code) with Flex.

The responsibility can no longer be pushed off on the software. For some time now, a non-compliant site, whether it targets HTML/JS or the Flash Player, is symptomatic of a lack of knowledge and experience on the part of the people who made it.

I'm also a little curious as to what possible value a sight-impaired person requiring a screen reader might hope to obtain from any mapping application (or plain old map, for that matter), considering the visual representation of anything in any form inherently requires vision in order to use.

What a great, if esoteric, dilemma—how would one go about creating a downloadable street map for the blind?

#3.1 Eric Geddes on 2008-09-23 04:21 (Reply)

What would be very useful is to have a website to cross check Flash's application and HTML.Thanks for this article.
----------------
Siva

FSBO

#4 siva (Link) on 2008-10-10 22:04 (Reply)

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