Wow, the Macromedia Central universe has been awfully quiet for an awfully long time. There’s no Central category on MXNA, and when I do a search there, I only see one blog entry over the last month that really has anything to do with Central. A year ago there were quite a few developers talking it up, with plans to make big money from a killer app. Now, silence.
One thing I noticed, that I’m not sure many people caught onto, was that at Flash Forward in NY this month, I heard MM representitives use the word “experimental” to describe Central at least twice. I’m sure no one ever used that word with it before.
I was never really taken with the idea of Central as it stands. I think there are some great ideas behind it, and I’m very much into putting Flash on the desktop. But I don’t think they got it right. There were some obvious issues, such as branding and licensing, which I think were well known and in the process of being addressed. But I think what it really lacks is a set of killer apps.
I didn’t see a single app released for central that I would call “killer”. But even a single one wouldn’t justify Central’s existence. It could just be done in Flash and compiled with SWF Studio or Zinc. I think one of Central’s more promising points was the inter-app communication (“blast”? correct me if I’m wrong). A few killer apps that actually talked to each other could create a synergy (sum > parts) that would potentially make Central worth installing. I know, it’s a developer oriented release, but I’m just sure why with so many enthusiastic developers working with it, nobody every produced anything really exciting with it.
While I was never much into Central, it was definitely something I kept my eye on, just in case. I can’t believe Macromedia would just trash it. In the 10-page Flash Platform paper, there is a single paragraph about Central, describing it as a “next generation solution”. My guess (hope) is that they’ve compiled the results of the Central experiment, and gone back to the drawing board to make something that really will take off.
Pretty much exactly what I have been thinking. After Gush, it was really apparent that something way too similar could be done without any of the Central fuss.
Now what really caught my attention, was the way the 8 beta player installed itself. Maybe Central isnt gone, just assimilated.
Central is one of a good initiative …
too bad it is a ‘technology’ on its own…
sometimes I wonder if Central could be a pure AS framework ??
Maybe with Flash 8 … (file i/o) ?
my answer, right now, is that I don’t use central because it *seems* obscure (not a ‘normal’ flash player) for any developer wanting to ‘cut’ software layers …
I think Flash does it very well.
So if Central would be flash player, then I would use such framework in order to build apps … and I am thinking of a big one … but couldn’t be done with Central though … only flash player 😉
I know my limits 🙂
Yeah, the Central chat is always empty :(.
I blogged about Central about Month ago. I did 2 posts giving my 2 cents:
http://teknision.blogspot.com/2005/06/my-central-priorities.html
I would say that Central hasn’t necessarily failed, it just hasn’t seen it’s potential yet. The idea of a persistant application that can be installed with one click from the web is extremely powerful and it’s biggest selling point. 97% of user’s will back away when presented with a traditional download. The power of using the Flash player as your entry point exceeds anything that you could ever do with Zinc or other tools. Zinc is way more powerful in features, but not in delivery. Do I think Central is gone? It depends on what you mean by gone. What you know it as, maybe. I believe it will continue to live in a new improved, possibly more integrated fashion. It is inevitable, since this is a next revolution in software. Look at XAML, Dashboard, etc. I do believe it was experimental, and in doing so it was probably very valuable to MM. The money they spent on putting a test suite into production gave them info to really figure out how they need to evolve in this area.
In addition to what Kenny said, Central is based on the Flash Player and so as long as the Flash Player keeps evolving, they are essentially building on to the Central Player as well. This goes for tooling too. I think their initial investment is not lost in this respect. I really think that the loss of involvment of the community hit when Flex was released, and then actionscript 2 along with the new IDE came out. This forced developers to reallocate their time. I believe that the power of Central is yet to be seen. Now about removing the Central category from mxna… <–not fair, they removed my blog and didn’t re-assign it to flash. I’m still trying to get a spot on that aggregator.
From a quick web search I may not have used the word “experimental” myself, but I’ve definitely talked about it being an experiment… I’d cite links, but I’m pressed for time now, sorry.
But in addition to those prior writings about the need for persistence beyond the browser, the Yahoo/Konfabulator deal this week adds to the votes from Apple’s Dashboard and Microsoft’s Avalon that our computers function more like active agents on our behalf, rather than us having to click from document to document all the time.
This thing will happen, one way or another, and SWF is in a very good position to help… right now I’m personally guessing that there will be a few different popular distribution formats, tied to operating systems or service providers… but one way or another the public will gravitate to background agents, I believe, and we’ll have to figure out a dozen or two related issues along the way (“how can devs make $?” “what about synch among devices?” the occasional-connecitivity problems, more).
Hmm… one of the hardest parts for me has been to figure how developers share, in such an environment… that old “highest framerate!” attitude has got to go, or else we’ve got to be able to throttle back the ill-behaved… there were all those hard issues about branding and control over the shell too (frequent question was “How can we prevent other people from installing their stuff with ours?”, which I hadn’t expected).
I don’t know if it will be called “Macromedia Central(tm)”, but the goals of this project will be achieved, one way or another, I’m convinced.
jd/mm
“…but the goals of this project will be achieved, one way or another, I’m convinced.”
I’m convinced, too. Everything you mentioned, John, is proof that there is a big market for this kind of thing. And Flash, with its power, built-in cross-platform compatability, and relative ease of development, is poised to be a potential big winner. Can’t wait to see what you come up with.
When they first announced it I had a bitter taste in my mouth. I didn’t understand why they didn’t use Director as the IDE. Imagine if they had funneled all that R&D and time into just getting Director to integrate flash content more natively rather than spend all that time, money and effort on a whole new ecosystem.
They already had tons of director users and if nothing else “Central” could have been just one huge Macromedia “Xtra” that tied into director. I was very verbal against the way MACR was going with Central then. I was published about my beef with the whole concept and said it would fail. That was almost 2 years ago.
All my complaints and suggestions to get on track were and have been ignored. I’m really not sure we’ll ever see it as the standalone environment they envisioned central to be years ago. Things have changed and other technologies have already emerged.
I love macromedia tools, but this one they screwed up.
Have you read the Flash Platform whitepaper? Central is mention, but more importantly a number of Central features are appearing in the next versions of Flash and Flex.
I was intrigued by what Central was trying to accomplish, but something about the “ecosystem” of applications all living together just never seemed to fit.
Overall though, the market opportunity that it presented was an interesting one. Flash is a fantastic medium, as we have seen, for delivering rich applications and desktops are a needed and logical extension. I echo Keiths thoughts in that I hope MM has taken this as a way of better understanding market needs/barriers and will come back with a 2.0 that delivers on the original premise, but in a way that is more consumable. In the end, users are still used to double-clicking an icon on their desktop to run a specific app, and I can only assume that will continue in the desktop environment.
Keep us posted John 🙂
I made a few central apps on the side but overall what I develop is driven by client demand and unfortunately there isn’t much client demand atm. =(
-erik
From my perspective, MM delivered Central DOA with it’s crazy licensing scheme, and then waited WAAYYY too long to fix it (almost a year?). By the time they did make it worthwhile to investigate as a platform for app-delivery, most developers (myself included) were so disenfranchised by the licensing that they refused to give it another look.
It’s a tragedy, really.
>One thing I noticed, that I’m not sure many people caught onto, was that at Flash Forward in NY this month, I heard MM representitives use the word “experimental” to describe Central at least twice. I’m sure no one ever used that word with it before.
fyi, Central was always a developer’s released, and was a way for us to learn about how to do Flash on the desktop.
We learned quite a few things, such as developers want Flash on the desktop, but they don’t want it in some shell (such as Central). Imagine if you could just deploy and run Flash apps on the desktop as if they were regular applications?
Regardless, we are commited to Flash on the desktop, although moving forward, that is not necessarily through Central.
mike chambers
mesh@macromedia.com
yes, I was aware that it was a developers release, but there was always the at least implicit assumption that a public release was around the corner. I think a lot of developers put a lot of time into it with that assumption. At any rate, I definitely agree with your conclusions, and what you are describing sounds great.
Jumping back into conversation. I’d like to say that though the notion of the Central product may be disappearing, developers shouldn’t be disheartened by it.
I spent alot of time working with it during the betas and afterwords. I think it was a smart investment on MM’s behalf. It gave them valuable market research with direct developer and customer feedback. For developers who worked with it, there were valuable patterns and a taste of the future.
I think there are a lot of positives that can be take from Central. In retrospect, it could possibly be thought of as an experiment even if it was intended to be a product. However, going forward, you will definitely see the knowledge base it created filter into the platform.
The ideas that Central represent are indeed the future. I personally believe that the technologies we are working with are on the edge of causing a phenomenal shift in what we know computers to be and how they are used.
Central was a great learning experience for web devs to get involved in the desktop app arena. Central (as an idea) has tons of potential to help Flash move even further into the “active desktop” arena and more than just being another standalone application. The information that has been gathered in the Flash dev community from working with Central will only strengthen Flash in the long run.
Just my opinion:
Central has failed because nobody uses it. There’s nothing in that program to say
“Hey, why don’t I develop software for Central?”
or
“Hey, why don’t I go check out what’s new in Central?”
While I believe the concept is genius, I think there is a problem in the marketing.
I personally don’t use Central because of some annoying bugs I find (mostly with the chatroom).
Most of the software available, at least since I had Central, wasn’t really worth it. No offense to Mike Lyda, but AIM on Central, while techinically it’s brilliant, why would I use it? Another example, Minesweeper (the highscores didn’t work if I recall).
My favorite thing about Central was the RSS feeds you could get. Very easy to manage everything.
If Macromedia launches Central with some useful programs, then it’ll succeed. But why are Central developers reinventing the wheel? Why do I need a weather checker if I can type in google Weather, or a XML editor when there are many better full length programs.
I personally would like to see Central as a program to help spread ideas and improve networking in the Flash commmunity.
-Danny
When I first heard of Central I was hoping it would be something in the lines of Java Web Start, that is, a way to easily and securely manage installation and updates of flash applications on the desktop. The largest market we have for flash desktop applications is not with general public apps but inside closed client networks. We would definitely benefit from a centralized way of installing and updating the apps but Central was an overkill for our uses.
i know of at least one group of people who have been working on a central + .net app for more than a year. i am certain they are jumping with joy right about now