Frank Leahy wrote: > Anyone know if RR has created a browser plug-in for RR? It would make > a nice competitor to Flash, etc.
<http://www.google.com/search?q=%22browser+plugin%22+site:lists.runrev.com&n um=20&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&safe=off&start=20&sa=N> In summary: Browser plugins offer no substanial benefit not already addressed by using a standalone as a helper application. At first glance the browser plugin appears to offer "instant content without needing to download the engine", but that's an illusion: a plugin is an engine, and if folks don't already have a plugin pre-installed the chances of getting them to do so are not significantly greater than getting them to download a helper app. Flash is successful because of early bundling deals with Netscape, and it remains preinstalled with nearly every browser and OS distribution. Plugins not preinstalled languish in obscurity; relatively few survive today. Moreover, a helper app provides a great many usability advantages over a browser plugin (see <http://www.fourthworld.com/embassy/articles/netapps.html>). And with secureMode turned on in the helper app it's no less secure. There is another advantage for businesses: with so many entertaining distractions just a click away in a browser, businesses lose billions in productivity each year to employees surfing sports, games, and other entertainment sites during work hours, the equivalent in the pre-Web world to giving your employees a GameBoy and telling them not to use it. ;) By migrating company portals to net apps they can make many of the same services and content available but without the productivity-killing distractions of the WWW. You can usually help clients wake up to the illusion of browser plugin ubiquity with this simple two-minute usabilty test: 1. You and your client walk over to his secretary's desk and ask him to visit three URLs and report back with a summary of what was on each page. Unknown to the tester, the URLs were chosen in advance so that one of them requires a plugin unlikely to be present on the user's system. 2. Observe the results. In most cases, unless the test subject is an ubergeek, you'll get a summary of two out of three pages, with a comment for the plugin page being something like, "I couldn't view it because my system doesn't have something it needs", with no attempt to download and install the plugin. -- Richard Gaskin Fourth World Media Corporation ___________________________________________________________ [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.FourthWorld.com _______________________________________________ use-revolution mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
