FLASH MX 2004: BAD KARMA?

TUESDAY, JANUARY 20 2004 @ 10:32 AM

A couple of days ago, my friend Christopher refreshed an old post of mine, where I reported how frustrated I was due to Flash's constant crashes and misbehaviors, and he offers some more insight on his own experience. In the other hand, Scott Barnes feels that the Community is being too tough with Flash and Macromedia's Flash Team, given some harsh comments and campaigns of sorts out there. But let's not forget: the issues are real.

First of all, I don't think the Community exists to negate or pretend to hide problems in the software, but rather provide all the feedback we can to help Macromedia fix the bugs. If someone's comments are a little harsh some times, it is not because we hate the 'Flash Team' (after all, they just follow business directives) it is because we are also customers, we paid for our software and we expect it to work appropriately. Ultimately, the Community has to be independent to serve its purpose.

I wasn't in the beta, but the word out there is that many of the problems we are experiencing now were already spotted during the beta. So, the fact that Flash MX 2004 was released in a hurry appears to be the reason of all our issues with the product today. Even Scott acknowledges that, but I would like to know how would you react if you were served a half-baked pizza. I certainly wouldn't pay for it, and most probably would never come back again.

So, it's been months since the release on Flash MX 2004 and we are still waiting for fixes for all the bugs the Community has been reporting. Yet, we still support Flash and want it to get better, we can't afford restarting our computer everytime Flash crashes, or closing Flash to be able to use other applications...

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BEMBINO

JANUARY 20 2004 @ 10:47 AM

Yeah, I in no way meant my comments to be negative toward the Flash team. I was really just wondering if others were/are having similar issues. It's a little disheartening when products that are meant to be a suite have a hard time running at the same time. I luckily haven't had many issues with the products, but the issues I did have were pretty big. My biggest complaint at the moment though is Freehand's lack of single-key shortcuts. As it is now I have to use both hands and one of my toes and an elbow to press CTRL + SHIFT + ALT + F5 + Z to zoom in. You'd think I was trying to execute some sort of killer combo move in a video game or something. (I exaggerate and jest of course).

JOHN DOWDELL

JANUARY 20 2004 @ 01:00 PM

"My biggest complaint at the moment though is Freehand's lack of single-key shortcuts. " Thanks for the specifics. Did you get this change-request in to the FreeHand team yourself? I've been lobbying for other changes myself, so it would be great if they heard from you directly, thanks.

(For the shortcuts, I haven't tested that, but from postings I've read I haven't been able to rule out focus issues (eg, when focus is in a textfield and typing "t" then it's a "t", not a command). I don't need to know myself, but it would be good to get into future descriptions. Another good item in the change-request form would be explaining how custom shortcuts like CMD-T or ALT-T or whatever wouldn't fit your workflow, thanks... that would give the team more info on your desired workflow.)

jd/mm

BEMBINO

JANUARY 20 2004 @ 01:05 PM

Hey John, it is on the "known issues" list for Freehand. I think I submitted a bug report as well.