So, Apollo is catching on, and the apps are starting to roll out. Some of them sound cool, and I’d like to try out more of them, but I run into a couple of things…
1. While it’s relatively easy to install an Apollo app, you do have to download the .air and launch it, go through the install process, and launch the program. Again, this is pretty painless, but it’s a few extra steps when you are used to just going to a web page and seeing the app appear.
2. Installing the app feels a bit like a commitment. Yes, I would like to download and install this item as one of the trusted applications on my computer. If I decide I don’t want it later, I know that I’ll be taking a trip into Add/Remove Programs and scrolling around trying to find it to nuke it.
3. You start building up all these installed apps on your desktop, start menu, etc. that are often just cute things you wanted to check out, but will never really use. Gets kludgy.
Fortunately, I see a really simple solution to this. One that is pretty unique in the history of applications. Developers should just make web-based demos of their Apollo apps. This, in most cases, is incredibly easy, and is one of the huge advantages Apollo has over something like WPF. Chances are the Apollo specific features of your app are relatively minor. Most of the functionality is straight AS3 or Flex. Most Apollo apps could be easily converted to web based apps very quickly, especially if they were built with that in mind.
Doing this allows me to play with a version of your app with no commitment. I can see what it’s going to look like and how it’s going to function, at least with a subset of features, all right in my browser. If I like it, then I can install it. If not, just close the browser or navigate away. There might be a concern that this will limit the actual installs, if people can play with the web based version. But honestly, I’ve heard of many Apollo apps that I just haven’t bothered to download and install, even though they might sound kind of interesting. I would have definitely checked out a web version and probably installed some of them.
This opens the door to a trial / full version economy, really easily. Like some of those PopCap games, where you can play a limited version on line, or pay a few bucks to down load the full version. Utterly simple to do this kind of thin with Flash/Flex and Apollo. If done right, it’s the same code base, just different targets.
I hope to see more people taking advantage of this kind of thing. I think it will really help push Apollo’s success.
That’s actually a great idea. And I agree sometimes I don’t feel like installing an app just to check it out. It would be nice to just preview the app right in the browser and make my decision from there.
I think developers should definitely use this method. Like you said it’s unique to Apollo applications… and won’t take a lot of work to make the two versions.
“Fortunately, I see a really simple solution to this. One that is pretty unique in the history of applications. Developers should just make web-based demos of their Apollo apps. This, in most cases, is incredibly easy, and is one of the huge advantages Apollo has over something like WPF. Chances are the Apollo specific features of your app are relatively minor. Most of the functionality is straight AS3 or Flex. Most Apollo apps could be easily converted to web based apps very quickly, especially if they were built with that in mind.”
Agreed, thanks. More, in similar vein, here:
http://weblogs.macromedia.com/jd/archives/2007/05/apollo_aint_cas.cfm
Good angle on the try/buy workflow, too… I suspect we’ll see some type of breakthrough hit structured like this, and then lots of people will start doing it.
jd/adobe
Interesting points. I think, a web-based Flex apps can have hooks to Apollo App, some of features might be there and user can be prompted to install if she wants to use those. Flex App can launch Apollo app if it detects apollo-app on the machine?. This way user can continue using web-based version and use the apollo version for some features (offline data etc)…
It would also be better, if data can be synchronized between web-based app and apollo app, without making user launch it, all in background…
Would this approach be usable? A way not to force things on user rather make things happen on demand?
-abdul
Abdul:
I’m still waiting for Production Premium (and hence Flash CS3), so I don’t have much experience in the area; however, I’d imagine you could have a Flash applet and Apollo program write to the same SharedObject with relative ease. It might require a hack – like loading the SO into Apollo with the file system class (as SO’s are typically organized by domain name inside ~/Library/Preferences/Flash Player and Apollo apps may not write their SOs in the same location), but should definitely be doable.