A company called Smokescreen has introduced a new technology (or rather a merging of old and new technology) to produce Flash-like animated ads using software that all platforms support (Windows, Mac, Linux, and mobile operating systems). The ads use a combination of Javascript and HTML5 to create ads that are nearly identical to their Flash counterparts.

The Smokescreen website lists multiple demos of their product in action, although some of them still need to work out the kinks. Technology powerhouses like Apple, Google, and Mozilla are pushing for the adoption of HTML5 video, while Adobe hopes to hold onto its claim on web animation and video. One obstacle that HTML5 proponents must overcome is the inability for current HTML5 video to display dynamic ads. Several marketing firms are working quickly to develop solutions. Current YouTube videos using HTML5 do not display ads, and those videos that do use Flash only.

HTML5 video will take the following format on your website:

<video src="crazycat.ogg" controls="controls">
We're sorry, your browser does not have HTML5 video support. Please download the video
</video>

There are a number of additional options:

autoplay – The video will start playing automatically

controls – Displays player controls

height – specifies height of video

width – specifies width

Once you have the video the way you want it, paste the code into your website, and it will work in any browsers that support HTML5 video. Since some do not, you should provide an alternate method of viewing the video as well.

When I installed it, I was not sure where I would even be able to find videos using it, but Google really does not waste any time. YouTube already has HTML5 videos encoded with VP8, and they run flawlessly. The video quality seems good and runs well in HD, without the high CPU load that usually accompanies Adobe Flash.

Yesterday, Google announced the release of their codec, along with plans to use Ogg Vorbis for audio encoding, and a new video format container based on Matroska. Collectively, this will be referred to as WebM. This could very well be the deciding factor in the HTML5 browser wars that we have been covering. Website owners and server administrators who want to give WebM a spin can find links to encoding software options on the WebM website.

Source: Webpronews.com

Answer: SVG stands for Scalable Vector Graphics. It is an open, XML-based graphics format that is being incorporated in Web standards. Many browsers already support SVG to some degree. It can be used for both still images and animations. Because SVG is a vector graphics format, the images can be resized and manipulated without degradation, which is why they are considered scalable.

For example, rather than having three different image sizes for an icon, a website can be configured to use an SVG image scaled to all three sizes. Even when enlarged, it will still maintain its quality. If your browser supports it, you can view an example here.

SVG file sizes can get large, depending on the amount of metadata included in the XML code, especially if the file includes gradients and animations. To compensate for this, there is standard SVG file compression, using gzip, that is lossless and reduces file size by 50%. As browsers continue to adopt HTML5 standards, SVG is expected to play a more significant role in web development.

Photo Source: Flickr

Web developers have long had a love-hate relationship with Flash. Some would build entire sites based on it, while others shunned it for its lack of Web standards compliance, high CPU requirements, and proprietary license. For most web hosting companies it will not matter either way in the short term, anyone with a website will need to consider what devices are supported by their website.

Scribd will move to a Javascript/CSS/HTML5 web application that works better with their interface.

“Why do you need a special reading application just to view a document?” asked Friedman.

Unlike Flash, which requires the installation of a third-party plugin, Javascript and HTML are built into all modern browsers and are becoming increasingly popular. Many of the cross-browser consistency problems that drove developers to use Flash have since faded away, especially with Microsoft moving closer to standards compliance with each new Internet Explorer release.

Source: InformationWeek

Just as we predicted, Microsoft has announced that their latest incarnation of Internet Explorer, version 9, will included support for some HTML 5 elements, including video. Much to the chagrin of Mozilla and other open standard advocates, however, the new demo build of the browser only supports h.264 video, following Google and Apple’s insistence on avoiding the open Theora codec.

Among the other improvements are support for scalable vector graphics (SVG), CSS3, and built-in hardware acceleration. It is not clear if Theora support will be added (Google Chrome supports both h.264 and Theora). Microsoft joins the list of browser makers that includes Mozilla (Firefox), Apple (Safari), Google (Chrome), and Opera.

For years, Microsoft neglected web standards and increasing security problems with their Internet Explorer 6 browser. The emergence of Firefox and other competitive browsers has encouraged the software giant to slowly adapt and reignite IE development. Nevertheless, up until now, Microsoft had resisted HTML 5 adoption, but with Google pushing it on YouTube and other sites like Vimeo following suit, they could not ignore it.

If Microsoft intends to keep their commanding share of the browser market, they will need to continue to adapt to web standards. At their MIX 2010 developer conference in Las Vegas, experts predict that Microsoft will unveil a new IE version that takes into account HTML 5 elements, including support for vector graphics like SVG.

Even with IE 8, the current version, Internet Explorer is still far behind competitors like Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Apple Safari, and Opera. If ever there were a time for Microsoft to make a game-changing play, that time is now.

Source: Webmonkey