Adobe Flash Overview

Adobe Flash is a platform for creating digital media content, including graphics, animation, audio, video and interactive media. Flash is most commonly used to display animated and/or interactive content on web pages but it can be used for other applications as well. In recent years Flash has also become a leader in online video delivery.

Flash content can be made either with the Flash authoring program (known simply as Adobe Flash) or third party applications such as Swish (www.swishzone.com). Flash is by far the best solution but it is fairly expensive.

Flash content can be played back in two ways:

1. SWF files are the normal way to deliver Flash on the Internet — the SWF file is embedded in a web page using special HTML code. The end user must have the Flash Player installed (most people do).
2. Flash files can be created as standalone executable files (.exe). These files run as a program in their own right and do not require the Flash Player. This option is useful for delivering content on CD or DVD.