Hi, well this isn't a tip, but more of a request to experienced and advanced webmasters for us learning and beginner webmaster.

When we first took steps learning html and shtml, there were bigger and better things to add to our website, css and javascript and then flash. And now there are new Web 2.0 apps, cms programs, and new programming languages like ruby. With all this technology available it can be quite a daunting task to choose which programming language and such to use for different kinds of websites. So, I ask that experienced webmasters can let us know some of the advantages and disadvantages of each programming language, know what the general learning code is like, which languages will be dropped in the future, which may be used more extensively, which tool is good for what kind of website, etc.... this way, we can put this community experience and knowledge into a chart or faq for the beginners, with some general opinions of the experienced.

I kinda realised that yesterday. I'm not great in flash, but I've been making a website for Uni in flash, and when it came to actionscript it just seemed so like PHP - I thought I'd have to learn ActionScript from scratch, it made it a LOT easier!

I learnt HTML first, then dabbled with a bit of JavaScript, then went on to do PHP - I must admit I really love PHP but I don't really know any other languages.

Man, mod security is ridiculous. It inconsistently rejects content about php and python. Sometimes the post works with them, sometimes, not.

The current "end all" solution for web design is a combination of Flash/PHP/XML/SQL.  Using Flash as the display end of the site ensures MAXIMUM cross browser and cross operating system compatibility which is FOOL PROOF.  When you design a site in Flash the way it looks on your machine is EXACTLY the way it will look on ANY other machine using ANY other major browser or major operating system (obviously it's not going to work on say yer Commodore 64).

Flash uses Actionscript as its code base which interferences nicely with both XML and PHP, so anything that you can't do in Flash (which isn't much) you can fall back on PHP and XML to handle it.  SQL is used for database operations.

So the final operating form looks something like this:

Flash <--> PHP <--> SQL
or
Flash <--> XML

With the Flash front end being what the user see's.

Now...the "problem" with Flash is that there is...endless ignorance in regards to what it can and cannot do, part of which is rooted in the fact that they upgrade their product often and party because certain things are no as "easy" to do in Flash.

In a HTML/Javascript/CSS web making environment so much is already done for you, from right click context menus to scroll bars it's very much a "no thinking needed" form of making websites.  In Flash, although with newer versions of Adobe/Macromedia's Flash building software some of that has been made a little more cookie cutter you still have to do a LOT more coding than you would have to do otherwise if you were using HTML/Javascript/CSS.

Because it has a much steeper learning curve many people tend to just pass things off as not being possible when in fact they actually are.

A common misconception with Flash is that search engines cannot spider it...which is completely untrue, search engines have no problems at all spidering the text content of a Flash file.  That being said though you SHOULD include a plain text fall back version of your site in the event that your site is being visited by a blind user (ie using Lynx, a plain text browser).

This combination of Flash/XML/PHP is also going to wind up as being the "industry standard" before too long, for all of the reasons I've mentioned here.  Its future is also very secure in the fact that no one can claim Adobe/Macromedia has a monopoly in that there are a whole variety of third party Flash builders avaialable, some of which I think are vastly superior to even Adobe/Macromedia's software.  For all of my Flash sites I use SwishMax, which has a MUCH nicer design interface than Adobe/Macromedia's.

Here's an example of a Flash site I'm currently working on:
http://www.backwater-productions.net/care-bears/

Oh, another HUGE reason for using Flash is its support of the On2 VP6 video codec, which is THE BEST option currently available for providing highly compressed video on the web.  This is the codec/form that YouTube, Google Video and other such sites use as their base.  The On2 VP6 codec also supports alpha transparent video.  And speaking of alpha transparencies Flash also supports 32 bit alpha transparent JPEG images as well as 32 bit PNG images.  Actionscript is also FIFTY TIMES FASTER  than javascript and at this point is no longer a scripting language but an actual object oriented language.

Well if you're talking about sites that are mostly plain text...okay, but otherwise Flash *IS* the be all and end all solution if you're talking about the MAXIMUM level of cross browser and cross operating system compatibility.  ...unless you're under the misconception that adhering to the W3Cs recommended idiocy in any way equates to cross compatibility...because it REALLY doesn't.  If all the browser makers suddenly out of the blue actually started taking the W3Cs RECOMMENDATIONS seriously then they might actually BECOME standards...but as it stands now unless you're going for an EXTREMELY  basic site design, yer gonna run into problems...most of which you might not even be aware of if you trust the W3Cs validator to tell you how well your site is put together.

I suppose ultimately the future of Flash depends largely on whether they can overcome all the misconceptions and stereotypes that surround them...that and whether the current "minimalist", "let's-pretend-we-have-a-design-even-though-we-don't" plain black text on a white background trend continues to be favorable.

Personally though I've always felt that that's more of a deficiency than a design style.  It's easy enough to slap together such a site in 12 seconds or less and then run around claiming that it's a "style"...but I'd be willing to bet serious money that even HALF the people making such claims aren't even capable of producing anything better than that.

You're right though about it being a lil too easy to make it too flashy in Flash...take my current primary website:
http://www.backwater-productions.net/

...yeah, WAY too Flashy, needs to be toned done considerably.  This is the new design style I'm working on:
http://www.backwater-productions.net/_images/_Scraps/Backwater_Design_Idea.png

I'd say the hardest part about Flash learning to tone things down and like you said, just because it's there doesn't mean you need to molest every last default transition effect in the menu.    ^_^

I usually try and keep things as clean looking as my Yoga Online prototype:
http://www.backwater-productions.net/wwcc/yoga-online/

The transition effects complement the style and content rather than work against it, like they seem to do on my primary site.  Most of that is my own fault though because I had this idea of creating a kind of music mixing interface thing, where I was going to have a music player and then you could set the beats 'n such by moving the mouse over different page elements...but then I never really go around to actually building it and then I kinda lost interest in that idea and now it's just kinda...tacky.

But that's not a problem with Flash, that's a problem with the way some people are using Flash.  Take my blog site:
http://www.backwater-productions.net/hatter-blog/

The front end is entirely Flash with a PHP/SQL backend and the ENTIRE site is around 100 Kilobytes...so its got no loading bars.  Part of the problem is that Flash cookie cutter templates that are WAY over the top with animation effects and such are in rampant circulation and most of them were coded quite poorly and so they have excessive load times (even on broadband).  It would be nice if more people would start using Flash but use in a NON flashy sort of way.  A lot of people argue that at that point you might as well just use HTML/CSS/javascript, but the counter argument to that is that you're losing a potentially large market due to compatibility issues and as far as basic, non flashy effects and other functionality Actionscript is still 50 times faster than javascript.

That being said I do think it's possible to get a little more creative than simply having a loader bar.  One of the things I'd like to try at some point is creating a little game that users can play while the site loads up.  Could be something really simple too like a tic-tac-to game or an old 8 bit style game.  One point I experimented a bit with making a little javascript game form based on the old Nintendo Battle of Olympus game:
http://www.backwater-productions.net/_test_platform/game/

Oh, another point I forgot to bring up about Flash is the ability to create actual web applications.  Using my new CB site as an example again:
http://www.backwater-productions.net/care-bears/

Check out the songs link.  It's not completely finished yet, but it's a good example of how you can create an actual program within your website, in this case an mp3 player.  With Actionscript 3 you can REALLY take it to a new level and you can actual create your own email, IRC or Usenet client in Flash.  If you went a little outside of the box and included PHP you could even create your own Flash FTP client.

I agree that for cross browser compatibility, Flash is the solution. It looks exactly the same in any browser. If coders treated it like a web app tool instead of a design tool, I think people's misconceptions might go away.

But if you're going to ask me to play a game while the page loads, see ya later.

I don't know how to make this happen but I'd like to.