Browser Specific Content, Part 1
January 30, 2010 in Technology, Web, WordPress by LwEEs
**Note: This is an ongoing article.**
With the release of the Apple iPad web developers have jet again take a look at Adobe Flash and mobile web browser Safari, the debate of whether Adobe Flash is too processor intensive for small devices has revived and some tech-driven people are making more noise than usual. Back in 2007 when the iPhone was released, Apple even had class actions suits about the phrase “the internet in your hands” because of the widely use of Adobe Flash on such device.
The story is repeating all over again, this time with the focus being the new Apple device, it looks like Apple has no plans to include Adobe Flash on their portable devices and whether they end up doing it or not, a good web developer should look at other alternatives to properly place code on websites.
I’m not an expert on the field but I have work enough as a web developer to know that you can set browser specific content on a web site to load separate code depending on the web browser used to visit your site. We see this everyday when you visit a site on your iPhone and it looks different from when you visit the same site from your computer. With this in mind I ask myself, how hard is it to code browser specific content to load beautiful websites on the iPad, iPod touch, and the iPhone.
The idea is to load non-flash objects on your site when they are visited from and “i” device and regular Adobe Flash when not. With WordPress, more than often, developers use browser specific hooks to display different design elements or “CSS” files depending on whether you are smart and use a regular web browser or you are locked into using IE6. The simple code looks a bit like this:

With this example in mind we can tell exactly that what I’m proposing is not far from reality or a crazy idea. Instead of arguing about whether Apple is going to allow Adobe Flash on the iPhone, iPod, or even the iPad, we can create an environment of good developer skills and fix the web to our advantage.
In the next installment I will be explaining the idea in more detail, give a few examples of the implementation, and discuss any comments that we have from you, our readership. Expect to have the 2 part of this article in the next couple of weeks. I’m creating a forum to discuss any ideas you may have or you can simply leave your comments here on this post.
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