Rich Interactive Applications
Application users love RIAs because they enable interactions that html cannot provide for. Independent research by Forrester Research Inc shows that well-designed RIAs are instrumental to successful application implementation projects, dramatically increases user engagement and results in eye-popping results which more than justifies the value of investments made; and make the case for further RIA projects.
What is RIA?
RIAs refer to independent, client-side applications in a sandbox or virtual machine environment that communicates with a remote web services. It can also refer to web applications that have most of the characteristics of desktop applications. The widespread use of this term reflects an increasing focus on the user experience when organisations and software vendors design their application's user interface.
History and Market Adoption
This term was first introduced back in 2002 by Macromedia - which was subsequently bought over by Adobe Systems - when addressing the limitations imposed by browser based applications during that time. Modern technology frameworks that addresses the user interface interactivity challenges include Adobe Flash, Flex/AIR, Java/JavaFX, Microsoft Silverlight and Ajax.
Adobe Flash, Flex and Javascript/Ajax technologies in particular enjoy spectacularly adoption rates and are generally considered the defacto standards in today's modern, user-driven application design paradigm. Statistics show that Flash-based technology dominates the market share with as much as 98% end user adoption while Javascript/Ajax is practically the standard functionality in all modern browsers.
Market trends (of application users) show that the Age of Features have come to an end. Welcome to the Age of User Experience!
Implications and Motivations
There used to be a time where users will bear with unintuitive interfaces or functional, but incoherent work flow built purely with the developers' perspective in mind. In this age of instant gratification, application consumers now expect nothing less than a well-thought out interface. Rich, interactive and intuitive applications that engage their limited patience and interest.
Get that right, and a Business Owner/Enterprise will be well on his way to achieving his/her business objectives via a software implementation, online, desktop or otherwise.
Commercial Imperatives for Well-designed Interfaces?
Check out some of the user interface that we have built in various projects. If you are convinced about the commercial imperatives for investing in professional resources for your next enterprise application project, drop us a note. And we will get back to you as soon as we can.