Adobe AIR: 10 reasons to love it, 10 reasons to hate it.

I came across a really good summary of the strong and weak aspects when using Adobe AIR. AIR is the Flash player supplemented by additional features to enable applications that are not browser-hosted, but installed as desktop applications.

 

Strong Aspects in short:

1. Fast execution.
2. Cross-platform.
   
3. Easy conversion of existing Flex or HTML applications.
   
4. Easy installation.
   
5. SQLite. AIR applications have use of a fast local database.
6. Synchronization services provided you use LiveCycle.
7. Rich design and multimedia.
8. Great for web vendors who want a desktop presence.
9. Declarative programming via FLEX.
   
10. Option for dynamic or strict typing according to developer preference.

 

Weak aspects:

1. Limited extensibility.
   
2. Database access limited to SQLite or web services.
3. Enterprises need to roll out applications over the network in a controlled manner.
   
4. Proprietary technology.
   
5. No threading support.
   
6. No model for commercial components.
   
7. Schizophrenic development model.
   
8. Security concerns.
   
9. Synchronization service depends on LiveCycle, the server-side piece which runs on J2E application servers.
   
10. Lack of UI standards may lead to annoying inconsistencies between AIR applications.