Early web based applications had a decidedly inferior overall user experience to that of their older and more mature desktop based relatives. Considerations of bandwidth, style consistency, interaction types and many more design attributes led to a diminished functional and aesthetic entity.

Along came Rich Internet Applications (RIA), which brought along the reach of the internet, with the best functionality of the desktop. Online applications now behaved like their older relatives, but they were unfortunately bound by the confines of a browser window, inheriting some of the browser style components that were undesirable. It was a better experience, but one that wasn't quite complete.

However all of that is about to change as Adobe is set to introduce a breath of fresh AIR....Adobe AIR that is.

The Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR) is quite simply a desktop based platform on which creative practitioners can guarantee that their hard work in the stylistic discipline will be retained between various operating systems (currently supported: Windows, OSX; support pending: LINUX).

The levels of cross-platform design consistency first seen within a browser using the Flash Plug-in is now possible on the desktop using this groundbreaking system runtime.

In addition to this, Adobe AIR runs your 'occasionally connected' applications as fully functional desktop software. No browser required.

Why is this significant?

With essentially some slight technical modifications to applications or content built in FLEX, HTML & JavaScript (AJAX), Flash or PDF, creatives now have a functional application or presentation tier. For designers of web applications over the last 15 years, this is fantastic news. The workflows, tools and methods of production that have served them so well in the past for web delivery also apply to Adobe AIR.

The delivery assets for handover to development teams are the same as for a typical web application; gif, png, swf, flv - all familiar formats. And there are a raft of plug-ins and extensions available for easy creation of Adobe AIR applications from within the most commonly used application/content creation tools. Visit Adobe Labs for more information about the AIR development tools available.

Take back your chrome!

One of the first things to note about an Adobe AIR application is that control of the design is completely in the hands of the creator. Buttons, menus, panels and more excitingly, the application chrome (the 'bounding frames' of the application and all the paneling there-in).

This is significant, as previously designing web applications has always had to occur within a fixed recta-linear canvas, with little to no control over the style attributes of this canvas. This freedom to be creative with effectively the 'shape' of the application opens up a whole new designing world.

However such creative freedom can have its pitfalls as the user must always be considered before dispensing with long established conventions. In the late 1990's amazing user interfaces were created for the MetaCreations tools. Whilst incredibly rich in appearance and functionality, many argued that having dispensed with certain conventional desktop application behaviours, the applications were difficult to use. Remember that you no longer have the user within your 'domain' (webpage); these new AIR tools are now components of a users system and daily experience.

What a state!

Another significant designer related aspect of an Adobe AIR application is the applications state.

Previously, applications were either online or offline. A desktop application, running in offline mode and needing a remote data source, provided a poor user experience. Visually, the interface would have 'holes' where missing data should be. There would be error messages, pop-ups or alerts informing you that this feature or that function couldn't be accessed. This caused the whole interface to look ill-considered, incomplete or at best messy. More often than not, you simply had to be online to use these applications.

Adobe AIR, however, uses a local set of data for when you are not network connected. This allows a user to manipulate the previous set of data whilst 'disconnected', for instance on a flight, and when next connected, the application will re-sync with the remote data source.

To illustrate further think of an Adobe AIR photo album processor. A user is returning from their vacation. On the 14 hour flight home the user can collate their photos, manipulate, crop and select the images that they would like to include in their online photo album. Photos can also be tagged for offline print processing at the closest photo processing lab. Whilst creating the album, the user remembers that they had a photo in for special processing. It would be a good idea to collect that photo at the same time as these new holiday snaps. The previously stored order details are retrieved, presented to the user (clearly indicated as offline data) and modified to collect with this new order.

As soon as the user regains network connectivity, the Adobe AIR application logs the new images with the photo processing lab, updates the new collection date for the previous print and uploads the newly created online album.

This 'occasionally connected' application class poses an interesting design challenge. The offline state has never really been one that a designer has had to consider. It was just assumed that if an application was not networked in some way that a user would not be using the application.

With the new class of network-aware applications, this offline state is no excuse for the application to not be 100% functional. Technically, the application can retain previously 'stored' data for just such occurrences. It is highly probably that one of the most significant benefits of Adobe AIR applications in the very near future will be the ability to complete complex and comprehensive tasks, whilst offline, and when connected, have these tasks render their effect to the online environments that make them 'breathe'.

What does it all mean?

The potential of new 'Desktop 2.0' applications is amazing. Over the last decade or more the increased number and competency of web application designers has caused a significant raising of the bar in the online applications space.

In some regard this has been to the detriment of the desktop. Once the domain of the ‘real' application, the desktop was somewhat discarded for the brave new world of the internet. Adobe AIR changes this trend.

AIR provides a fantastic opportunity for a designer of interactive tools to maintain consistency across platforms; enhanced branding opportunities on the desktop; a family resemblance from online-only to 'occasionally connected' applications and most importantly and possibly, for the first time, of no significant design related learning curve as the tools and production methods are familiar. Some of the amazing visual effects seen within flash apps and websites will now be seen on the desktop. Visual transitions that enhance a users comprehension of progress through a task that have been refined for web applications will now assist in desktop task processing. Support for H.264 video will see innovative use of video tutorial and entertainment direct to desktop.

In summary, Adobe AIR provides an applications designer with the freedom to design from the ground up, without the constraints posed by developing within a strict container, with enforced style restrictions and without the overhead of a browser. It will be a familiar design exercise with some exciting and challenging new opportunities.

And that is a breath of fresh AIR.