No Web Apps?

[turbolaserguy]

I downloaded the latest version of LiveCode and tried to make a simple web application. But in "Build Standalone Settings...", I couldn't find "Web." Why?

[LCNeil]

Dear turbolaserguy,

Thank you for your request.

LiveCodes support for deploying to the web was removed in August 2012. As this is the case, it has also been removed from LiveCodes standalone application settings.

The following email was sent out informing users of this and includes information as to why this happened.

Code: Select all

We have recently reviewed our product lineup to see how it can best be adjusted to meet the needs of the largest number of you, our customers, allowing us to move forward strongly with LiveCode in an ever changing digital world. When we do this review, we look both at the number of customers using a given platform and at what the technological landscape for that platform looks like. In the latter case, we aim to ensure that the quality, robustness and depth of support for a given platform can truly meet the needs of those using it.
As a consequence of this review, the decision has been taken to drop support for the Web Plugin deployment option. The existing version of LiveCode Web will remain available for download and use by licensed customers, but no further updates to this platform will be made, and it will be withdrawn from sale in our store from August 31st.
On the face of it, we do have a small but nonetheless sufficient, group of customers to justify support for this platform. However we have been forced to make this decision because over the past couple of years browser technology has shifted considerably. We have seen a move towards browsers that do not allow running plugins with full functionality. It is no longer possible for us to properly support the latest versions of Safari because this functionality has been disabled. Internet Explorer 10 for Metro has no plugin support. The mobile platforms have their own restrictions on plugins, in particular iOS which bars them completely. We find ourselves in a position where it is simply impossible to support all modern browsers with the existing functionality. We see this as a continuing trend with other browsers increasingly likely to restrict functionality further, rather than something that we think is likely to be reversed in the future.
We did not take this decision lightly. Instead we waited some time to see if there was any negative reaction to this direction in the broader industry that might have precipitated a positive change in direction for browser plugin development. Unfortunately it does not appear that this is the case. Web deployment can no longer be supported to the quality standard that we aim for as a platform -- or even at all, in the case of many popular browsers today. We feel our development resources are better spent elsewhere, in strengthening our core desktop offering, continuing to expand our mobile feature set and platform support, while aiming towards the highest possible standards. We are also continuing to review the web landscape and will continue to look at other possible technical (non-plugin based) approaches that we may be able to employ in the future.
We appreciate that this decision will impact on a number of you and will do whatever we can to assist you in migrating to a different deployment option. In many cases functionality provided by the Web option can be provided in a different way, either by using LiveCode Server, or a desktop based app. For example, you can create a LiveCode standalone application which displays a splash screen and downloads stacks from the web easily. If you would like assistance in exploring other ways to deploy your app, please email us at webpluginmigrate@runrev.com and we'll be happy to advise you.
If you have any questions and concerns about the withdrawal of LiveCode Web please feel free to contact us, either at support@runrev.com or webpluginmigrate@runrev.com.

Kind Regards,

Neil Roger
--
RunRev Support Team ~ http://www.runrev.com
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