Accessible Rich Internet Applications: the Search Engine Challenge

The perception that Rich Internet Applications (RIAs) and Accessible Rich Internet Applications (ARIAs) are inaccessible to search engines is perhaps one of the main factors that hinder their wider adoption by the web development community. Recent announcements that RIAs and ARIAs are becoming more search engine friendly is provoking web developers to look for further information and evidence that will support or refute these announcements. This paper outlines research undertaken and tests performed to establish if RIAs and ARIAs developed using Adobe Flex are crawlable and indexable by the Google search engine by default. The conclusion drawn from testing is that RIAs and ARIAs are not yet fully supported by the Google search engine. They can however be made search engine friendly by employing third party software and some imaginative coding techniques. This conclusion contradicts various published statements from search engine providers such as Google, RIA software providers such as Adobe and numerous field experts.