3D CSS Effects in Snow Leopard Safari, And More on Future of Video and Flash?

[MacRumors]

In the past, we've speculated that Apple's resistance to supporting Adobe's Flash on the iPhone and their efforts to add new features to HTML/CSS is, in part, to reduce their long term dependence on Flash.

Ajaxian points to an impressive demo by Charles Ying which shows off hardware accelerated 3D CSS Visual Effects that are now supported in Snow Leopard's Safari builds as well as the latest Webkit nightly builds. If you have either of these versions installed, you can view a live version yourself here. Otherwise, you can watch this video of the demo:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3R6sb4NO25E

These new 3D effects have been proposed for standards inclusion. If successful, future browsers will also adopt these effects.

While these will help provide standards-based tools for accomplishing visual effects that have been the realm of Flash in the past, there has recently been a setback on efforts to standardize on a specific video playback format for HTML5. Video remains the most popular use for Flash on the web. Due to ongoing disagreements between Apple, Google and other web browser developers, the acceptance of a single video codec standard for HTML5 has been indefinitely delayed.

"After an inordinate amount of discussions, both in public and privately, on the situation regarding codecs for video and audio in HTML5, I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that there is no suitable codec that all vendors are willing to implement and ship," Hickson wrote. "I have therefore removed the two subsections in the HTML5 spec in which codecs would have been required, and have instead left the matter undefined."

Apple, of course, has been pushing H.264 and opposes the Ogg Theora alternative due to the potential patent claims in the future. Mozilla and Opera have their own issues with cost and licensing issues with H.264 and prefer Ogg Theora. The inability to come to an agreement means that there will be no accepted standard format for HTML5. As a result, Flash will likely remain the dominant format for online video for the time being.

Article Link: 3D CSS Effects in Snow Leopard Safari, And More on Future of Video and Flash?

[oli2140]

I'm not going to lie, that looks pretty impressive.

[Morky]

The MPEG group needs to give their stuff away or have it rendered obsolete by Flash and Silverlight.

[Maximillian]

In case anyone is wondering, the music is by Ratatat ('Track 01' off of '9 Beats'). And it f***ing rocks.

[Peace]

Using the link under Snow Leopard and Safari makes it VERY impressive.

[Boneoh]

This is great. But the freakin' committee can't agree on a standard codec? WTF!

Best example of design by committee is a camel, they were trying for a horse!

[macUser2007]

There are so many sites I can't view on my new 3G S, it's pathetic.

Apple really must implement Flash on the iPhone ASAP, or it will be the butt of jokes again, like with copy/paste.

Flash is A MUST, with over 95% adoption rate across platforms. It is the only HUGE weak spot left on the iPhone.

If I were the competition, I'd make ads showing Android (or WM) accessing fun FLASH sites and video, while the iPhone shows blank pages.

[BornAgainMac]

I hope Apple wins this one with their bully powers.

[Pooshka]

Does anyone happen to know the URL of that website?

[g4jedi]

"If successful, future browsers will also adopt these effects."
Don't hold your breath! IE will always be way behind on this sort of thing. Look at the simple text-shadow effect in CSS. Up until recently, it was only compatible with Safari and to this day is not supported by any IE.

[pdjudd]

Originally Posted by Boneoh

This is great. But the freakin' committee can't agree on a standard codec? WTF!

I call that par for the course. Large companies almost never come to a complete agreement - expecially when their objectives are different.

[cosmokanga2]

Downloaded the nightly build to test it and it is awesome. Get this supported in more browsers and websites could really be cool.

[xUKHCx]

Originally Posted by Pooshka

Does anyone happen to know the URL of that website?

.

Originally Posted by MacRumors

If you have either of these versions installed, you can view a live version yourself here.

[John.B]

Originally Posted by MacRumors

Apple, of course, has been pushing H.264 and opposes the Ogg Theora alternative due to the potential patent claims in the future.

The lack of hardware acceleration for Ogg Theora is the main issue. Apple has been pushing H.264 because its a standard that (unlike Flash) runs fast on Apple hardware and hardware by other manufacturers.

Originally Posted by macUser2007

Flash is A MUST, with over 95% adoption rate across platforms. It is the only HUGE weak spot left on the iPhone.

No offense buddy, but get a clue.

Flash sucks on Linux and OS X. If Adobe wants Flash to really be the ubiquitous standard (and have the web world bow down to them in homage) they need to seriously improve performance on the non-Windows platforms. I can only imagine how bad it would drain the battery of the iPhone.

Personally, I'm glad that Flash isn't on my iPhone, it saves me from having to figure out how to run a Flash block plug-in on Mobile Safari like I have to for Safari and Firefox.

[Detektiv-Pinky]

It looks nice in this demo, but I fail to see the general usefulness in a web-browser?

[str1f3]

Originally Posted by Morky

The MPEG group needs to give their stuff away or have it rendered obsolete by Flash and Silverlight.

It's not that simple. The MPEG group uses that money to pay for research and personnel. This isn't a company like Microsoft. It consists of industries, universities, and research institutions.

I would like to see them maintain or lower the current license rate. That being said, H.264 will move forward not matter what Mozilla or Opera says. There is too much hardware that supports it and Ogg Theora is not as good.

Silverlight will go nowhere and flash is losing its stranglehold as less websites are using it everyday.

I'm truly impressed with this. This is the future of the web.

Originally Posted by macUser2007

There are so many sites I can't view on my new 3G S, it's pathetic.

Apple really must implement Flash on the iPhone ASAP, or it will be the butt of jokes again, like with copy/paste.

Flash is A MUST, with over 95% adoption rate across platforms. It is the only HUGE weak spot left on the iPhone.

If I were the competition, I'd make ads showing Android (or WM) accessing fun FLASH sites and video, while the iPhone shows blank pages.

The iPhone will never support Flash. They want to kill it off. It is the reason you see them pushing standards like http live streaming and CSS3

Originally Posted by Detektiv-Pinky

It looks nice in this demo, but I fail to see the general usefulness in a web-browser?

Why not go back to the command line? It's just as useful and quicker.

[PJR]

So this might be a really dumb comment, but are we looking at this from an application viewpoint, or a capability one?

Because as far as I can tell, this is an application called CoolIris that is already available and works quite well on Macs.

http://www.cooliris.com/

If it is a "new" application then Apple really ripped somebody off...

[ziggyonice]

Originally Posted by MacRumors

The inability to come to an agreement means that there will be no accepted standard format for HTML5. As a result, Flash will likely remain the dominant format for online video for the time being.

Noooo! Down with Flash!!!

[Lixivial]

Argh, rehashing the "debate" over HTML5 video codecs really needn't be done.

Hickson put it to rest weeks ago. The argument being there's no "defined" standard for img tags, audio, or anything else. And it's simple enough to support both, so that's what will happen.

[str1f3]

Originally Posted by PJR

So this might be a really dumb comment, but are we looking at this from an application viewpoint, or a capability one?

Because as far as I can tell, this is an application called CoolIris that is already available and works quite well on Macs.

http://www.cooliris.com/

If it is a "new" application then Apple really ripped somebody off...

This isn't by Apple. This is what you can do with open standards.

[DavidLeblond]

Originally Posted by PJR

So this might be a really dumb comment, but are we looking at this from an application viewpoint, or a capability one?

Because as far as I can tell, this is an application called CoolIris that is already available and works quite well on Macs.

http://www.cooliris.com/

If it is a "new" application then Apple really ripped somebody off...

The article isn't about how neat the video is, but that the video was done using CSS.

[markm49uk]

Originally Posted by macUser2007

There are so many sites I can't view on my new 3G S, it's pathetic.

Apple really must implement Flash on the iPhone ASAP, or it will be the butt of jokes again, like with copy/paste.

Flash is A MUST, with over 95% adoption rate across platforms. It is the only HUGE weak spot left on the iPhone.

If I were the competition, I'd make ads showing Android (or WM) accessing fun FLASH sites and video, while the iPhone shows blank pages.

It will never happen - flash needs to die. Apple are making a concerted effort to make this so - what websites in particular are you missing ? I avoid flash sites but that might be just me.

[MacFly123]

Originally Posted by macUser2007

There are so many sites I can't view on my new 3G S, it's pathetic.

Apple really must implement Flash on the iPhone ASAP, or it will be the butt of jokes again, like with copy/paste.

Flash is A MUST, with over 95% adoption rate across platforms. It is the only HUGE weak spot left on the iPhone.

If I were the competition, I'd make ads showing Android (or WM) accessing fun FLASH sites and video, while the iPhone shows blank pages.

Originally Posted by g4jedi

"If successful, future browsers will also adopt these effects."
Don't hold your breath! IE will always be way behind on this sort of thing. Look at the simple text-shadow effect in CSS. Up until recently, it was only compatible with Safari and to this day is not supported by any IE.

Originally Posted by pdjudd

I call that par for the course. Large companies almost never come to a complete agreement - expecially when their objectives are different.

Originally Posted by John.B

The lack of hardware acceleration for Ogg Theora is the main issue. Apple has been pushing H.264 because its a standard that (unlike Flash) runs fast on Apple hardware and hardware by other manufacturers.


No offense buddy, but get a clue.

Flash sucks on Linux and OS X. If Adobe wants Flash to really be the ubiquitous standard (and have the web world bow down to them in homage) they need to seriously improve performance on the non-Windows platforms. I can only imagine how bad it would drain the battery of the iPhone.

Personally, I'm glad that Flash isn't on my iPhone, it saves me from having to figure out how to run a Flash block plug-in on Mobile Safari like I have to for Safari and Firefox.

It is all a complex history and political corporate war that is going on. It isn't as simple as iPhone needs FLASH lol. FLASH sucks in all seriousness. Pretty much the only reason it is still around is because it got in with video online. All of these battles you see going on like Apple refusing to put it on the iPhone is all strategic to set things right and get it out of everything once and for all. I hope they succeed because I hate flash, but it is looking like a difficult, long drawn out battle.

P.S. I think IE will always suck as well. That is a whole other battle. But pushing for these standards helps force Microsoft to stop crippling the web as they have done for the last 10 years! It is just their nature to try to lock in people to every aspect of their products/technologies at whatever the cost or expense to advancement instead of simply innovating and making products that people would actually CHOOSE versus being forced!

P.P.S. These new effects are pretty much exactly like CoolIris: http://www.cooliris.com/

[tekcor]

Originally Posted by macUser2007

Apple really must implement Flash on the iPhone ASAP, or it will be the butt of jokes again, like with copy/paste.

Flash is A MUST, with over 95% adoption rate across platforms. It is the only HUGE weak spot left on the iPhone.

Flash is an abomination. It started as an animation suite, which was pushed into gaming by it's users. So Macromedia made it more powerful for games. Adobe has purchased it and is using Flash as it's own development environment, but it's just not that good.

It's not optimized at all either. I was realizing that while browsing the web on my battery that all these damn Flash-based ads are killing my battery. Why does this stupid 468x60 ad need so much of my processing power!? It's because the Flash developers are completely inept at making Flash hardware-friendly.

I guarantee the day Adobe makes a good version of Flash, Apple will support it. Until then, no flash on the iPhone. I'd have it completely uninstalled on my laptop, if it wasn't necessary for so much of the media on the web.

[str1f3]

Originally Posted by Lixivial

Argh, rehashing the "debate" over HTML5 video codecs really needn't be done.

Hickson put it to rest weeks ago. The argument being there's no "defined" standard for img tags, audio, or anything else. And it's simple enough to support both, so that's what will happen.

That will last only so long. There is no hardware that supports Theora. Meanwhile Nvidia (9400m) and ATI are coming out with H.264 accelerated hardware. That's including almost every smartphone under the sun which has H.264 acceleration. This is like Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD. Everyone knows who's going to win but the question is how long will it take?