Adobe Testing MacBook Air-Optimized Version of Flash Player

[KnightWRX]

Vorbis is DOA anyway if/when MPEGLA hits them with IP infringement.

10 year old FUD.

If anything it's WebM that killed Vorbis. Why would you want VP3 when you can use VP8 free ?

The point is, currently, H.264 is behind on support right now, destroying John.B's argument that going by browser support it's the clear winner.

 

[RWinOR]

How about future updates

Somebody want to explain to me exactly why the flash runtime has to be optimized for a specific model Macbook???

Good question, this leads to the next questions, even if Adobe is successful at creating a hardware specific version for all the mainstream computers... How on earth are they going to keep all those versions up to date. It may be optimized at first install but when you get those regular updates from Adobe it is going to creep to the mainstream resources hog version. I do not think any company has the resources available to ensure multiple hardware specific versions all upgrade properly. Perhaps they can maintain two or three vesions I.E. Max OSx, Windoze, Linux but throw in specific Mac hardware, specific Dell or HP boxes ( just to name the big hardware makers) running windoze x.x or Linux and you have one very large nightmare.

Any software that needs that much tweaking should not be mainstream. If Flash is not mainstream then it needs to die a quick death.

 

[TMay]

10 year old FUD.

If anything it's WebM that killed Vorbis. Why would you want VP3 when you can use VP8 free ?

The point is, currently, H.264 is behind on support right now, destroying John.B's argument that going by browser support it's the clear winner.

Going by existing browser support only tells you about the present, not the future. The fact is that h.264 is the future, and I stand by my previous statements.

You might try to convince me that the consumer world is crying for an open source codec for camcorders, cameras or DVD/BD players but I just don't see that at all.

Mozzilla org can do what they want, but it won't change the facts.

 

[KnightWRX]

Going by existing browser support only tells you about the present, not the future.

I'll stop you there, you stepped into an argument. Read it from the start, his argument was about the present. End of debate.

You obviously have your views, I do not support them as I do not promote the MPEG-LA's FUD to keep their stranglehold on our media and sure do wish that people would have learned something from Unisys and the GIF fiasco of yesteryears, for the WEB (this blu-ray, camcorder, etc.. argument bs has to die, it's not even a blip on the map).

So let's both save time here and not argue about it, it is quite off topic.

 

[TMay]

I'll stop you there, you stepped into an argument. Read it from the start, his argument was about the present. End of debate.

You obviously have your views, I do not support them as I do not promote the MPEG-LA's FUD to keep their stranglehold on our media and sure do wish that people would have learned something from Unisys and the GIF fiasco of yesteryears, for the WEB (this blu-ray, camcorder, etc.. argument bs has to die, it's not even a blip on the map).

So let's both save time here and not argue about it, it is quite off topic.

Yes, of course facts are off topic, and conveniently right after you just posted your view.

lame,

buh bye

 

[KnightWRX]

Yes, of course facts are off topic, and conveniently right after you just posted your view.

No, facts are not off topic, as long as they relate to "Adobe Testing MacBook Air-Optimized Version of Flash Player". If you want to start a thread on the merits of WebM vs H.264... then please don't, there's already a 300 pager somewhere. You are free to go read it, resurrect it and discuss about it there.

I told you my views after you told me yours and so you would understand why this would be a dead end debate anyway and to make you understand this wasn't the place for it.

 

[BaldiMac]

Oh... my... god.

THIS is why we compare MR (coverage of Flash) to Fox news. This has never, ever been true. It's been demonstrated to be untrue.

Yet people parrot it again and again.

Do you notice something about that example? The page isn't scrolling. You can either have mouseover or scrolling. Not both. It's common sense. That's all people were originally talking about when they mention mouseover problems on touchscreens. It's not any more a problem with Flash than HTML. It's just that mouseover is used more with Flash.

Of course, there are people on either side of argument that don't understand the problem and overstate it. But it's useless to argue the fringe.

 

[deadkennedy]

Adobe takes free software, resells it and charges it TWICE!!!!

Recipe:
1) TAKE FREE Eclipse open source IDE
2) Make Flash Builder Standard and Flash Builder Pro out of it
3) SELL ONCE within Web Premium as Standard version
4) SELL TWICE by charging the upgrade price to Premium


Make sure you pass this on and expose the greed!

 

[ct2k7]

I welcome this, if this is true, and the result is true.

 

[err404]

So just to confirm, you're leveraging what is possibly the biggest complaint with Apple in general to criticize adobe?
I mean, macs are great....but seriously? They have more control over their user experience than anyone.

We are talking about the web experience.
The problem with Flash is that only Adobe can optimize the code. Every other aspect of the browsing experience has multiple vendors competing to fill the user need.
This issue underscores that Adobe's cooperation is required by every vendor making or consuming a browser. That's fine when you're in the running the most popular OS (Windows) or the hot new trend (MacBook Air), but Adobe has demostrated that once a platform is out of the spotlight, the quality of their player fades. Just look at their historical support for Apple and Linux as examples of this.
As for OpenScreen, you can't create a compatible open source Flash player because the released spec is incomplete in precisely the area it's used most, video playback.

BTW-I'm not pointing a finger at Adobe. They have dealt with the issue the best they can. However, web site dependency on what should be an optional plug-in has elevated Flash to almost the level of a requirement. The recent trend of providing alternative playback via HTML5 is a good start to bringing competition back into web multi media performance. Now we just need the W3C to define a blessed codec so videos don't need to be served in both Vorbits and MP4.

 

[jlseattle]

Flash vs. HTML5

Hi,

I just wanted to present my point of view on this issue in regards to HTML5 versus flash. I ran accross an website that has a pong table setup with 1/2 flash generated and 1/2 html5 generated. When you run this website in Safari (the most recent version) the flash video is choppy when the ball crosses the screen. When the ball crosses to the HTML5 side it is very smooth. This is what my expectations were for what I have been hearing.

NOW, this is where it gets interesting. I took this website into Firefox and ran the same test. The ball had the same performance in HTML5 vs. Flash. The ball was faster in both and choppy in both (meaning the video performance was better but still choppy).

So my conclusion is that one factor is the actual engine (flash or HTML5) but it also is dependent on the web browser and how it is programmed to interpret the flash/html code efficiently. I draw this conclusion because I believe that Safari is programmed to use HTML5 efficiently and flash very inefficiently. And firefox is programmed to do both somewhat efficiently but not as good as Safari on the HTML5 portion.

Test for yourselves:
http://labs.codecomputerlove.com/FlashVsHtml5/

 

[jayducharme]

Here's the problem. Safari crashes a lot using Flash, BUT when I use Firefox on the Mac, it doesn't.

WHY is that? Safari isn't the best browser anymore.

I agree, sadly. For a few years nothing came close to Safari for speed and stability. Now Safari regularly crashes. And any embedded Flash elements cause scrolling to lock up when the cursor encounters them.

Although I have issues with Firefox, it seems to handle Flash beautifully.

 

[AidenShaw]

if so, it could be Apple's fault

Somebody want to explain to me exactly why the flash runtime has to be optimized for a specific model Macbook???

Good question, this leads to the next questions, even if Adobe is successful at creating a hardware specific version for all the mainstream computers... How on earth are they going to keep all those versions up to date.

It's a question of APIs.

If Apple provided a common API for hardware acceleration across all systems - no "specific" machine optimizations should be necessary.

Windows does this with the Direct* family of APIs - the Microsoft APIs map the API call with the hardware capabilities, so that the applications don't have to worry much about the actual hardware - the API will emulate features that may be missing on a particular system.

There's little detail available about exactly what Adobe is doing to "tweak" Flash for the MBA, so we're all speculating.

It could be something as simple as Apple having updated the acceleration API for better support of the 320 - and Adobe tweaking Flash to use the updated API if it's present.

Without understanding what the coders are doing, it's risky to propose theories.

 

[KnightWRX]

I agree, sadly. For a few years nothing came close to Safari for speed and stability. Now Safari regularly crashes. And any embedded Flash elements cause scrolling to lock up when the cursor encounters them.

Although I have issues with Firefox, it seems to handle Flash beautifully.

Chrome. Webkit browser so all the Safari goodness, and it uses more recent builds and is lighter weight. It's really a good effort by Google.

 

[BaldiMac]

Hi,

I just wanted to present my point of view on this issue in regards to HTML5 versus flash. I ran accross an website that has a pong table setup with 1/2 flash generated and 1/2 html5 generated. When you run this website in Safari (the most recent version) the flash video is choppy when the ball crosses the screen. When the ball crosses to the HTML5 side it is very smooth. This is what my expectations were for what I have been hearing.

NOW, this is where it gets interesting. I took this website into Firefox and ran the same test. The ball had the same performance in HTML5 vs. Flash. The ball was faster in both and choppy in both (meaning the video performance was better but still choppy).

So my conclusion is that one factor is the actual engine (flash or HTML5) but it also is dependent on the web browser and how it is programmed to interpret the flash/html code efficiently. I draw this conclusion because I believe that Safari is programmed to use HTML5 efficiently and flash very inefficiently. And firefox is programmed to do both somewhat efficiently but not as good as Safari on the HTML5 portion.

Test for yourselves:
http://labs.codecomputerlove.com/FlashVsHtml5/

A browser doesn't interpret Flash code. The Flash plugin does. Safari does not run Flash code.

 

[e-coli]

If you have to specifically engineer your product to run on a thoroughly capable, modern machine, your technology needs to die off.

It's really pitiful to watch this play out.

 

[The Phazer]

This.

Not that it really matters anymore. The industry has, and is, moving on from Flash.

It really, really isn't. The amount of content being supplied to non-iOS devices in HTML 5 is much, much smaller than the amount supplied to iOS devices.

And that's simply because of DRM. You can serve content to iOS in relative security on HTML5 because nobody can write code to capture it. If you do, out of the app store it goes, and hence can't be run by almost everyone. But on a computing platform that doesn't require approval to run third party code? Then no, there'd be a Firefox extension to download the content within the day, and unlike Flash, said software wouldn't be illegal.

Which is why we're seeing the industry going in the direction it's going - serve HTML 5 to iOS but nowhere else. Which means Flash won't be going anywhere any time soon. And there will always be sites that can't be arsed to factor in for iOS and just use Flash.

Phazer

 

[johannnn]

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/4783/adobe-flash-player A 10.2 preview release has hit MacUpdate without any release notes. Can this be the "MacBook Air-Optimized version"? I don't find any info.

edit: probably not, by looking here http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/flashplayer10/

 

[macintoshtoffy]

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/4783/adobe-flash-player A 10.2 preview release has hit MacUpdate without any release notes. Can this be the "MacBook Air-Optimized version"? I don't find any info.

edit: probably not, by looking here http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/flashplayer10/

Apparently it doesn't replace the 64bit preview that was released around 2 months ago. Adobe with each passing month re-enforces why it should never be allowed on the iPad - if they can't get the desktop right then what makes them believe that they'll get it right on the iPad?

MacBook Air 'optimised' is just another buzz word by Adobe to hide the fact that they've yet to actually fix the real problems with Flash - problems that they can fix but refuse to do so (as seen in the 'know faults' but continue to ship it even with them).