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Flash Websites
- Thread starter jsf721
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What websites?
Most video sites have HTML5 content.
For games you got app store.
There are browsers on app store that can access flash content.
Most video sites have HTML5 content.
For games you got app store.
There are browsers on app store that can access flash content.
Your post makes me laugh.
Because Youtube is html5 and not flash. So that should definitely not be a problem.
What sites are you trying to access otherwise?
Why the disbelief? Do you honestly think all the Flash sites magically disappeared? YouTube is not completely HTML5. I encounter plenty of videos, linked to on FB for example, that aren't playable on my iOS devices. YouTube's entire catalogue has not been converted over and a good portion is still in a Flash wrapper. Lego is another example of a site that still has Flash elements.
The world has been moving away from Flash for many years. Apple's announcement in 2007 that the iPhone would have Flash-free browsers helped accelerate that process. The absence of Flash in the iPad (2010) helped accelerate it further.
In the fall of 2010, Adobe started demoing their tools to convert Flash websites to HTML5. They recommended that sites stop using Flash as a means to deliver content via the web. Instead, Adobe is recommending that Flash developers use their packaging technology to deliver Flash code via the app stores that are available for a variety of mobile devices.
This fall, Adobe announced that they are discontinuing development of Flash player on mobile devices. At the end of November, bloggers of Microsoft reported that ARM-based Windows tablets will also be Flash-free.
These announcements should serve as a wake-up call to website owners: Flash is no longer suitable as a conduit to deliver web content. While some sites could hypothetically maintain parallel delivery of content via HTML and Flash, that is completely unfeasible for the vast majority of website owners. It's just too damn expensive. Adobe itself is recommends converting to HTML delivery.
@darn is right: Flash sites will not magically disappear. Many website owners are ignorant that their Flash websites are unable to deliver content to an increasing percentage of web users.
Can you please provide an example of a video hosted on YouTube.com that is not available through HTML?
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Some historical corrections:
In 2007 it was commonly assumed that the iPhone would get Flash very soon, so that it could honestly claim being able to show "the real internet".
Even Mossberg predicted it. The prediction of "Flash soon" continued for years on the internet.
It wasn't until 2010 that Apple announced it would never have Flash.
On the contrary, that clip recommended continuing to write in Flash for Flash capable devices, and export to HTML5 for the iPhone.
I'm not a big Flash fan, although we did consider and reject it for a current tablet app. At the same time, HTML5 / CSS3 isn't a full replacement yet. Both the Xoom and the iPad I tested did horribly on some CSS3 animations that would look nice in Flash. (An HTC tablet looked great, however.)
It was increasing, but still relatively small. Moreover, judging from some mobile stats I saw recently, I think that the percentage of non-Flash-capable users might decline for a while, before starting to inch up again.
Flash still penetrates almost all desktop class browsers, along with most Android devices, which are being activated at over 700,000 a day now.
--
Here's my take: as a user, it's still really handy to have Flash capability right now, on both desktop and mobile.
I also think that HTML5 is just as unready for prime time, as mobile Flash was back when Jobs first complained about it.
I'm all for moving fully to a standard HTML, but it needs to be implemented to be at least as capable as Flash to replace it. And so far, I'm not seeing a consistent HTML5 performance (or standards set) yet.
Apple has always kept its cards close to the chest. "It was commonly assumed" only meant that the industry analysts were wrong. Jobs's "Thoughts on Flash" did not solidify Apple's policy; it only gave a rare glimpse into why Apple had made those decisions over 3 years earlier.
I'm certain that it was an upsetting thing for Adobe that the iPhone (then iPod Touch then iPad) were Flash-free. They would be motivated to shake all trees -- including spreading rumors -- that Apple would undo its decision. They knew that a Flash-free line of products was the beginning of the end for their platform.
One correction, Ken: the iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad are *all* Flash-capable. Apps like Politifact and Machinarium were written in Flash, packaged using Adobe's iOS packager, and distributed through the iOS App Store. This past summer, Machinarium was briefly the #1 iPad paid game in the iOS App Store. Apple has banned Flash from running in the browser on iOS devices. It appears that Microsoft has made exactly the same decision for their Win8 ARM tablets.
You main point is also incorrect. John Nack's October 2010 blog posting was clear: it is beyond the budgets of most websites to create and maintain a Flash site AND an HTML site:
Adobe's John Nack said:
Good luck, indeed. Nack is clearly recommending an HTML-only solution.
kdarling said:
The fact that Adobe has dropped browser development for all mobile devices should take a hit on that percentage. Now that Adobe has officially given a vote of no confidence for mobile Flash in the browser, companies should be leery on using it for any mission-critical software.
A significant percentage of the new Win8 machines should also be Flash-free in the browser.
But "penetrates" is not the same as actually having the software installed or actually using it.
Here's my take: Flash was already in decline when Apple drew a line in the sand on iOS. Flash would have eventually disappeared, but Apple has accelerated its demise.
Will Flash wind up being a superior means to distribute apps to the various app stores? I don't really know, and I'm happy for the marketplace to sort it out. I tend to think that all of the cross-platform apps are inferior to apps custom-made for the specific platforms. It is interesting to note: Adobe is delivering some new apps to a variety of mobile platforms, and they're NOT using Flash to deliver those programs. They seem to not like the taste of their own dog food.
They don't really compare. HTML has never had the security problems of Flash; entrusting the security of your browser to a third party was a total non-starter. Flash is opaque data; it breaks the native UI in the browser and makes native accessibility problematic.
That's a bit of a platitude. If vendors want to provide a truly rich experience, they make native apps. That has worked out just fine on the iOS platform.
We shall see. Imagine where we could be today if Adobe hadn't spent all that energy complaining about Apple's decision.
Labeling your differing opinions as "corrections" was out of line. Adobe is indeed advocating an HTML-only solution, and I have yet to see any evidence that Apple would ever have backtracked on its no-Flash decision.
You neglected to watch the video. He was saying to write in Flash, export to HTML5. That way, you only wrote once and saved money.
I don't disagree. I just don't see anything capable of universally replacing it yet. Certainly not HTML5.
Sure. Or imagine if Apple had helped Adobe instead.
My correction section was totally in line and accurate. You had said:
Apple made no such public announcement in 2007. (You might be thinking of Java, instead.)
Moreover, their well known cohort Mossberg even declared that Flash must be coming. Perhaps that was deliberate handwaving on their part to get people to ignore the lack at the time, who knows.
The blog is NOT advocating having a website that serves up both Flash and HTML.
I don't really care if website developers wish to keep their website sources in Flash, Smalltalk, or Prolog, or even HTML. It doesn't matter to me one whit. The current failing is the use of Flash to deliver content to web browsers.
Philosophically, I do have a difficult time imagining Flash as some sort of ultimate repository for website sources. I'm guessing the converters will be used more for one-shot conversion of snippets.
The troubling word is "yet". If we waited for the Flash advocates to judge the fitness of a replacement tool, that replacement would never happen.
Since Adobe has committed to accelerating the development of HTML with Flash-like features, their abandonment of mobile Flash should help us get the "needed" features in HTML more quickly, right?
I don't know what "helped" would mean. Apple wasn't willing to entrust the correct functioning of their iOS browser to a third party. That runs from all sorts of decisions to functionality, User Experience, security, performance, and scheduling of product releases. "Helping" Adobe could have created all sorts of harm to Apple.
You need to spell out exactly what kind of "help" you're talking about. Just a platitude of "help" is not convincing.
What I said was completely accurate. You got confused because Mossberg made an error in his reporting. Apple did announce its iPhone in 2007 -- including the implicit announcement that the browser would be Flash-free.
It looks like Walt got it wrong. iOS Safari contains no plugins at all. AFAIK, none of the iOS browsers have plugins. Microsoft is going with the same plugin-free approach for Metro Mode in Windows 8.
Did he ever reconcile that error in his 2007 column?
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It seems as you guys have got into a deep debait about whether or not flash is being advocated by apple, but in your discussions you've missed the original topic of this thread. Bottom line is there are high numbers of websites using flash and not really any unanimous result for an acceptable form of viewing the matter on any of apples devices, so how would one go about that?
That's revisionist history.
When Apple announced the iPhone and that it would run "the full version of Safari" there was considerable excitement in the Flash community, and a lot of conjecture that developers could build Flash apps that would run in the browser, eliminating their need to learn Objective-C.
(which is why Apple prohibited runtimes like Flash and Java--so developers couldn't circumvent the app store)
Then you should have no problem providing the discussion with the facts.
You used quote marks. Are you quoting something? If so, please tell us what it is.
When Apple announced the iPhone in 2007, there was no way for developers to create any Objective-C apps at all. The App Store was announced on March 6, 2008.
Developers do not have to learn Objective-C in order to create iOS apps. Flash code can be packaged for a variety of mobile app stores -- including the iOS app store. Flash-based apps like Machinarium are available today in the app store.
Forcing apps to be submitted to the app store helps minimize security risks for the platform. If developers make their apps free, Apple gets no revenue for distributing them.