Adobe ceases development on mobile browser Flash, refocuses efforts on HTML5

Looks as if Adobe are throwing the towel in on mobile flash:

http://www.zdnet.com/blog/perlow/ex...rowser-flash-refocuses-efforts-on-html5/19226

Ding Dong, the witch is dead?

 

Not surprising. Even the mobile platforms that boast that they will do Flash (with a smirk towards Apple) are struggling with it. Not seen a decent browser implementation yet.

Jobs must be laughing from the grave.

EDIT: Do you think Adobe deliberately waited to tell this news until Jobs was dead?

 

It's about time, mobile flash has been pretty much laid twitching on the floor for a while now due to nothing but a lack of support. Ever since Apple revolutionised the way we use Applications (No Apple, I will *not* call them 'Apps' ) on mobile devices it's been very, very redundant.

It's funny really, considering how much bad rep Apple got for not supporting this technology.

 

Thank goodness, the amount of space wasted on the desires limited internal memory for flash is ridiculous, now let me un-install the bloody thing.

 

I'm just waiting from a voice from beyond the grave:

"One last thing... Tell Adobe, I was right..."

 

*snip*

EDIT: That article is incredibly vague... from what I can gather they're only stopping producing the Flash Player plugin for mobile browsers and are refocusing on AIR. Considering AIR is basically just a way of creating desktop applications using Flash/Flex with useful things like inherent AJAX support this isn't surprising.

Considering desktop-style Applications is the leading paradigm on smartphones these days it makes sense. Running games/applications in a browser is old hat on phones, and it's unsurprising that Adobe have finally woken up to it.

 

Job losses at Adobe as well, according to the beeb:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15648899

 

With HTML5 being able to run like native apps (on the iPhone, at least... not sure about the 'droids and the WinPho's out there - Example: Gametrailers), it was a question of time.

Bye bye...

 

First of all. Nothing is official

1- People who complain about Flash and praise, know nothing. HTML5 barely works between web browsers. If the rumor is true, you better install a bunch of web browsers on your desktop and phone, and keep switching between them to view sites.

2- HTML5 can't even do 1/10 of Flash (I know, I already develop in Flash)

3- Flash 11, is full GPU rendering, solving (about time) the problem with battery life due to it's high CPU usage. 5 years late, but hey better late then never (I think that if it Adobe isn't acquire Macromedia, Flash 11 features would be on Flash 9... but that's just my opinion. As I believe that Adobe never cared about Flash until the last couple of months).

4- Like any game, like program.. Flash requires optimization when you program it. They are things you can do properly, and some things you don't. It's all about how you program it. Also it's knowing HOW and WHERE to use Flash.
We don't see full page Java web site (thank god)...Sadly this isn't true for Flash. I think this is the main point where Flash got it's bad reputation.

5- HTML5 is CPU intensive... a simple look at the task manager, demonstrate this.

Assuming it is true I see 2 possible path:
1- Internet web ads will now be an HTML5, causing more of problem on system resources utilization, not solve the problem, break web sites, and can't be blocked. In addition, people would need all the web browsers on their phone and desktop/laptops to visit different web sites as HTML5 is implement differently on every web browser.

2- Websites will switch to Silverlight (which is like Flash 11, minus the complex 3D part)

 

First off - it is official:

http://blogs.adobe.com/conversations/2011/11/flash-focus.html

 

Ok Well, the Adobe managers who took that decision should be fired.
To me, that is like Microsoft coming and saying... ok we stop making Windows OS's. They are other alternatives such as MacOS and Linux. Enjoy!
It simply doesn't make any sense.

Anyway, what is done is done. Silverlight were we come.

 

I'd rather write in html than actionscript to tell you the truth.. I really liked flash back in the day.. could pretty much make anything you put your mind to and let everyone see it

I agree with goodbytes it is awesome, but it makes a lot more sense to write all your code without plugins.. hope they get the whole html 5 fiasco straitened out between browsers.. just my opinion though

I haven't messed with actionscript in a long time- probably like 5 years.. so take my opinion as someone who hasn't written in actionscript for a long time.. I love flash though

 

Actually, it is...

HTML5 is an open standard designed for interoperability, and it's supported quite extensively by the major layout engines. Not to mention it's not actually a finalised standard yet, and new features are being added all the time. This notion of 'switching browsers' is highly amusing.

And even less than that is actually relevant on a mobile device. HTML5 does everything that is still relevant to these platforms - that is, rich media content on the web, primarily audio and video. People on mobile devices don't care about interactive content beyond that - if they want to play games or do something productive they'll buy an application native to the device, designed for that device's interface and use/play that. We may lose a lot of functionality with HTML5, but it's functionality that's unused anyway.

TBF, Adobe are artists, the software they write is not of the highest standards. Not badmouthing flash, because most of the groundwork for that was laid by Macromedia and in all honesty it is a fantastic platform for what it does.

But we're moving on from the paradigm of web applications hosted in a browser, to the world of thin clients and cloud computing, desktop applications that give at-a-glance information updated from live web feeds. Web-browser hosted applications are old hat, Adobe have realised this.

I agree; it's usually bad optimisations on account of the person who made the application, not the Flash platform itself. However, as stated above, these kinds of applications are just being superseded.

Since when? Also, you know web browsers are implementing support for HTML5 to be rendered on the GPU, just like Flash, right?

Why could the HTML5 ads not be blocked? You know that Ad Blockers simply blocks content that comes from a set of blacklisted URLs, rather than just blocking all Flash content, right?

Also, the HTML implementation isn't different on separate browsers at all, I'd love to know where you got that claim from.

This is so highly irrelevant it's amusing. They're only stopping development on the Flash Player plugin. Flash player still exists on desktops, and the Flash platform still exists on mobile devices as Adobe AIR. Silverlight doesn't offer anything else in this ballpark and it isn't going to be more highly adopted. Not to mention Silverlight is far more comparable to the entire AIR platform rather than specifically Flash.

HTML5 will become the new standard for delivering interactive web content, and this is a good thing. HTML5 is an open standard, anyone can use it without having to worry about licensing or any of the headaches that can be associated with Flash. A leading platform that uses a proprietary editor isn't a good thing for letting that standard grow.

EDIT:

Adobe still has AIR, which is a logical progression of the Flash platform for a more modern design methodology. It combines Flash & Flex with nifty tools like native AJAX support and wraps it up into a unified SDK. Flash exists as part of AIR, and AIR is supported by every major mobile platform, desktop OS, everything does AIR.

AIR does everything Flash does, and it's most certainly not dead.

 

The new rumour is that Silverlight 5 will also be the last release - are we seeing the death of proprietary systems here?

I for one am glad that Adobe have finally acknowledged the poor performance of Flash and are willing to move on - AIR is indeed the logical progression, coupled with the still-developing HTML5.

 

Unlikely - Silverlight is the primary development platform for WinPhone 7, so it's not likely to die anytime soon.

However, one thing I will say is that this isn't an acknowledgement of the poor performance of flash - it's more of a shift from applications hosted in a web browser to applications run natively on the device. It's Adobe adapting to the market, nothing more.

 

Also, Microsoft uses for Silverlight for it's DRM control on the Zune.net music service, and also the Zune desktop software is made in Silverlight.

What bugs me, is that HTML5 is light years behind. Nothing beats compiled code esecpailly down to system binary (example: C/C++) in efficiency. HTML5 apps will consume more power therefore provide less battery life. You want proof? Check out the demo applications in HTML5 on Windows 8 dev preview. They eat my laptop battery life, and performance is low. They work great when my system is plugged in.. but go on battery , where my last gen Core 2 Duo P8400 2.2Ghz CPU is stuck at 800MHz (made on purpose), and Nvidia GPU stuck at minimum speed, the experience of these apps (not Windows, no my software, just these apps), are choppy. If it has trouble to run on my Core 2 duo... you think that a ARM processor will fly in term of performance with it's power saving features turned on? Granted, maybe that it needs optimizations as it's only an alpha version. But still, you feel the limitation of HTML5 made software. If I kep my Windows power management to default on Power Saver, where my CPU can go to max performance if needed, then yes, my laptop runs these apps OK. But I lose my a lot of hours from my 10 hours of battery that I have when in Win7.

I think the problem is that people saw that you can do primitive games with HTML5 + Java Script (well you could have practically all done it in Java Script.. as HTML5 is a just a formatting language with new tags such as video and audio, but people think you can actually do programs with it. And you are still going to have a web browser problem, as in fact already today we have the problem. Some websites appears incorrectly on some web browser or simply don't work at 100%. The more complex HTML5 is, the more of this problem we will see.

I agree that it is best to avoid plug-ins as much as possible. I agree that HTML5 video and audio tags are great (if the web browser developer can agree on a codec). But to do games, and applications with it, that is an foolish.

 

Fact is:
HTML5 is markup, and from a byte-by-byte angle, it's lightweight... more so than HTML4/XHTML/Flash.

CPU usage will come down with time... it's on the browser manufacturers to make it happen now, and not on Adobe.

With HTML5 being able to act like native apps on mobiles, CPU usage will go down simply by not having to run HTML4 support there.

Adobe has been having issues with it's flash plugin for mobiles, and with new smartphones becoming ever more popular, HTML5 is making a push in that market segmetn right now (I have honestly not heard of anyone bithcing about an HTML5 website not working on his phone's browser - but that mighthave to do with the fact that noon'es runnig IE6/7/8 there..)

 

Fact is, it is only true because web browsers uses GPU acceleration to manage HTML 5 content. That is cheating. That is like saying that HTML5 will not cause any performance issue as CPU's and GPU's will be more powerful over the next 5-10 years, that it won't be an issue. That is covering the problem under the carpet.

It should not even run HTML5 content in the first place. It should be using compiled binaries software.

What's next? We are back in the old days of the first home computers, where you use codes like "Go to line xx", to have the system execute a code as it reads it? Come on.

I bitch on the PC (I don't have a cellphone), I keep needing to switch between Chrome, Firefox, and IE. Well not anymore, as web sites adjust it's code HTML4/HTML5 mode based on the web browser you use. Heck even Windows 8 Blog video's don't work in Firefox. Lucky you can download them, but they work in IE. It has nothing to do with IE, and Microsoft. It has to do that every web browser wants to interpret the standard and use their own video/audio codec differently, as they think their method is best in the world.

I personally feel where we are back in the old days or IE and Netscape where we had to switch between the 2 constantly.

 

This is my point - people want native applications on mobile devices. This means that web browser hosted applications, no matter the language, technology, platform, whatever you want to call it is seeing a rapid decline in popularity.

I think the real point is that Flash on mobile devices isn't being superseded by HTML5 (for anything other than video and audio playback in the browser, anyway). Flash on these devices is being superseded by native applications, made in AIR, Silverlight, and other SDKs designed to run natively on the device. Why? Well, they offer ease and speed of access, an interface tailored to that device/range of devices and more functionality at a lower footprint than what is feasibly capable with browser-hosted applications.

Arguing what's going to be the future of browser hosted applications on mobile devices is redundant; there isn't a future full stop imo.

 

Ah yes, now I get your point. +rep