Hasta La Gadget!

Man, Adobe is really teasing up Flash and 3D. Straight from the mouth (or, rather, keyboard) of product manager Thibault Imbert: “What kind of [3D] API? True textured z-buffered triangles ? GPU acceleration? Even better? What I can say is forget what you have seen before, it is going to be big.” Big talk in regards to a session at the company’s upcoming MAX 2010 conference entitled (aptly enough) “Flash Player 3D Future.” According to the description and some added details care of Imbert, expect discussion and demos of a renderer coming in a future version of Flash Player. We’d love to give you something more concrete, but looks like that might be awhile — the talk isn’t until October 27th.

Flash Player investing in a 3D future, plans coming in October originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 08 Jul 2010 20:21:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The cat-and-mouse struggle between Android users, carriers, and manufacturers to gain, patch, and re-gain root is one that shows no signs of slowing down, but the EVO 4G’s latest recommended root method is particularly creative. Made necessary after the most recent over-the-air firmware update patched the old way of doing it, you’ve now got to visit a page on Adobe’s site for tweaking local Flash settings, at which point a script works some magic and apparently takes advantage of a vulnerability in the EVO’s Flash Lite build. Of course, that’s just one of twelve harrowing steps in the whole process — but regardless, it’s not often we’re thanking our lucky stars for a security issue.

Latest EVO 4G root uses Flash Lite exploit to do its deed originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 06 Jul 2010 13:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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In an open letter three months ago, Apple CEO Steve Jobs challenged Adobe to ship its Flash software on any mobile device and prove it worked well.

Adobe, now, has an answer. The company has released Flash Player 10.1 to its mobile partners and the technology should be in the hands of Android phone users with the upcoming Android 2.2 ‘Froyo’ update to the operating system.

Flash Player 10.1 will be available as a “final production release” for smart phones and tablets, once users are able to upgrade to Android 2.2, says Adobe.

Among the devices that will get Froyo and Flash Player 10.1 are the Dell Streak, Google Nexus One, HTC Evo, HTC Desire, HTC Incredible, Motorola Droid, Motorola Milestone and Samsung Galaxy S. Google hasn’t said yet exactly when Android 2.2 will be available to users, though it is expected in the next few weeks.

Adobe says Flash Player 10.1 will also be available in devices using BlackBerry, webOS, future versions of Windows Phone, MeeGo and Symbian operating systems.

If major Android phones get Flash capability it will be a push back against Apple’s efforts to turn public opinion against Flash on mobile devices.

With the launch of the first iPhone in 2007, Apple declared war against mobile Flash. Apple is supporting HTML5 and its efforts have influenced the online video landscape significantly. Many major websites are starting to use HTML5, and video players such as Brightcove are serving up HTML5 videos for devices not compliant with Flash. Separately, Apple has worked with companies like YouTube to produce iPhone-compatible versions of their sites.

“We have routinely asked Adobe to show us Flash performing well on a mobile device, any mobile device, for a few years now. We have never seen it,” wrote Jobs in a note posted on the Apple website in April. “Adobe publicly said that Flash would ship on a smartphone in early 2009, then the second half of 2009, then the first half of 2010, and now they say the second half of 2010. We think it will eventually ship, but we’re glad we didn’t hold our breath. Who knows how it will perform?”

But many developers are not convinced. Adobe’s Flash standard is still widely used on the internet, for everything from animated banner ads and splash screens to infographics, educational content and games. Much of that content has been unavailable on mobile devices: The previous version of Adobe’s mobile Flash player, Flash Lite, supported only basic Flash content, such as video.

Gadget Lab’s first look at a Flash Player 10.1 beta showed that Flash on the mobile phone can be fun, unlocking sites that otherwise would be inaccessible. But it’s not a flawless experience. On a Nexus One, Flash content — especially video — took time to load, which was frustrating. And it sucks bandwidth.

Still, for Adobe, it’s a big step toward making Flash a contender in mobile multimedia.

See Also:

• Adobe Gives Up on Flash for iPhone, iPad
• Steve Jobs Claims Flash Will Kill the Mobile Web
• Adobe CEO, Ex-Adobe Engineers Weigh In on Jobs’ Flash Attack
• First Look: Flash Arrives on New Android OS

Photo: Flash Player 10.1 on a Nexus One phone (Keith Axline/Wired.com)

When Adobe said Flash gives you the full web experience, it meant it. Part and parcel of the web, as we all know, is the good old hacking community, which has been “actively exploiting” a vulnerability in Flash Player 10.0.45.2 (and earlier versions) and Adobe Acrobat and Reader 9.x to overtake people’s machines and do hacky stuff with them. This so-called flaw also causes crashes, but that’s probably not what’s worrying you right now. Adobe says the 10.1 Release Candidate for Flash Player looks to be unaffected, while versions 8.x of Acrobat and Reader are confirmed safe. To remedy the trouble, the company advises moving to the RC for Flash, and deleting authplay.dll to keep your Acrobat from performing undesirable gymnastics. Oh boy, Steve‘s gonna have a field day with this one.

Adobe’s Flash and Acrobat have ‘critical’ vulnerability, may allow remote hijacking originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 05 Jun 2010 17:45:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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