Hasta La Gadget!

Adobe may be a bit curt with its page to Apple and its iPhone faithful, but try getting Flash from a webOS device, and the company’s got a message of hope: Flash 10.1 is coming, just wait until the first half of 2010. We don’t know how long this message has been up there, but as far as both we and PreCentral can tell, it’s fresh. It’s certainly a date we haven’t seen before — last we heard a public beta was coming the end of this year, which may or may not still be the plan if the above message is referring to a final, non-beta release. Now you current Pre / future Pixi owners have something else to look forward to besides release 1.3.1.

Filed under: Cellphones

Flash 10.1 coming to webOS in first half 2010, says kinder, gentler Adobe page originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 11 Nov 2009 22:49:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Adobe’s seemingly tried everything in its fight to get Apple to tear down enough development barriers to get Flash ported to the iPhone, culminating in a native compilation option in CS5 that… well, really doesn’t solve much of anything. So far, nothing’s worked. What’s next? Get the masses fired up with some old-fashioned propaganda and let ’em riot down at One Infinite Loop, of course! Visiting Adobe’s Flash download page from an iPhone now shows a pretty tersely-worded message informing the user that they’re getting short-changed simply by Apple’s refusal to budge, so yeah, if you hear an occasional cry of “this is outrageous, I’m writing Apple immediately!” while sitting at an airport gate or a coffee shop, you can safely guess what just happened.

[Via Gear Diary]

Filed under: Cellphones

Adobe engages Apple in passive aggressive warfare with iPhone’s Flash message originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 02 Nov 2009 14:58:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Adobe is finally bringing Flash to the iPhone. Now’s your chance to tell us what you think programmers should use this awesome power for.

Adobe has been working long and hard to finagle Apple into imbuing the iPhone with a full Flash experience. The solution unveiled Monday was a compromise at best: Adobe announced its new development kit would convert software written in Flash into standalone iPhone apps. Though this is a lesser Flash experience, Adobe claims there are over 1 million Flash developers worldwide, so expect a flood of new Flash iPhone apps and games to land in the App Store in the near future. Compare that to the 100,000 iPhone developers that Apple says are already out there, and you’ll get an idea of how this might start to change the landscape for iPhone apps.

That gets us in the mood for wishing. There are plenty of Flash-based games, apps and streaming-video sites we’d love to see turned into iPhone apps. Some examples include the Hulu TV-streaming service, the Straw Hat Samurai fighting game, or maybe even a mobile version of the Aviary multimedia suite.

Read on for our wish list of iPhone-ported Flash apps we’d like to see in the App Store. And after you’re done, feel more than welcome to suggest the Flash apps you want to see, in the Reddit-powered list below. If Flash developers see enough demand for their apps and games, they might feel compelled to deliver their wares to the iPhone.

One note: Before submitting your suggestions, make sure to check out Adobe’s limitations for converting Flash into iPhone apps. But keeping that in mind, let your imagination run wild. Ours have already.

Hulu

We have a feeling consumers wouldn’t have created such a fuss over the lack of Flash on the iPhone if a Hulu app were available. Imagine how great that would be. Missed the first episode of Flash Forward? On your bus ride home, launch the Hulu app, punch Flash Forward into a search and stream the episode over a 3G connection — all free, with the brief interruption of a few ads. We estimate this will make commuters’ lives 40 times less miserable. (If a Hulu app ever appears, AT&T and Apple might cripple it to work Wi-Fi only, but hey — this is a wishlist, so we can dream.)

Straw Hat Samurai

Samurai warriors are rad (almost as awesome as ninjas). Imagine how fun this game Straw Hat Samurai would be on an iPhone. The game involves using your mouse to draw lines onto the areas you’d like to slash your enemies to death. It’s charmingly simple, and with an iPhone it would be even better, using our fingers to swipe across the touchscreen to swing the sword. We think kids with an iPod Touch would especially love this game. Try it out at Kongregate if you haven’t already.

Dolphin Olympics 2

Yeah, that’s right — we like this dolphin game. Got a problem with that? It’s fun. You take on the role of a dolphin, and the goal is to do as many tricks as you can in two minutes. Sounds like a stupid time waster, we know, but that’s what all games are, right? See if you can make the dolphin fly into space, and then tell us this game isn’t entertaining.

Aviary

Aviary is a pretty impressive multimedia suite coded in Flash. In your desktop browser you can apply effects and make basic edits to images, and there’s even a vector-editing tool. We wouldn’t expect this to translate smoothly into an iPhone app, but it’d be great to see a lighter version modified for iPhone owners. We’re a pretty multimedia-savvy bunch, aren’t we?

We’re just getting this conversation started. Your ideas are probably even better. Add your wishlist items for Flash-ported iPhone apps in the Reddit widget below. And don’t forget to vote!

What Flash software would you like to see as a standalone iPhone app? Submit and vote on wishlist items below.

What Flash software would you like to see as a standalone iPhone app? Submit and vote on wishlist items below.

Submit your wishlist item

While you can submit as many items as you want, you can only submit one every 30 minutes. No HTML allowed.

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See Also:

• Flash Lands on iPhone — One App at a Time
• Why Apple Won’t Allow Adobe Flash on iPhone
• False Hopes: Adobe Desperate to Install Flash on the iPhone …

Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

Adobe on Monday announced plans to roll out mobile versions of its Flash platform to several smartphones. Apple’s popular iPhone, however, is gaining a lesser Flash experience.

At its worldwide developer conference in Los Angeles, Adobe said it would be releasing Flash for mobile platforms including Microsoft Windows Mobile, Palm’s webOS and Google Android. But don’t expect Flash to come to the iPhone’s Safari mobile browser. Instead, Adobe is adding support to its Flash Professional CS5 developer kit to convert software written in Flash into standalone iPhone applications.

Let’s put it this way as an example: Ever watch videos on Hulu? If you own a Windows Mobile-powered phone, or the Google-Android G1, you’ll be able to watch Hulu videos through your phone’s browser. But for the iPhone, Hulu would have to use Adobe’s new development tools to create an iPhone app containing the Hulu experience.

Why the segmented experience for iPhone customers? Apple declined to comment, but some iPhone developers speculate Apple opted against a full Flash experience because of technical problems it could raise on the handset, such as battery drainage or sluggish web browsing. They also noted Flash apps could pose potential conflicts with Apple’s App Store policies. By requiring such applications to be submitted to Apple for inspection and approval, the Cupertino corporation retains control over the iPhone OS experience.

“These [smartphone] processors are going to become a lot more powerful now, but I think right now between battery and memory and raw processing power, performance is a major issue,” said Bart Decrem, CEO of Tapulous, developer of the popular iPhone game Tap Tap Revenge. “As an app developer I’m very focused on performance. I can see how Flash may not have the right performance characteristics yet.”

Many consumers have complained that the lack of Flash on the iPhone causes them to miss a major chunk of the internet. Several websites rely on Flash to support their streaming video, and a plethora of Flash applications and games are also available on the web. In the UK, two customers complained that Apple was falsely advertising the iPhone in a TV commercial by saying “all the parts of the internet are on the iPhone” when the handset does not support Flash. The UK’s Advertising Standards Authority deemed the ad misleading and pulled the ad.

In November 2008, iPhone developers told Wired.com they did not foresee a full Flash experience appearing on the iPhone at any point. The iPhone developers’ terms-of-service agreement prohibits Flash from appearing on the iPhone.

“An Application may not itself install or launch other executable code by any means, including without limitation through the use of a plug-in architecture, calling other frameworks, other APIs or otherwise,” reads clause 3.3.2 of the iPhone SDK agreement. “No interpreted code may be downloaded and used in an Application except for code that is interpreted and run by Apple’s Published APIs and built-in interpreter(s).”

Previously, iPhone programmers also pointed out that supporting the Flash framework would open a backdoor for Flash apps to appear on the iPhone, which could conflict with Apple’s approval guidelines for its App Store. Third-party software that Apple would prohibit from the App Store, such as apps containing malicious code, could possibly make it onto the iPhone via Flash.

Also, Flash apps could pose competition with Apple’s App Store. And while the App Store continues to flourish, recently exceeding two billion downloads served, there’s no economic incentive for Apple to rush to deliver a full Flash experience, said Scott Meinzer, co-creator of iPhone development house Tap Tap Tap.

Meinzer added that he wouldn’t expect a full Flash experience to arrive on the iPhone anytime soon. He said even on desktops, Flash is not a smooth experience, often causing sluggish browsing and frequent crashes. Thus, running on a phone, a full Flash experience would not be any better, he said.

“It seems like for Flash to work well on the iPhone, Apple has to bless it in some way,” Meinzer said in a phone interview prior to Adobe’s announcement that it would support coding Flash apps for iPhone. This compromise of Flash apps rather than a full Flash experience, then, appears to be Apple’s blessing.

Adobe said a public beta of Flash Professional CS5 will be available by end of 2009. Some Flash iPhone apps are already available in the App Store.

The jury is out on whether consumers will find individual Flash iPhone apps a sufficient substitute for a full Flash experience. What are your thoughts? Vote in the poll or add your comments below.

See Also:

• False Hopes: Adobe Desperate to Install Flash on the iPhone …
• iPhone Users: There Will Be No Flash Soup For You
• Why Apple Won’t Allow Adobe Flash on iPhone

Photo: Steve Rhodes/Flickr

A ton of good news about Adobe Flash 10.1: Full Flash is coming to Android, BlackBerry, Symbian, WebOS and Windows Mobile. and it’ll be actually GPU accelerated, meaning you can play back YouTube in HD perfectly. But the bad news?

Nothing for the iPhone. “Still a closed device and not much progress there,” Adobe told us as they gleefully detailed that Flash was invading basically every other smartphone. Also, we gotta wait until mid-2010 for the full rollout.

But, betas for Windows Mobile and WebOS are coming this year, with Android and Symbian early next, meaning you can get your mobile Hulu on before then. BlackBerry will be a bit longer, since RIM just joined Adobe’s Open Screen project. Supposedly, Flash won’t run like total garbage on phones, either, like Flash Lite. Fingers crossed, guys!

The GPU acceleration for Flash is the real deal, for sure, though—I watched a Star Trek trailer on YouTube HD on an Nvidia Ion-powered HP Mini 311 output to an external monitor, even, and it ran flawlessly. Which, if you’ve ever tried to play an HD Flash clip, even on full-fledged systems it molests CPU cycles, so just working on a $400 netbook very nearly deserves applause.

Flash 10.1 has a few other tricks too with full support for multitouch, gestures and accelerometer input—meaning it’d be perfect on the iPhone, if Apple would ever let it through. And make no mistake, Apple is the roadblock there, since Adobe said engineering work has continued (10,000 years later). The fact that full Flash will be on basically every single smartphone platform also makes that pretty clear.

If you want to spin that positively (my coffee cup is half-full, after all) the iPhone is now basically the only place you can go to flee from Flash, which basically covers everything like a pulsating squid thing with icky tentacles and stuff, ceaselessly stretching out to ensnare more. There is no escape. Except the iPhone. (Which kinda makes no Flash a feature, right?)

Oh, and the new Adobe AIR—TweetDeck, the NY Times Reader and other software runs on top of it—will slightly be less abominable, gobbling less memory and acting more like a real application, with USB mass storage support, multitouch and gesture input, and p2p powers for stuff like Skype and gaming.

Bottom line, It’s a Flashy world, we just live in it.

Adobe Unveils First Full Flash Player for Mobile Devices and PCs

Close to 50 Open Screen Project Participants Support New Browser Runtime for Multiple Platforms

LOS ANGELES – Oct. 5, 2009 – Adobe Systems Incorporated (Nasdaq:ADBE) today unveiled Adobe® Flash® Player 10.1 software for smartphones, smartbooks, netbooks, PCs and other Internet-connected devices, allowing content created using the Adobe Flash Platform to reach users wherever they are. A public developer beta of the browser-based runtime is expected to be available for Windows® Mobile, Palm® webOS and desktop operating systems including Windows, Macintosh and Linux later this year. Public betas for Google® Android™ and Symbian® OS are expected to be available in
early 2010.

In addition, Adobe and RIM announced a joint collaboration to bring Flash Player to Blackberry® smartphones, and Google joined close to 50 other industry players in the Open Screen Project initiative.
Flash Player 10.1 is the first consistent runtime release of the Open Screen Project that enables uncompromised Web browsing of expressive applications, content and high definition (HD) videos across devices. Using the productive Web programming model of the Flash Platform, the browser-based runtime enables millions of designers and developers to reuse code and assets and reduce the cost of creating, testing and deploying content across different operating systems and browsers. Flash Player 10.1 is easily updateable across all supported platforms to ensure rapid adoption of new innovations that move the Web forward.

The browser-based runtime leverages the power of the Graphics Processing Unit (GPU) for accelerated video and graphics while conserving battery life and minimizing resource utilization. New mobile-ready features that take advantage of native device capabilities include support for multi-touch, gestures, mobile input models, accelerometer and screen orientation bringing unprecedented creative control and expressiveness to the mobile browsing experience. Flash Player 10.1 will also take advantage of media delivery with HTTP streaming, including integration of content protection powered by Adobe® Flash® Access 2.0. This effort, code-named Zeri, will be an open format based on industry standards and will
provide content publishers, distributors and partners the tools they need to utilize HTTP infrastructures for high-quality media delivery in Flash Player 10.1 and Adobe® AIR® 2.0 software.

“With Flash Player moving to new mobile platforms, users will be able to experience virtually all Flash technology based Web content and applications wherever they are,” said David Wadhwani, general manager and vice president, Platform Business Unit at Adobe. “We are excited about the broad collaboration of close to 50 industry leaders in the Open Screen Project and the ongoing collaboration with 19 out of the top 20 handset manufacturers worldwide. It will be great to see first devices ship with full Flash Player in the first half of next year.”

“We are excited to join Adobe and other industry leaders in the Open Screen Project,” said Sundar Pichai, vice president of Product Management at Google. “This initiative supports our common goal to move the Web forward as a platform and to spur innovation in the industry through technology such as Adobe Flash.”

“Adobe Flash technology provides a key experience on new Windows phones, enabling people to enjoy rich Flash based games, videos and other interactive Web content on the go,” said Stephanie Ferguson, general manager, Product Management, Microsoft Corp. “We look forward to bringing in the new capabilities of Adobe Flash Player 10.1 to the Windows phone browser when it becomes available.”

“Motorola is excited to be one of the first handset manufacturers to ship Android based devices with Flash Player support early next year,” said Christy Wyatt, vice president of software applications and ecosystem at Motorola. “As the No.1 platform for video on the Web, uncompromised browsing of Flash technology based content is essential for a rich mobile experience and something users expect from Motorola today.”

“As a longtime partner of Adobe, and more than 400 million Nokia phones shipped with existing Flash technology to date, we are excited to see Flash Player becoming a reality for mobile phones and other mobile devices,” said Purnima Kochikar, vice president, Forum Nokia. “Nokia is excited about full Flash Player coming to devices and we are committed to supporting Flash Player 10.1 on mobile devices in 2010.”

[Adobe]