Hasta La Gadget!

A rather clever programmer has managed to get the iPhone to run interactive apps created using Adobe’s Flash platform. And because it works inside the Safari browser, it isn’t subject to the dictatorial rules of Apple’s App Store.

The software is called Gordon, and it doesn’t actually allow Flash itself to work on the iPhone. Instead, Gordon is a JavaScript runtime written by Tobias Schneider which allows the browser to play and display .swf files (the Shockwave Flash file extension). A runtime is a collection of software that allows the running of code inside it. A helpful analogy is a software emulator for a games console which allows you to play the actual code of, say, Super Mario World on your PC.

Does this mean that the iPhone now supports Flash? Not really. You can’t just visit any site that has Flash, because the hack only works on sites that have installed it. Developers would need to add this runtime to each instance of Flash on their sites (although calling the runtime only requires a few lines of code).

And while the open source project is available to all, it still doesn’t solve one of Flash’s biggest problems. These SWF files still hog the CPU. One demo, a simple vector graphic of a tiger, throws my desktop browser up to around 100 percent CPU usage.

Still, the hack potentially opens the door to a new class of interactive, animated mobile websites. While many web developers rely on Flash to accomplish things that can’t easily be done in HTML, those Flash apps won’t run on the iPhone. And while the lack of Flash support has been one of the most persistent criticisms of the iPhone platform, Apple has done nothing to rectify the problem. Adobe’s workaround, announced in October, has been to offer developers a way of converting Flash apps to iPhone apps, but that wouldn’t support Flash within the web browser, and those apps are still subject to Apple’s approval before they’re available.

You can see it in action yourself by heading over to this Gordon demonstration page (which works in both Mobile Safari, on your iPhone or any desktop browser). On a new iPod Touch, the animations run just fine, and as the runtime is directly displaying the SWF files it should also work with video.

Could we ever see a browser in the App Store which would let us view any Flash content this way? It’s very doubtful, due to Apple’s ban on anything which can run interpretive code.

Also, when naming the project, Tobias doesn’t seem to have considered the search terms required to google it: Flash Gordon. Or maybe that’s the joke?

Gordon demos [Paul Irish]

Gordon project code [Github/Tobias Schneider]

What goes better with a brand new Freescale smartbook reference design than a little Flash? An actual price and a release date, maybe, but Flash isn’t too shabby either. That, naturally, comes courtesy of a little help from Adobe, who worked with Freescale and Movial to get Flash 10.1 up and running on Freescale’s i.MX51 family of processors — which, incidentally, power a range of other mobile devices in addition to smartbooks you can’t buy. Still nothing in the way of demos or anything, unfortunately, but Freescale says that the first devices ready to support Flash 10.1 will indeed be smartbooks.

Freescale, Adobe and Movial team up for Flash 10.1 on i.MX platforms originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 06 Jan 2010 17:16:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Pocket Wizard makes radio-frequency remote controls for camera flashes. These off-camera strobe triggers are the choice of professionals as they have a reputation of being bulletproof, firing the speedlight every single time, over and over and over.

That is, until PW got fancy and started adding support for more advanced auto-flash modes, those that let the camera and flashgun talk back and forth to create perfect exposures from afar. The Canon-compatible FlexTT5 units were suffering from radio interference when used with certain Canon speedlights, limiting the range and reliability of the system. Now, Pocket Wizard has come up with a fix.

Has the company issued a recall, or promised to send out re-engineered units that are less sensitive to interference? Nope. Instead, it will send owners of the FlexTT5 a tin-foil hat for every unit they mistakenly bought.

The hats are gussied-up somewhat with a fancy name: AC5 Soft Shields. As there is a lack of pictures accompanying the press release, we are left to guess that these free “fixes” are little more than the DIY version pictured above, a quick wrap of aluminum/copper sheeting whipped up by Flickr user Daniel Aqua.

Better news for those who paid around $420 per receiver/transmitter pair, Pocket Wizard will, in “mid to late November” (yes, in ten months) take another $30 of your cash for the plastic, umbrella-mountable AC7 RF Shield. And remember, you’ll need one for every flash you buy. Way to go, PW.

AC5 Soft Shield Available to U.S. FlexTT5 Owners at No Cost [Pocket Wizard via DIY Photography]

DIY RF shield for flash (Photo): Daniel Aqua/Flickr

Outside of the occasional leaked roadmap, one of the best ways to predict the future of consumer electronics is by looking at the evolution of the components within. Take this Toshiba NAND package for instance. While the launch of a 64GB embedded NAND flash memory module (the highest capacity in the industry) that combines sixteen 32Gb NAND chips fabricated using 32nm manufacturing processes might sound a bit boring, consider its uses. As you’ll recall from the iPhone 3GS teardown, Apple’s lovely uses either a single 16GB or 32GB Toshiba NAND module depending on the model purchased. The fact that Toshiba is now sampling its new high-capacity chips with mass production set to begin in Q1 2010 hints at what we can expect from the next-gen iPhone rumored to have landed in Foxconn’s lap. That’s enough capacity for 1,070 hours of recorded music (at a 128Kbps bit rate), 8.3 hours of 17Mbps high definition video, and 19.2 hours of 7Mbps standard definition video according to Toshiba’s calculations. The iPod touch, you’ll remember, differs by using a pair of NAND packages for a total of 32GB or 64GB of flash today. Anyone for a 128GB iPod touch? Check the module’s internals after the break — fascinating stuff, really.

Continue reading Toshiba announces 64GB NAND packages: Apple winks, gives a nudge

Toshiba announces 64GB NAND packages: Apple winks, gives a nudge originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Dec 2009 02:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Believe it or not, we first heard of SDXC nearly a year ago. Aside from a highly guarded chip spotted at CeBIT, though, we’ve yet to see any of those cards in the flesh. Thankfully for the impatient among us, it seems as if the SD Specification 4.0 is well on its way to being hammered out, with the maximum data transfer rate scooting up from 104MB/sec to 300MB/sec. The actual scheme will also be changing from parallel to serial, with an unspecified amount of pins (more than 9, though) assisting in the speed increase. We’re also told that the external dimensions of the cards will remain the same, and that backwards compatibility is of the utmost importance. We’re guessing that newer cards will be able to rely on parallel transfers when used on older readers, while newer readers will accept data via the serial scheme; unfortunately, the nitty-gritty details have yet to be made public, but we’re hoping for a serious coming-out party at next year’s CES.

Next-generation SD specification comes to light, 300MBps just around the corner originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 02 Dec 2009 02:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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