Farewell to Flash

http://techcrunch.com/2015/08/23/farewell-to-flash-what-it-means-for-digital-video-publishers/

by jacobsimon • 11 years ago

73 49 11 years ago

There are still many developers and dev-shops working with flash on a daily basis. It seems important they get an official EOL from Adobe with an upgrade path (most likely to html5).

dspillett2• 11 years ago

There are still many developers and dev-shops working with flash on a daily basis.

They need to break out of that stagnation soon or they risk being completely obsolete and not noticing until it is too late. I for one don't have flash installed (or enabled in cases where it is present as a built-in) in my usual browsers (and that isn't going to change: we are long past the point where anything a Flash app does is replicated by something else so if it is a choice of "use flash or don't be able to use X" I'll skip X and use Y instead of re-enabling Flash). I'm not the only one I know with this attitude and while we are in a minority currently that will change over time, and probably not a long time.

It seems important they get an official EOL from Adobe with an upgrade path (most likely to html5).

Waiting for that would be a bad business decision on their part. It is obvious where things are going (or at least where they are not going or where they are no going to stay) so waiting for Adobe to tell them the facts is silly. They should be researching alternatives now if they have not done so already and making migration plans.

CmonDev• 11 years ago

...being completely obsolete...

By technologies/languages that are older than Flash?

noja• 11 years ago

Because they chose to, or because the client required it?

melling• 11 years ago

They're going to get let behind very soon if the don't change for themselves. Few people want technology that doesn't run on mobile. It's their careers. Companies will use them for as long as they can then replace them.

fenomas2• 11 years ago

official EOL from Adobe with an upgrade path (most likely to html5)

Flash-the-authoring-tool has been able to publish HTML for some years now, and an EOL from Adobe wouldn't mean anything (there haven't been any new features for SWF authoring in years anyway, so killing the tool now would basically just mean killing the HTML-authoring part).

The fact that some devs still make Flash content has little to do with Adobe, and everything to do with the fact that some clients (like ad networks) still want SWFs for various reasons.

sharpercoder2• 11 years ago

EOL from Adobe wouldn't mean anything

I disagree. There are many people who simply say: Adobe is still developing this, as such it is viable technology.

Eol-ing this would solve that problem. I agree it is not any technical solution.

s_kilk• 11 years ago

And it's not just developers either. Flash is still pretty common in the animation industry.

nodefortytwo• 11 years ago

There are still places where flash reigns, mainly in digital out of home.

Its changing though, but it does mean we need a standardised way of deploying bundles of html/css/js and traditionally we haven't been great and standardising.

fenomas2• 11 years ago

I'm no expert, but I gather that a big factor is ad networks failing to adopt any kind of standards for HTML ads. Make a SWF that meets certain requirements and you can use it with any network, but use HTML and every site has different rules about all the sizes involved, whether you can use libraries, how stuff gets cached or doesn't, etc.

It's not my area but, but considering it naively I wonder why all the ad networks don't just pick a version of Swiffy, then keep using SWFs with the rule that the content has to play well with swiffy. (Or maybe they already do such things.)

philliphaydon• 11 years ago

I can't wait for porn sites to hurry up and adopt html5 video. Sick of flash.

jacquesm• 11 years ago

The big hold-up in streaming media is support by the vendors of streaming servers, supporting both html5 and flash at the same time requires transcoding and many of the services (mine included) require flash on the uploaders side, either for historical reasons or because they rely on obscure features not present in video device access primitives available using javascript.

SXX• 11 years ago

Most of porn sites has HTML5 video support for years. Just change your browser useragent to iDevice one and you'll be surprised.

bshimmin• 11 years ago

"Over the years, Flash has become famous for a few less-than flattering features that can all play a role in hindering user experience, including intrusive experiences, increasing page-load times, lowering a site’s search engine optimization (SEO) and security flaws."

With the possible exception of "security flaws", replace "Flash" with "HTML5" in that sentence and it still makes perfect sense.

cjhveal• 11 years ago

I'm curious to know what aspects of HTML5 you think harm UX and SEO.

I was under the impression that overall HTML5 benefited search engine indexing through defining and encouraging the use of semantic tags and embedded microdata. Plus extending the capabilities of the browser with geolocation, drag-and-drop, extended input types, etc.

If by "HTML5" you mean that more extensive browser capabilities lead to the trend of building fully client-side/single-page applications, maybe I could see something there.

Tobu• 11 years ago

A website I visit is using the new PageVisibility API to cover content with an annoying message if I switch away from their tab.

mavdi• 11 years ago

Most single page web applications are as bad when it comes to SEO as Flash websites. "Download our mobile app" pages are the new skip intros of Flash days. A lot of Javascript apps are CPU hogs, HTML5 video decoding performance is as bad as Flash video on Mac and Linux. Security flaws are starting to show themselves while more native API is being opened. Should I count more?

koonsolo3• 11 years ago

For those who still think Flash is dead, Adobe should anounce EOL, and it doesn't support mobile, see the Adobe Flash roadmap: http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flashplatform/whitepapers/roadma...

justwannasing3• 11 years ago

"Adobe on Wednesday said it will no longer push its Flash software format for use in the browser programs that come with smartphones and tablet computers. Instead, Adobe will increase its support for HTML5, a collection of technologies backed by Apple and others such as Google Inc. and Microsoft Corp."

From 2011: http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB100014240529702043580045770279...

koonsolo3• 11 years ago

"Adobe continues to actively invest in enabling developers to create and deploy Flash based content as mobile (and desktop) applications via Adobe AIR."

stevenh• 11 years ago

The author claims that Chrome and other desktop browsers will be revoking all Flash support. Like it or not, the opposite is happening. Flash is directly integrated into Microsoft Edge. Google has also doubled down on supporting the Flash plugin in Chrome for the long haul; they continue to enthusiastically cooperate with Adobe to write code to improve the plugin. http://googleprojectzero.blogspot.com/2015/07/significant-fl...

Adobe has no intention of ever announcing an EOL for Flash. People only think to use "EOL" and "Flash" in the same sentence because Alex Stamos made a melodramatic tweet during the uncomfortable 48 hour timespan between the world becoming aware of the existence of Hacking Team's 0-day and Adobe releasing a patch to fix it.

jeromegv2• 11 years ago

Doesn't really matter that some desktop browser are still supporting it, with mobile traffic getting bigger every year, there isn't any use case for any typical website to support it.

koonsolo3• 11 years ago

Flash supports desktop websites using Flash Player, and mobile through Adobe AIR. You are right there is no use case to support mobile browsers, because you can deliver your Flash application/game straight as an app on mobile platforms.

justwannasing3• 11 years ago

Never, EVER use a Microsoft browser as a reference for how things should work!

As far as Adobe is concerned, they stopped development of Flash on mobile and recommends switching to HTML5 video/audio so don't think Adobe is still head over heels about Flash.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB100014240529702043580045770279...

nine_k• 11 years ago

This is not about how things should work, this is about how things are going to actually work for a number of desktop / laptop users, with Chrome and a Microsoft-supplied browser being the two top choices.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers

pier25• 11 years ago

Adobe has no intention of ever announcing an EOL for Flash

That's irrelevant, Adobe is known for keeping dead products afloat. The Flash platform is gracefully becoming another Director or Cold Fusion which are still being sold.

pix64• 11 years ago

Mozilla is not planning on supporting any addons other than Flash in 64-bit Firefox

makomk• 11 years ago

"However, it’s important to remember that Flash was developed in a time where the desktop was king. The long load times it commands simply aren’t conducive to mobile environments — a deal-breaker for today’s mobile-first world."

Has he looked at the sheer amount of JavaScript modern HTML5-based sites download, especially the advertising-based ones? They make Flash look positively efficient and friendly.

abritinthebay2• 11 years ago

Having worked on both... no. Flash apps would routinely be 20-50mb of streamed assets.

A couple of megabytes of JavaScript which is then gzipped to a few hundred kilobytes is nothing in comparison. The biggest slow down today is in performance AFTER loading due to 3rd Party ad code; not due to the weight but what it actually does.

WhiteNoiz3• 11 years ago

Having worked with both I would disagree with this statement. Image assets are the same size whether you're making a Flash site or a javascript site (both use zip compression, both support JPG's, PNG's etc). What you're referring to is bloated microsites that went overboard on k-weight.

If we're comparing apples to apples, there actually was a lot of things Flash did more efficiently. For instance, efficient storage of vector shapes, more complex masking which allowed the use of JPG images in place of PNG's (which resulted in a smaller file size), and a large API that reduced the need for external dependencies (and thus code size).

Flash also had far more advanced animation capabilities that HTML5 is still struggling to reproduce. HTML5 still lacks decent tooling for producing such animations that work in an efficient, cross browser way. Think about why GIF's and autoplaying videos are so popular now. They provide the most reliable way to add motion and interest to a page and they those things are huge file size wise.

One concrete example - we're making the move from Flash banners to HTML5 banners and finding that we'll need a much larger file size to even approach the same level of polish that we did before. Whereas before Flash banners were typically limited to 40-50k, the IAB is going to recommend 200kb banners as the standard for desktop HTML5 banners.

Now I'm not saying the world should stick with Flash, but instead of just ripping on Flash, I think as web developers we need to be pushing for better tools and better capabilities that will allow for more creativity and expressiveness than we are typically able to produce now. And just as a disclaimer, I've tried Adobe Edge, Google Designer, and coded many things by hand using Canvas, SVG, CSS3, etc.

JimmaDaRustla2• 11 years ago

When I updated to Win10, I decided to never install Flash on the fresh install. So far so good, any site still requiring flash is now behind the times.

mhurron• 11 years ago

You don't need to unless you use Firefox. Microsoft ships its own Flash plugin for its browsers.

JimmaDaRustla2• 11 years ago

True. I don't use Edge, and have disabled Flash as well.

snake117• 11 years ago

No doubt its going to be hard to phase out Flash. My browser keeps blocking Flash on sites like Yahoo and its funny because then Yahoo's video player, which is one of the clunkiest by the way, doesn't even load.

As a side note, I found this page to be a great follow-up: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_HTML5_and_Flash

snogglethorpe• 11 years ago

What's really annoying is that there are quite a few sites that have flash-based video players and so run afoul of flash-blockers (on by default!) on the desktop, but then play just fine when viewed from something like an ipad that doesn't support flash. ><

zeveb• 11 years ago

We’ve been watching HTML5 impede on Flash for a while

I don't think 'impede' means what TechCrunch think it means…

Also, when I visited their home page I got an 'Install Flash plugin?' dialogue…

kevinSuttle• 11 years ago

Am I the only one who caught that the author claimed Flash powers gifs?

Strom• 11 years ago

It's an interesting sentence indeed.

there are still many Flash-powered multimedia items on the web, including graphics, videos, games and animations, like GIFs, a preferred method of expression for millennials and adults alike.

The author could have used GIFs just as a comparsion though, to help readers understand what kind of animation is being talked about, i.e. "like GIFs", not Toy Story.

Aoyagi• 11 years ago

I will never understand the hatred towards Flash, especially considering a good browser can just block flash elements (please let's not call them "apps") in a click-to-play fashion...

shmerl• 11 years ago

Flash is like a staunch zombie - just never dies.

nye2k• 11 years ago

One reason why flash is not going anywhere: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Flash_animated_televis...

jdonaldson2• 11 years ago

Languages like Haxe offer a way to develop against flash targets, in addition to other platforms like js, cpp, python, etc: http://haxe.org/

I think there's a chance that flash still stays useful, despite Adobe's action/inactions.

jestar_jokin• 11 years ago

If they switched the Flash IDE from ActionScript to Haxe, Adobe could reclaim their lost developer mindshare, and make it enticing to continue using it for 2D games and animations.

jdonaldson2• 11 years ago

Yeah, I wish they'd do this instead of trying to do their own html exporter.

Farewell to Flash

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