Adobe is effectively killing off its Flash Player browser plug-in for Android. The current version of Flash will be removed from the Google Play store on August 15th. As previously announced, Adobe won't develop a version for Android 4.1 (Jelly Bean), and the current version of Flash - if it works at all - won't be supported by Adobe on Android 4.1. Users can only maintain a certified installation of Flash - including future security updates - if they have a device that came with Flash pre-installed and do not update to Android 4.1. Users who download the Flash Player themselves from Google Play before August 15 technically have an "non-certified" installation, but may continue to receive security updates as long as they don't upgrade to Android 4.1. The news is no surprise, as Adobe announced over seven months ago that it was halting development of Flash Player for mobile devices. The company promised to continue releasing security fixes, however, and one such update was just released earlier this month. Adobe has refocused its mobile efforts on Adobe AIR and HTML5.
Here is the full statement:
Beginning August 15th we will use the configuration settings in the Google Play Store to limit continued access to Flash Player updates to only those devices that have Flash Player already installed. Devices that do not have Flash Player already installed are increasingly likely to be incompatible with Flash Player and will no longer be able to install it from the Google Play Store after August 15th.The easiest way to ensure ongoing access to Flash Player on Android 4.0 or earlier devices is to use certified devices and ensure that the Flash Player is either pre-installed by the manufacturer or installed from Google Play Store before August 15th. If a device is upgraded from Android 4.0 to Android 4.1, the current version of Flash Player may exhibit unpredictable behavior, as it is not certified for use with Android 4.1. Future updates to Flash Player will not work. We recommend uninstalling Flash Player on devices which have been upgraded to Android 4.1.
Adobe not supporting Flash on Android Jelly Bean
updated 09:27 am EDT, Fri June 29, 2012New Flash installs also being disabled on Google Play
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Adobe will stop supporting Flash Player in Android from Android 4.1 onwards, with new installs of Flash on the mobile OS ceasing altogether in the near future. A company blog post has announced that there will not be a certified implementation of Flash Player on Jelly Bean; development and testing of Flash for the new version of Android has already ceased.
As of August 15th, moreover, Flash Player will be withdrawn from the Google Play Store. Downloads after that date will mostly be limited to updates for devices with Flash Player already installed. Some files should be be available in the Adobe archives for download, but without Google Play-based updates.
Late last year, Adobe confirmed that it was stopping work on mobile Flash, finishing at version 11.1 for Android and the BlackBerry PlayBook. Future developments were redirected to bugfixes and closing security holes, with the company focusing on AIR.
CNET Editors' review
by: CNET Staff on October 04, 2011As Adobe has focused on Flash Player development in the aftermath of the rise of HTML5, it hasn't ignored its other content-delivery system: Adobe AIR. AIR 3 brings some hefty speed improvements to the system, thanks to a little something new called Stage3D.
In case you're new to AIR, which stands for Adobe Integrated Runtime, it's a platform that runs applications across multiple systems without coding in more than one language. It's powerful and respected for giving people the same end-user experience, whether on Windows, Mac, or Linux. One very well-known AIR app is TweetDeck. If you try to install an AIR app without having previously installed AIR, you'll be automatically prompted to download it.
Stage3D brings combined hardware-accelerated 2D and 3D graphics rendering that's up to 1,000 times faster than previous versions of AIR. Although it's only for desktops at the time of writing, Adobe promises that it will soon take Stage3D to its mobile apps. The advancements offered by Stage3D should bring far more complex graphics development for the player, and allow some developers to use it as a viable alternative for their projects, especially for cross-platform efforts. It includes more support for Android devices including software licensing and hardware, captive runtime support for developers to bundle AIR along with their programs (removing the requirement to separately install AIR), and native extensions for enhancing AIR's capabilities.
AIR has allowed developers to make hybrid applications, or desktop tools that can integrate with various Web services, while still allowing some offline functionality that Web browsers don't yet have. This includes things like taskbar and dock notifications. With these latest updates, Adobe is really improving AIR as an alternative development environment and maintaining its relevance on the Web.
Read more: Adobe AIR - CNET Download.com http://download.cnet.com/Adobe-AIR/3000-2383_4-10652806.html#ixzz1zOLEKoBG
Steve Would Be Proud: How Apple Won The War Against Flash
Late Thursday, an extraordinary thing happened: Adobe announced in a blog post that it would not provide Flash Player support for devices running Android 4.1, and that it would pull the plugin from the Google Play store on August 15. The retreat comes five years after the introduction of the iPhone, the device which thwarted Flash’s mobile ambitions, almost even before they began.
That Adobe would make such an announcement nearly five years to the day that the first iPhone was sold is kind of funny. I’d like to think that the Flash team has a sense of humor and was well aware of the timing when it posted the blog entry, but I could also see the entry as unintentionally ironic. Either way, it caps off a five-year battle to win the mobile landscape — a war which for Adobe ended in defeat.
At the time the iPhone was announced, lack of support for Adobe Flash seemed like a glaring omission, for a platform that was so hell-bent on being a portable computing device. But it wasn’t until the iPad came out, two-and-a-half years later, that the battle between Apple and Adobe, Flash vs. HTML5, and “open” vs. “proprietary” reached a fever pitch.
The iPad Effect
The iPad was announced in January at WWDC, but wasn’t available until March. And when it did finally become available, people began to notice that the lack of Flash, which then was the de facto standard for video playback and interactivity on the web, was missing. For the iPhone, not having Flash was a minor annoyance — after all, few other smartphones had very good Flash support at the time… But for the iPad, which in many cases was being used as a laptop replacement, at least for consumption of media, that was a big deal.
It wasn’t long before Google latched onto this and began promising an alternative to the “broken” Apple devices which wouldn’t give users access to the full web, as publishers intended them to view it. It’s tough to believe now, but at one point, Flash on mobile devices was actually considered a feature. There was Google’s Andy Rubin in April 2010, announcing that Android would have full Flash support in Froyo, the next version of the operating system to be released.
The Impact Of “Thoughts On Flash”
Battle lines were drawn, and just a few days later, Steve Jobs issued his epic missive “Thoughts on Flash,” which sought to explain, once and for all, why Apple didn’t — and wouldn’t ever — integrate Flash into its mobile and tablet devices. There were numerous reasons, and Jobs debunked the trope of Flash being “open,” as well as its ability to access the full web. He also brought up security, reliability, performance, and battery life issues that plagued devices using the plugin.
Most importantly, though, Apple didn’t want Adobe developers to create cross-platform apps which didn’t take advantage of the most latest features, development libraries and tools. Jobs wrote:
“Our motivation is simple – we want to provide the most advanced and innovative platform to our developers, and we want them to stand directly on the shoulders of this platform and create the best apps the world has ever seen. We want to continually enhance the platform so developers can create even more amazing, powerful, fun and useful applications. Everyone wins – we sell more devices because we have the best apps, developers reach a wider and wider audience and customer base, and users are continually delighted by the best and broadest selection of apps on any platform.”
It turns out Jobs was right. When Flash finally did ship on Android devices, it didn’t provide users with the full web, as was promised. Android users who wished to watch videos on Hulu through the Flash browser, for instance, were met with a message saying that the content wasn’t available on the mobile web. Same thing for users who tried to access most premium video sites on Google TV, which also supported Flash. More importantly, even when those videos or interactive Flash elements did appear on Android devices, they were often wonky or didn’t perform well, even on high-powered phones.
The end result was that users stopped seeing Flash on mobile devices as a good thing, and developers quit trying to support the framework on those devices.
The Flash Issue Isn’t Just About Mobile
But the impact of that battle goes beyond just how people view content on mobile phones. While pretty much all developers have settled on building native apps or coding for the mobile web when trying to reach those users, the battle has also had an impact on the way that developers think about multi platform web development. Even when not building for 4-inch screen, they’re increasingly turning to HTML5 to build new user experiences or render interactive applications, rather than writing to be seen in the Flash player.
Video might be the last industry where the Adobe Flash Player continues to have a hold on how content is displayed, but even then, a growing number of sites are moving to HTML5-based video players for delivery. YouTube and Vimeo are leading that charge, displaying their videos in a HTML5 player first, when available, and only falling back to Flash when the player isn’t supported. And many others are following that lead.
Frankly, Flash had never been a huge business for Adobe, even when development for interactive websites using the plugin were in high demand. As time goes on, it will become an even less important part, as its development tools — where Adobe makes the bulk of its revenue — focus on catering to a developer base that is increasingly interested in building HTML5-based web applications. As more can be accomplished in-browser without a plugin, that’s good news for users and developers alike.
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