
What's new in Flash 11 - whatever_dude
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flashplayer/articles/whats-new-flash-player11.html
======
ender7
Some of these are really welcome changes for me (native JSON, bezier curves,
TLS sockets, DisplayObjectContainer.removeChildren).

And yet...

And yet I'm still planning on switching my web app to HTML5.

This is coming from a guy who's sunk over two years of development into Flash.
It's not because the runtime is buggy and/or crashy (it is, but it's not that
bad). It's not because it's so much easier to develop in HTML5 (I will dearly
miss AS3 and generating art assets in Flash). It's not because HTML5 has more
useful features than Flash does (Flash has more, and they're implemented more
reliably).

I'm doing it because Flash doesn't run on tablets [1]. And that's what my
users want. I don't have the time to develop three native clients for iOS,
Android, and Windows 8, so HTML5 it is.

I will miss Flash dearly. I'm praying that between some combination of
backbone.js, easel.js, raphael.js, and inkscape, I'll be able to build
something as expressive as my old system.

[1] Those new Android ones included. I've used those tablets that "support
Flash". It's a nightmare.

~~~
ido
I was originally in your shoes, but after my first real attempt at writing a
game in js/html I came to the conclusion it's still a ton easier in flash.

If you are talking about something more static (e.g. a non-game application or
a fairly static game like a match-3) it's probably less of an issue.

~~~
jessicarios
Yeah, it's easier -- but flash games are rather pointless. Does anyone
actually make money selling flash games? You'd be better off learning Cocos2d
and developing something that actually makes money, such as an app.

~~~
ido
I'm making a living (mostly) selling flash games.

I agree that the app store has more potential for making big money, but there
is also a good chance you'll make very little
(<http://www.dilbert.com/2011-02-12/>).

Of course you don't really need to choose, you can make your game for both
flash & mobiles :)

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davidu
I guess crashing isn't a feature. I'm not trying to be a troll, but let's be
honest -- There has never been a version of Flash that hasn't piece a complete
piece of garbage when it comes to stability and performance.

If Adobe "got it" this list of "What's new" would include words like "removed"
and "deprecated" and "eliminated." Those words don't appear once. They've just
thrown more stuff into the kitchen sink that was already overflowing.

They have amazing developers, but there is a reason Flash is the beast it is,
and this isn't moving it in the right direction in terms of delivering a
stable, secure and fast experience.

~~~
noamsml
If adobe "got it", Flash would compile into cross-platform HTML5 code. The
world doesn't need another inner platform.

~~~
whatever_dude
I'm wondering how would HTML5 video support audio, webcam feeds, and a
plethora of other features that Flash has had for years but that are barely on
the HTML's radar.

Having a time machine is not the same as "getting it".

~~~
ugh
That’s a minority of use cases. Flash can stick around as a bridge technology
for a few years to cover those. The majority of stuff that’s today done in
Flash can easily be done with plain HTML, CSS and Javascript, often not even
the newest variety.

~~~
montibbalt
Can it be done with something that's not Javascript? Not trolling, I'm
genuinely asking.

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racecar789
ActionScript 3.0 is what JavaScript should be. Actual classes, typed
variables, and a platform that works the same in every browser.

Contrarian view but I see flash improving its lead on html. Adobe doesn’t have
to deal with a bureaucratic standards body and can act decisively when making
platform changes. Ex: I’d like to see MS, Mozilla, IE, Chrome, Apple, Opera
all agree to implement similar features in Flash 11 (and work the same in each
browser). Then I’d like to see them agree on new feature sets when Flash 12,
13, 14 come out etc.

I just don’t see how five browser vendors can equal the agility of one flash
vendor. Too much red tape in the html congress…

Yes, Flash is proprietary and it doesn’t work well for mobile. All I can say
is that I’ve been burned one too many times by IE not showing CSS table
borders on empty cells (last time I checked IE8 still requires that damned
ampersand in each cell!). I’m fed up with browser incompatibility. All of the
JavaScript frameworks (and now with Google making Dart) confirm that
JavaScript is inherently outdated and broken. I gave up on html for Flex and
am not looking back.

Just my humble opinion…

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BillPosters
As an HTML/JS developer I really appreciate these powerful features that HTML5
will never have, and wasn't designed to have.

People who say "use HTML5 instead of Flash" obviously have limited experience
in actually building HTML web apps and sites.

Ever tried making a javascript pre-loader? Not gonna happen. There's no
jquery.bytesLoaded to the rescue. Even before the web-app has loaded, HTML is
struggling to stay in the same game as Flash or native apps. Pre-loading sound
files and other assets and relaying the bytes loaded to the user as a progress
bar just isn't possible in HTML. You might be able to cook up a half-baked
progress loader in JS, but it will suck, I promise.

It's obviously true that for SIMPLE things like menus and other interface
features, HTML5 is the choice. But when you start getting seriously rich and
multimedia heavy, then you need flash or native apps. And I prefer the Flash
development and deployment freedom over native app lock-in any day.

Flash should be allowed as an optional plugin on iOS devices, simple as that.
Then people who want it can have it, and people who cry about Flash can turn
it off and stick with their iTunes account.

~~~
rimantas
Strangely enough I've seen a few preloaders working just fine. Are you aware
about <progress> element in HTML5, XMLHttpRequest Level 2, Progress Events?

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keeperofdakeys
The most interesting thing about Flash 11 is the Stage3D and how it compares
against webgl. It looks like IE10 won't support webgl (at least the version in
WDP doesn't), and webgl penetration on the mobile platform hasn't gone very
far yet. This will make Flash 11 very attractive to developers who want
accelerated 3d content. Although, the very fact webgl exists (and has
implementations) means it definitely isn't out of the game.

~~~
melling
There are 3 free implementations of WebGL, and I think Opera support is on the
way. If there's a WebGL game that you want to play, you can install Opera,
Chrome, Safari or Firefox.

As for mobile, neither Apple nor Microsoft will support it. Flash will be
around for years, but platform support is on the wane.

~~~
ryannielsen
By default, Safari does not support WebGL. With Safari 5.1, you need to enable
the Develop menu in Safari's preferences and then select Develop > Enable
WebGL.

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jjcm
I'm very surprised to see native 64bit linux support as one of their first
bullets. It may very well be too little too late though. As of late, the only
thing that I've used flash for has been to supplement my <audio> tags.

The native JSON / jpeg-xr / LZMA support will certainly make flash feel
somewhat more lightweight, but I don't think it'll be enough to make it not
feel bulky.

~~~
nextparadigms
Shouldn't the new Web Audio API in Chrome be enough to replace that (at least
for Chrome users) ?

~~~
keeperofdakeys
Currently html5 audio is a bit limited, especially when you want to play
multiple sounds and on time (html5 audio doesn't have latency guarantees). Of
course, the web audio api is designed to fix this, firefox also has their own
solution. The fact that this won't work on every browser (like iOS or
android), means it isn't much of a solution for now.

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melling
Before everyone starts complaining about Flash, I challenge people to go 30
days without Flash.

<http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/141/tn_14157.html>

[http://www.cultofmac.com/67699/uninstall-flash-for-mac-
os-x-...](http://www.cultofmac.com/67699/uninstall-flash-for-mac-os-x-in-
seven-easy-steps-how-to/)

~~~
mikeleeorg
I've been using Chrome's FlashBlock extension and loving it:

[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/gofhjkjmkpinhpoiab...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/gofhjkjmkpinhpoiabjplobcaignabnl)

For those who want to take melling up on this challenge (and I would encourage
it because it's an eye-opening experience to see much your favorite websites
depend on Flash, or not), this extension is a nice bridge.

Flash embeds aren't loaded automatically. Instead, a placeholder appears
instead. Clicking on that placeholder loads the Flash file, so you can
selectively choose which Flash embeds to see.

~~~
keeperofdakeys
Chrome has an inbuilt plugin blocker, that does the same as flash blocker. You
may need to activate it in about:flags to see the option in the plugin
settings. An advantage is that it doesn't depend on javascript, so it is
friendly with the javascript blocker in chrome, if you are feeling very
paranoid.

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acqq
Note: "High-efficiency SWF compression support: Developers can now take
advantage of LZMA compression for their SWF files. LZMA compression can reduce
SWF size by up to 40 percent, enabling users to benefit from richer
experiences with shorter download times and reduced bandwidth consumption."

If I understand correctly, they must have used the code developed by Igor
Pavlov, the author of 7z, who made it LGPL. LGPL means his code must be in a
separate DLL, can anybody confirm that?

Note that this guy, to which Adobe refers:

<http://blog.kaourantin.net/?p=124>

claims it's public domain, but it's not:

<http://www.7-zip.org/>

~~~
carussell
From lzma920.tar.bz2!/7zC.txt:

    
    
      LICENSE
      -------
      
      7z ANSI-C Decoder is part of the LZMA SDK.
      LZMA SDK is written and placed in the public domain by Igor Pavlov.

