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I suppose they are talking about the interface in the upper right part of the app as shown in this screenshot.

Clicking the bars slides the bars and shows the tool you want. It isn't a tabpage like I am used to seeing but has the same function. I have seen this technique used somewhere else recently and it wasn't an Adobe product. I wish I could place it. Actually, it just dawned on me that this screenshot is a beta version so it is possible they have already corrected it.

I personally hate the palette UI metaphor (what is so great about windows floating over your workspace getting in your way all the time anyway?) and was very happy when Macromedia moved Flash MX to their panel model. Still not as cool as Corel's dockers, IMHO, but a great improvement nonetheless.

Macromedia seems to have a Flash player available for Linux (Clicking on the link will give you the option to download Flash 5 for Linux if you're running under it...)

A Linux Quicktime player, not a Linux (or other) non-Quicktime player. Actually, since Flash MX also is Mac/Windows-only, Sorenson still doesn't support Linux. Hello?

"They" would probably ignore Fontographer, since changing the bits of a font constitutes a tiny part of the program's functionality. Not to mention that Fontographer has been around a very long time...way before the DMCA was ever conceived...

...which brings up an interesting question that may have been answered before : what about apps that are prey to the DMCA but were written and conceived before its time? Are these applications/devices/etc immune from persecution by some "grandfather" clause?

"They" would probably ignore Fontographer, since changing the bits of a font constitutes a tiny part of the program's functionality. Not to mention that Fontographer has been around a very long time...way before the DMCA was ever conceived...

...which brings up an interesting question that may have been answered before : what about apps that are prey to the DMCA but were written and conceived before its time? Are these applications/devices/etc immune from persecution by some "grandfather" clause?

There's another reason Flash ads are going to become the new wave - with the introduction of Flash MX, Flash files are compressed using z-lib, resulting in considerably smaller file sizes than previous versions. For example, on a project I'm doing in MX my 50k file was compressed to under 12k. Once people start adopting the Flash MX player and advertisers realize they can fit way more in one of those than a standard .gif or .jpeg, you're going to be seeing a lot more Flash ads.

The problem is that 99.999999% of the flash you encounter on the web is waste of bandwith.

http://www.macromedia.com/support/flash/ts/documen ts/playerfaq.htm#one_six

Did you know that Macromedia has a pretty good donation program? We -- and many of the Northwest environmental orgs we work with -- have gotten flash and other MM products from it.

The donation form is online.

best,
jon

------------
Jon Stahl
ONE/Northwest: Online Networking for the Environment
www.onenw.org

This is because they're counting from Flash 2, and only in the US. Here's the breakdown by version type, according to the same NPD Research study. It's worth noting that these numbers aren't ultimately very helpful, since almost all Flash 5-produced files cannot be executed by a Flash 3 or even Flash 4 player. I would estimate that there are very few web sites out there nowadays that use anything lower than Flash 4.

The real interesting question is how many users have the more _recent_ player. I was actually surprised that Macromedia created another player version with the release of MX, since the Flash 5 penetration was still relatively low (~50-60%) as it had only been released for about a year and a half and was not shipping with OSes. In fact, Macromedia made a big deal about how Windows XP would ship with the Flash 5 player - now they're already out of date.

Go to Tools->Internet Options->Security->Custom... to disable ActiveX/plugins.

If you want to uninstall Flash completely, see this:
How to remove the Macromedia Flash Player ActiveX control

On a similar train of thought, Macromedia Flash is used very frequently for distracting advertisements on pages that are difficult to ignore. Can anyone offer some suggestions as to how to disable Flash in IE6.0? These options haven't worked for me:
1) uninstalling Flash (as described by their website). It prompts to be reinstalled frequently which is more annoying than the ad itself. I get the prompts even with Enable Install On Demand turned off.
2) turning animations off (Tools->Internet Options->Advanced->MultiMedia->Play animations in web pages) doesn't do any good for non-gif animations as far as I can tell.
3) turning off third-party browser extensions (Same place as #2) also doesn't affect Flash.

Now that I drove that home, on with my story:

Macromedia did try to open up the Flash 4 format so that other people could create software compatible with it. And in fact, LiveMotion was Adobe's entry into that market.

This was Flash 4, though. They're now essentially up to Flash MX (read: 6), and the spec has grown significantly since then. The first big change was scripting from 4 => 5, and while I have no idea what they added from 5 => MX, but I'm sure it's sizeable. (Memo to myself: look into it, consider upgrading just because it might be fun to try some animation.)

Remember, once again, that Macromedia makes the player plug-in, and if you base a site on Flash, you're still going to be at their mercy no matter whose development tools you use. And if you use someone else's tools, they may not keep up with Macromedia's changes.

Now, it's doubtful that they'll do anything to break an animation when viewed through an older plug-in or browser, but there may be side-effects, and they will affect both usability and user perceptions of your site.

Yes, I'll admit, this argument smacks of FUD, but sometimes the unthinkable happens.

Barring my qualms against it, I'll side with everyone else who answered so far and recommend not using Flash to build a website because it can prevent normal navigation, SWFs can take a long time to play over slow connections (I'm still stuck on a 56K dialup--I know from whence I speak), and as of Flash 5, Macromedia's authoring environment had some seriously "avant-garde" (read: bad) user interface design philosophies. There are those who believe [really C|net news] the Flash-based web is not necessarily a good idea.

The load speeds and display times could be the biggest issue, since web surfers have notoriously short attention spans.

But that's just my opinion, as always. The salt shaker is to the left; take as many grains as you need.

Now that I drove that home, on with my story:

Macromedia did try to open up the Flash 4 format so that other people could create software compatible with it. And in fact, LiveMotion was Adobe's entry into that market.

This was Flash 4, though. They're now essentially up to Flash MX (read: 6), and the spec has grown significantly since then. The first big change was scripting from 4 => 5, and while I have no idea what they added from 5 => MX, but I'm sure it's sizeable. (Memo to myself: look into it, consider upgrading just because it might be fun to try some animation.)

Remember, once again, that Macromedia makes the player plug-in, and if you base a site on Flash, you're still going to be at their mercy no matter whose development tools you use. And if you use someone else's tools, they may not keep up with Macromedia's changes.

Now, it's doubtful that they'll do anything to break an animation when viewed through an older plug-in or browser, but there may be side-effects, and they will affect both usability and user perceptions of your site.

Yes, I'll admit, this argument smacks of FUD, but sometimes the unthinkable happens.

Barring my qualms against it, I'll side with everyone else who answered so far and recommend not using Flash to build a website because it can prevent normal navigation, SWFs can take a long time to play over slow connections (I'm still stuck on a 56K dialup--I know from whence I speak), and as of Flash 5, Macromedia's authoring environment had some seriously "avant-garde" (read: bad) user interface design philosophies. There are those who believe [really C|net news] the Flash-based web is not necessarily a good idea.

The load speeds and display times could be the biggest issue, since web surfers have notoriously short attention spans.

But that's just my opinion, as always. The salt shaker is to the left; take as many grains as you need.

Flash MX can be purchased for $99 if you are some sort of educator. That certainly lowers the price. Go to this URL to get it:

Macromedia Flash Education Store

You will need to attest that you are an educator.

Or an in-browser app that automatically Google-linked everything in a page? Like M$'s proposed auto-linking, but populist. True hypertext.

Good luck! Don't count on feeling lucky d;-)

I've seen plenty of places where flash is used well to do things that otherwise couldn't be done. Despite all the anti-flash sentiment around here, it's not flash or macromedia itself which sucks, it's designers which insist on making kludgy, overbranded, full-flash sites which suck. Macromedia is actually trying to educate its users about usability and trying to encourage them in the next flash.

Flash ain't a bad tool, but only in the right places, and this is one of the better uses I've seen...

Huh? So what would you call Macromedia's flash player for Linux?

Mass market games are about money. They cost money to develop, to advertise and to distribute. Certainly there are many great community, grass-roots, hobby games out there and java may be ideal for those, but this story was about the xbox, ps2, gamecube etc.

First, Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft will always attempt to strong-arm developers into producing single-console titles. "Only for XBOX" boasts one-time-Mac-developer Bungie about Halo. So who Sun think they are fooling is anyone's idea. In fact, one can find a way that Sun has competed directly or indirectly with all the major players. Sony and Nintendo use MIPS processors, and the N64 used SGI technology. The Xbox, and, for most people, the PC, is owned by Microsoft. Nuff said.

I dont see what Java can do for games that flash, virtools, renderware cant do. Class "A" titles are frankly more concerned by how long it takes to load a level, than by easy of portability. Halo and Jak&Daxter are both touting their "instant-loading" abilities. Imagine if the JITC had to compile the level before loading! I did find it terribly amusing that the clever fellow who pointed out how JITCs can compile for all sorts of different processors ever so well and how I, the developer, can instruct the JITC to compile the code just once, unfortunately forgot, or was blinded by his own brilliance, that neither the ps2, nor gamecube, have a harddrive.

So, if we limit our discussion to the PC, why dont I just use C#? The developement environment is infinitely better than anything for less than $5000 and its guaranteed to run on 99% of all game-playing PCs.

Sorry, Sun, you had your chance at making Java a generic gaming scripting engine, but that was years ago when you were still a bunch of arrogant fuck-heads who thought Java was amazing and we could all bloody well pay $100,000's for it. Now that C# arrives, you're so keen to push Java for games. Hmmm. See ya!

Though often dismissed for its common use in annoying web advertisements and over-developed corporate web sites, I have had considerable success in leveraging Flash media for the creation of web-based e-learning tools for everything from offline CBT's to online distance learning programs.

With the introduction of the new Flash MX version, the abilities inherent to this tool are reported much expanded. This advancement in Flash media technology was discussed on Slashdot here and pays reference to this article at news.com.

Among its benefits, Flash it cross-platform and supported by most current main-stream browsers. For more information, you can visit their website.

By disabling Flash, you make more good than bad, unless you love large blinking, running and screaming banners!

Instructions on how to remove Flash plug-in. For testing purposes, yeah :-)

Flash MX (the new version of Flash set to launch in about two weeks) includes a number of accessibility improvements over previous versions of Flash. To whit, from Macromedia's site:

"Macromedia Flash Player 6 now supports assistive technologies such as screen readers through support of Microsoft Active Accessibility. In addition, Macromedia Flash MX now integrates tools for creating accessible content. To add descriptive text to animations and user interface elements, select an item and enter the appropriate description. Users with disabilities will be able to experience your content."

Linkage

Granted, you have to use Microsoft's Active Accessibility product, but nevertheless, they're taking some steps in the right direction that should help to make Flash somewhat more accessible than it currently is.

http://www.macromedia.com/macromedia/proom/pr/2002 /flash_mx_accessibility.html
They WILL have that support. As of yet the only verion that you can download off their site is 5.0. It remains to be seen just how good their accesibility features are.

Just in case anyone was doubting your statistic, Macromedia has a breakdown of Flash adoption stats at http://www.macromedia.com/software/player_census/f lashplayer/. They say their penetration is 98.3% of the browser market as of 12/01.

Actually, in the new version of Flash, you can develop applications that "adhere to standard browser navigation buttons". For example, you can write your Flash so that clicking the back button allows you to "go back". Fo more info, check the Feature Tour.

I guess you've never heard of OpenSWF.ORG.

Flash is an open standard, and it has been since early 2000. In fact, many companies (including Adobe) have released products that write .SWF files.

Actually, They _Have_ Done it.

I remeber seeing a product demo for Generator which would let you query an ODBC data source and dynamically generate flash files(I saw it demoed on windows, I know they had a Solaris and Linux version). Its not one of their big products anymore, but they still have information about it online

The dynamic capabilities were a little crude (you could change attributes and set variables dynamically) but if you combined them with a little scripting you could do some neat things. The demo I saw was custimizing a flash add for a visitor. The template flash said something like "Hello ${name} when would you like your ${color} ${model}" and from the db it would fill the feilds and make the car the right color.

There used to be an online condom ordering shop that used generator, I can't find it now.

Maybe they don't believe their own hype?

You can get instructions from the macromedia site directly about removing the plugin (from Windoze). IE is still pretty annoying however because you still get a message from most sites about installing the plugin and if you disable that you get a message about enabling active x.

You read it incorrectly ;)

(or more likely I described it incorrectly)

You can specify text areas within flash who's value are dependant upon variables. These variables can be set internally or externally. Externally via the querystring (e.g. http://flashfile.html?name=bob). The variables can also be set from a text file in a querystring format.

The way I've seen it most used is by using a dynamic web page (either ASP or JSP) to out.print (or response.write in ASP) the variables, in querystring form, to a page. (similar to how you load vars from a text file)

more info here Load variables into Flash

So the DB connection isn't contained in the Flash file, it's contained in a dynamic web page. A new flash movie isn't generated every time the user hits the page either.

They do make a Flash plugin for Linux (I'm using it on Mozilla right now)...

Flash for Linux v5.0r47

Now if its Macromedia's Shockwave that you are referring to, then yes, it is not currently available on Linux. I gasp at even thinking about people trying to do web sites ENTIRELY in Shockwave...

nakhla writes: "This article at [a news web site] details how [a software company] is expanding its [flagship product] to [sell more]. Rather than relying on [open standards implemented by many companies] to [get work done], [the company] wants [its proprietary product] to be used [to replace existing open standards]. [Trust us, says the company, we will do all the heavy lifting for you]. With [state issue here that this product does not address], could something like this be the answer? The article also mentions how [company] is on a campaign to have its [product] [offered even more widely than it is today]."

[Here is some fuel for those of you taking these comments seriously.]

Macromedia has a press release describing the 'improved' accessiblity of Flash MX - it uses Microsoft Active Accessiblity. Unfortunately, I doubt that those features will apply to any non-Windows versions of Flash player

Macromedia Flash Player 6 now supports assistive technologies such as screen readers through support of Microsoft Active Accessibility. In addition, Macromedia Flash MX now integrates tools for creating accessible content. To add descriptive text to animations and user interface elements, select an item and enter the appropriate description. Users with disabilities will be able to experience your content.

will we see companies like Macromedia (who also promised native OS X support) hurry along to follow suit?"

I bet you'll see a press release from Macromedia soon, but that'll be it for a while. They're behind schedule releasing Dreamweaver 5 and Ultradev 5, which is rumored to support dot-Net, and they've gotten to the point where they're just putting out open-ended Microsoft-style vaporware press releases instead.

Not to disrespect Mac folks, but I bet the profit involved in putting out Ultradev 5 with dot-Net authoring will result in a lot more sales than Dreamweaver in native OSX, but of course, that's just my betting. Then again, maybe this is the reason DW/UD5 is so behind schedule - maybe they're trying to release everything at once, including native OSX support and dot-Net authoring. I'm getting to the point where I wouldn't accept anything less when this thing finally comes out.

I think that's what Macromedia did.

On the Mac side (classic & OS X native), BBEdit is the pro's choice... it does context-sensitive coloring, etc and is the hands-down favorite for any kind of program coding on the Mac -- and it recognizes SQL syntax as well.

Adobe just announced that Golive 6 for OS X would have the Zend debugger engine integrated within it, as well

Dreamweaver Ultradev is another good choice, but at this point in time PHP isn't exactly integrated into it unless you use 3rd party extensions or an abstraction layer like ADODB.

--dr00gy

This plugin might have had legs a year or so ago, when any new internet technology could garner support for no other reason than it was a new internet technology. Now that Macromedia's shockwave has a pretty impressive 3D engine, with hardware acceleration, the Blender plugin might not see that much attention. Flash has the 2D animation market pretty much sewn up, and I'm expecting SW to do the same for 3D...

Adobe Atmosphere

Macromedia Shockwave3D, in cooperation with Intel

Curious Labs Avatar Lab

Viewpoint VET

This goes way beyond VRML, and there are some big clients using those technologies. E.g. AOL is using Viewpoint.

Actually, yes there is, if you get a more recent distro from RedHat or Mandrake, at least in my experiences, it is included.Here is the download link for the player. I hope that this helps you.

<cfoutput type="excessive whitespace">

Sure, I think Flash can even be OK, too, if there's also an alternative means of accessing the information. Macromedia has a Flash Accessibility Extension Kit that will help Flash creators to produce an accessible version, too. I don't think Flash should be used just to produce something flashy. It's not the tool itself but how it's used, in my humble opinion.

Regarding the two levels of WCAG, I agree. It seems that the Olympics sites ought to be required by law to conform to those standards, actually. FYI, not only does the U.S. have the Section 508 Guidelines for government sites, increasingly more countries are also working on or have already established guidelines to help ensure that anyone can access their sites.

Flash for Linux can be found here

You can use Quicktime and other windows plugins with Codeweavers' Crossover plugin here, well worth the $20--and don't take my word for it, theres a downloadable demo.

The reason the stand-alone Flash virus file is able to access CMD.EXE has nothing to do with any inherent security hole in the basic Flash player itself. The stand-alone file uses a fairly well known (in the Flash community) function that is only available in the stand-alone Flash player. In fact, Macromedia even has this function documented in their Flash support section. It's the "exec" command that takes an argument of the path to an application to execute.

This virus really has more to do with running an unknown executable than it does exploiting some kind of vulnerability in Flash. This is because any stand-alone Flash player file is an .exe, not a .swf. The stand-alone .exe is composed of 1) The .swf file that runs and 2) The entire Flash player itself (~2megs) in executable form. By including the entire player within the file, the bundled .swf can be run anywhere without any necessary previous installation.

What cracks me up personally is that the very possibility of a Flash virus has been discussed before on Flash community developer message boards. When the "exec" command for the stand-alone player was still undocumented and somebody posted about it (having "discovered" it somehow) there was quite a discussion about the new functionality uses. But, there was also some speculation on how it could be used for malicious purposes. This was around a year ago, IIRC.

Flash is a memory resident, file infecting virus. It infects .COM and .EXE files. Although it does not infect COMMAND.COM.

For the Macromedia Flash plugin, visit this page: ShockwaveFlash

Currently it has a link to flash_linux.tar.gz.

For RealPlayer 8 follow that link and fill out the form.

The other alternative is to look at Anon Cowards post which has a link, or borrow your mate's computer and steal his plugins. :-)

For the Macromedia Flash plugin, visit this page: ShockwaveFlash

Currently it has a link to flash_linux.tar.gz.

For RealPlayer 8 follow that link and fill out the form.

The other alternative is to look at Anon Cowards post which has a link, or borrow your mate's computer and steal his plugins. :-)

I guess you need to read more Flash marketing literature. Since Flash plugins in various versions have shipped with the popular browsers on Windows and Mac for the last few years, Macromedia now prefers that Flash be thought of as a built in standard feature of web browsers. (Which happens to be proprietary to them.) Therefore people should just merrily build sites partly or all in Flash, content in the knowledge that it will be accessible to all (that matter).

Just check out flash overview for more info about how everyone already has Flash. (Flash plugin required, natch!)

On a less bitter note, at least the current (version 5) Flash can actually print. Who knows what cutting edge functionality they will incorporate next.

Macromedia has the full SWF File Format SDK on their website. Now get crackin! I expect a beta version on my desk in a week!

Macromedia != macrovision (safedisk)
Macromedia is the company that gives such wonders as Flash, Director, and now ColdFusion.