The Shumway Open SWF Runtime Project

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

The Shumway Open SWF Runtime Project

Posted by Unknown on Monday November 12, 2012 @02:27PM from the now-there-are-four dept.

theweatherelectric writes "Mozilla is looking for contributors interested in working on Shumway. Mozilla's Jet Villegas writes, 'Shumway is an experimental web-native (Javascript) runtime implementation of the SWF file format. It is developed as a free and open source project sponsored by Mozilla Research. The project has two main goals: 1. Advance the open web platform to securely process rich media formats that were previously only available in closed and proprietary implementations. 2. Offer a runtime processor for SWF and other rich media formats on platforms for which runtime implementations are not available.'" See also: Gnash and Lightspark.

99 comments

Min score:

Reason:

Sort:

Bug fix required - click to play by tqft · 2012-11-12 14:32 · Score: 0

They are going to need to fix this one soon then
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=738698
Click-to-play

--
The Singularity is closer than you think
Quant
1. Re:Bug fix required - click to play by caspy7 · 2012-11-13 01:49 · Score: 2
  
  I've been using it in Beta and it works fine.
  I think it's due out in one of the next two versions.
2. Re:Bug fix required - click to play by tqft · 2012-11-13 08:05 · Score: 1
  
  Nightlies not so happy right now
  
  --
  The Singularity is closer than you think
  Quant
3. Re:Bug fix required - click to play by msauve · 2012-11-13 11:36 · Score: 1
  
  What's the problem, according to the summary, this is all about open Single White Females?
  
  Not even the link, or the document linked from the link, seems to know what "SWF" means.
  
  --
  "National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
4. Re:Bug fix required - click to play by Lord+Byron+II · 2012-11-14 07:03 · Score: 1
  
  SWF = Shocking White Flasher.. I think..
No thanks by gagol · 2012-11-12 14:33 · Score: 2

I will put my efforts learning to do great things in html5.

--
Tomorrow is another day...
1. Re:No thanks by girlintraining · 2012-11-12 14:42 · Score: 0
  
  I will put my efforts learning to do great things in html5.
  Blank pages are the only thing you can do with HTML5 right now in many browsers. Some people, preferring not to wait, have taken the unusual step of working with what's available now. I know, it's a weird concept in IT... I prefer to time travel to the future too, but my TARDIS is busted, and worse, infested with a red-headed scottish girl with a terrible welsh accent. You wouldn't happen to have one I could "borrow", would you?
  
  --
  #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
2. Re:No thanks by gagol · 2012-11-12 15:00 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Please define "many browsers". Also, kudos for you if you want to contribute, just my cup of tea to work on stopgap measure when a new standard is getting supported in ALL mobile browsers and most desktop one too: http://html5test.com/results/desktop.html.
  
  --
  Tomorrow is another day...
3. Re:No thanks by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 15:34 · Score: 1
  
  HTML5 still does not come close to what Flash can do with at least 10 times less cpu usage.
  The HTML5 was presented as a Flash replacement but it is even lacking basic functionality like timelines and animation.
  That is what made Flash so popular.
4. Re:No thanks by DavidClarkeHR · 2012-11-12 15:39 · Score: 2
  
  Blank pages are the only thing you can do with HTML5 right now in many browsers. Some people, preferring not to wait, have taken the unusual step of working with what's available now.
  Well, yeah. Fundamentally, I agree. But if you're waiting for slow, incremental change? The internet isn't really the best place. You're probably better off looking in politics.
  
  --
  - Nec Impar Pluribus, or so I'm told.
5. Re:No thanks by TheGratefulNet · 2012-11-12 15:43 · Score: 2
  
  Blank pages are the only thing you can do with HTML5 right now in many browsers
  yeah, well.... at least they load fast!
  
  --
  
  --
  "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
6. Re:No thanks by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 16:55 · Score: 0
  
  You are awesome! Continue creating web sites for the IE 6 crowd. Actually, now that I think about it, those are probably the folks who click on the spammy ads... hmm.
  For business users with an incompetent management and IT staff stuck on IE6, they probably gave up years ago and pull out their Android device or iPhone to browse the Web.
7. Re:No thanks by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 20:03 · Score: 0
  
  You wouldn't know a welsh accent if it came up and bit you in the face...
8. Re:No thanks by RaceProUK · 2012-11-13 01:31 · Score: 1
  
  my TARDIS is busted, and worse, infested with a red-headed scottish girl with a scottish accent
  FTFY
  Anyway, there's a new companion now.
  
  --
  No colour or religion ever stopped the bullet from a gun
9. Re:No thanks by jones_supa · 2012-11-13 01:40 · Score: 1
  
  Also, some years ago there was buzz in Slashdot about HTML5 video replacing Flash, but even today the HTML5 video players are complete garbage: they take monstrous amount of resources and the controls are glitchy.
10. Re:No thanks by caspy7 · 2012-11-13 01:54 · Score: 1
  
  End-game-wise, this will help to transition users and developers away from Flash and to HTML5.
  I'd say that's pretty great.
11. Re:No thanks by nitehawk214 · 2012-11-13 02:48 · Score: 1
  
  I will put my efforts learning to do great things in html5.
  Blank pages are the only thing you can do with HTML5 right now in many browsers. Some people, preferring not to wait, have taken the unusual step of working with what's available now. I know, it's a weird concept in IT... I prefer to time travel to the future too, but my TARDIS is busted, and worse, infested with a red-headed scottish girl with a terrible welsh accent. You wouldn't happen to have one I could "borrow", would you?
  I wish I could borrow someone's Amy...
  
  --
  I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
12. Re:No thanks by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-13 03:00 · Score: 0
  
  That's because, contrary to all the hype and optimization, Javascript largely sucks. Perhaps Javascript does have something in common with Java after all.
  Of course it doesn't help people are reluctant to put much effort and money into html5 solutions so long as flash continues to limp along. Personally, given html5 penetration of mobile and general lack thereof (or soon to be) of flash in the same segment, companies would be retarded to not be investing in an html5 solution for the near tomorrow.
13. Re:No thanks by defcon-11 · 2012-11-13 08:24 · Score: 1
  
  The project is targeting HTML5 capable browsers, this will not work in IE8, or whatever crusty browser you're still using in the hinter land.
14. Re:No thanks by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-17 05:50 · Score: 0
  
  lacking basic functionality like timelines
  Not basic. It's something for the authoring tool.
  
  and animation.
  Bunk.
Bugs in the demo by HatofPig · 2012-11-12 14:36 · Score: 3, Interesting

In the race card demo the "best lap" time is actually just your last lap. And when you finish all 10 laps the clock doesn't stop, so your "final time" keeps increasing. I wonder if this is a bug in Shumway or the game itself. And I only get around 7 FPS on average, on Firefox in Linux/x86.

--
Silicon & Charybdis McLuhan Kildall Papert Kay
1. Re:Bugs in the demo by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 14:44 · Score: 0
  
  "only get around 7 FPS on average"
  was kinda expecting worse, tbh
2. Re:Bugs in the demo by girlintraining · 2012-11-12 14:44 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  In the race card demo the "best lap" time is actually just your last lap. And when you finish all 10 laps the clock doesn't stop, so your "final time" keeps increasing. I wonder if this is a bug in Shumway or the game itself. And I only get around 7 FPS on average, on Firefox in Linux/x86.
  Sounds like the app has a... (puts on sunglasses) race condition. YEEEEEEEEEEaaaaaaah!
  
  --
  #fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
3. Re:Bugs in the demo by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 15:01 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  I get ~22 FPS, on Chromium in GNU+Linux/x86_64
4. Re:Bugs in the demo by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 15:06 · Score: 0
  
  old browsers will perform like shit and this thing will do nothing to deprecate their usage...
5. Re:Bugs in the demo by dgatwood · 2012-11-12 15:14 · Score: 2
  
  In the race card demo [github.com] the "best lap" time is actually just your last lap.
  At least it loads for you. In the current version of Safari (OS X), I just get:
  TypeError: Attempting to change value of a readonly property. kanvas.js:49
  
  --
  Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
6. Re:Bugs in the demo by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 15:40 · Score: 0
  
  Ah, Slashdot FUD spreaders, eschewing logic since the mid-90s...
7. Re:Bugs in the demo by adri · 2012-11-12 18:09 · Score: 2
  
  ok, you win the internet tonight.
8. Re:Bugs in the demo by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 18:49 · Score: 0
  
  I'm getting ~10-11 FPS with my Zacate e-350 based computer running Win 7 and Firefox 16.0.2 which is a lot better than I was expecting, and the game itself was reasonably playable.
9. Re:Bugs in the demo by philip.paradis · 2012-11-12 18:59 · Score: 1
  
  In the race card demo
  It's quite saddening to see Mozilla playing the race card. However, I'm glad to report that I'm getting ~22 FPS using Firefox 16.0.2 on OS X 10.7.5.
  
  --
  Write failed: Broken pipe
10. Re:Bugs in the demo by Decker-Mage · 2012-11-12 19:52 · Score: 1
  
  I bow to your superior sense of timing ;-).
  
  --
  "[I]t is a wise man who admits the limits of his knowledge or skill, and that pretending either causes harm." --Terry Go
11. Re:Bugs in the demo by BZ · 2012-11-12 21:57 · Score: 1
  
  Sounds like a JavaScriptCore bug. There are no readonly properties in sight around that line...
SWFDec - SWF Decoder - another SWF implementation by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 14:39 · Score: 3, Informative

http://swfdec.freedesktop.org/wiki/
Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by alostpacket · 2012-11-12 14:45 · Score: 4, Insightful

I love the Free / OSS nature of something like this, but one of the absolute best** things about Flash is the ActionScript language (specifically AS3) (and to a lesser extent flex).
Since it is based on ECMAScript, it offers nearly everything JavaScript does and more. Classes, Inheritance, Polymorphism, both dynamic and static typing, etc, etc. And some things I find truly awesome such as the EventDispacter pattern and DisplayObject event bubbling.
So what are the chances of ActionScript being considered for something like this? Are there legal hurdles that make it a non-starter?
Also, how does this compare to other OSS flash players like Gnash? Conceivably this could solve the biggest problem with Flash, the lack of security involved when the player is proprietary.
**Yes, Adobe stagnated and got lax about security as well as bundled toolbars with the plugin as well as other privacy implication with SharedObjects. However, as a scripting and vector animating platform, Flash was amazing tech. And it makes damn nice RIAs and did great for video for its time. However it's clear that time is over due to some serious missteps on Adobe's part. So please don't get me wrong, there are many valid criticisms of Flash, but it was an innovative technology (and still is to a much less extent).

--
PocketPermissions Android Permission Guide
1. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by alostpacket · 2012-11-12 14:46 · Score: 4, Informative
  
  Sorry to reply to myself, but it seems I'm tired and wasnt thinking -- Big clarification: The Shumway player does support AS -- as it support SWFs, and thus naturally, AS3.
  
  --
  PocketPermissions Android Permission Guide
2. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 15:44 · Score: 1
  
  Don't forget autobinding, vector animation, and a consistent, usable, extendable (if flawed) UI framework that displays correctly in any environment.
  HTML5 is great, except I have to write 5-6 different versions of my program, with 10x the code.
3. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by drkstr1 · 2012-11-12 18:00 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  We got our first "no flash" order on a project awhile back, and I have cried a little on the inside every day I have worked on it. My first introduction to flash was compiling SWFs in Linux using the MXMLC compiler. In fact, I even wrote the Actionscript 3 syntax highlighting rules for KDevelop (Kate) 3.5, because that's what I had available on my system to use. The flash platform is an AMAZING technology stack, and it is sad to see it go to waste behind a wall of patents wielded by a bafoon of a company.
  
  --
  Fanboy Status: Apache Flex, C#, Eclipse, KDE, Pirate Party, Ron Paul, Slackware, Windows 7
4. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 18:52 · Score: 1
  
  So, how long have you been working for Adobe? Flash and SWF are terrible technologies. They're slow, they're buggy, they're insecure. Most of the time when my browser crashes it's because of one of those two technologies.
  I wish you could say who the no flash order was from, because they deserve my business. Flash was one of the worst things to ever happen to the web.
5. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by drkstr1 · 2012-11-12 20:55 · Score: 1
  
  So, how long have you been working for Adobe? Flash and SWF are terrible technologies. They're slow, they're buggy, they're insecure. Most of the time when my browser crashes it's because of one of those two technologies.
  I wish you could say who the no flash order was from, because they deserve my business. Flash was one of the worst things to ever happen to the web.
  I can promise you flash is only as slow and buggy as the flash developer. Unfortunately, there are hordes of the sluggish variety mucking about. Security is a non issue. In fact, flash is one of the easier things to get clearance on in our government contracts. I will however be the first to admit the platform would do much better if the whole thing were given to Apache. The problems with Flash are political, not technical.
  
  --
  Fanboy Status: Apache Flex, C#, Eclipse, KDE, Pirate Party, Ron Paul, Slackware, Windows 7
6. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 22:25 · Score: 0
  
  One word: Flash video players. The only video players I know of that manage to max out a core on my core2duo for a 480x320 video.
7. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-13 00:40 · Score: 0
  
  One word: Flash video players.
  Which was not what the person you were responding to was talking about. There is far, far more to Flash than video playback.
  
  The only video players I know of that manage to max out a core on my core2duo for a 480x320 video.
  Then that player is broken. It should be using hardware acceleration to playback videos.
8. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by FictionPimp · 2012-11-13 00:57 · Score: 1
  
  Having the flash plugin is just more more attack vector on my system who's sole purpose is to essentially display advertisements, youtube videos, or horrible "I wish I was a real application" user interfaces. I can't tell you the number of times we have had to rush to update flash because of the threat of infections.
  I can live without it. If it can't be done with html and javascript it probably is best not done in a web browser.
9. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by quetwo · 2012-11-13 01:07 · Score: 2
  
  Not all SWFs are AS3 -- quite a few of the older ones out there are still AS2 -- and all but two of the demos they've provided are AS2.
  By looking at the code, it looks like they've implemented maybe half of the opcodes in the SWF spec for AS3. They got the easiest ones for graphics, but they are missing all the networking ones, most of the effect, and a lot of the event handling. They still have a LONG way to go before they can say they run even a portion of the Flash apps out there.
  On a side note to those who are interested in the project -- Apache just released a flash compiler (the former Flex compiler), and a second, next gen compiler for ActionScript. It's available on the Apache Flex Incubation Project (http://incubation.apache.org/flex). The next-gen compiler is pretty awesome, and very well documented...
10. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by jones_supa · 2012-11-13 01:43 · Score: 1
  
  One word: Flash video players. The only video players I know of that manage to max out a core on my core2duo for a 480x320 video.
  Sounds like you're not using Windows. Unfortunately I believe it's the only platform on which Flash is properly hardware accelerated.
11. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by Hatta · 2012-11-13 02:14 · Score: 1
  
  I can promise you flash is only as slow and buggy as the flash developer.
  If that were the case, the only way to explain the extreme shittiness of flash apps would be that flash attracts shitty developers. Why is that?
  
  --
  Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
12. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by NoSleepDemon · 2012-11-13 02:18 · Score: 1
  
  That's the problem though - Adobe couldn't exactly dump all those "developers" still using AS2, so they kept backwards compatibility. I'd wager a lot of AS3 "developers" are of the same calibre as AS2 "developers" - that is, artists who have diversified a little into scripting but don't really have a good understanding of programming or optimisation. The end result is as you said, loads of flash applications that murder your machine when they run. Also it took Adobe till Flash CS5.5 to make an IDE even remotely conducive to an efficient workflow.
13. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-13 02:23 · Score: 0
  
  Sorry, but even without hardware acceleration, you should be able to play a 480x320 video using almost no CPU power. On this crappy i3-2310M laptop, playing a video like that in a real media player - using pure software-decoding - uses about 5% CPU.
14. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by Toonol · 2012-11-13 02:31 · Score: 1
  
  Because it's easy. That's a good thing.
15. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-13 02:40 · Score: 0
  
  Because it's much easier to get into and use than JavaScript or HTML5 so more 'normal' folks use it.
  Anyway, from what I've experienced so far, HTML5 is far slower and buggier than Flash by an order of magnitude!
  Part of the problem is the same problem that HTML has had since the Netscape vs IE wars - Every browser implements things differently and does it their own way; You don't have the fixed platform that Flash has.
  What gets me tho' is why YouTube's HTML5 is so bad - It should be able to leverage video acceleration much more easily than flash since it doesn't have to use RGB, yet it uses 3x more CPU time on my laptop than Flash and is far less responsive!
16. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-13 02:57 · Score: 0
  
  Yeah, AS3 kicks the *** out of Javascript, on a feature-by-feature comparison. Unless you're one of those mentally deranged folks who really enjoys prototypical inheritance.
  Seriously though, I do miss working in Flash. Mostly for AS3, but I also enjoyed MXML. I agree that its basically game over except in niche areas like publishing for mobile games. I think Adobe should have moved towards opening up the player years before they did. Let people participate in the evolution of the whole platform, not just publishing the SWF format and leaving it at that.
  I still hope someone can figure out how to separate AS3 from SWF... maybe a byproduct of Shumway will be an efficient AS3 -> JS transcoder? I'd totally dig web development again if I could use AS3.
17. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by jones_supa · 2012-11-13 04:06 · Score: 1
  
  Yes, but your real media player probably still outputs to a YUV overlay on the GPU, saving a great amount of CPU time. Flash does the colorspace conversion on CPU.
18. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by defcon-11 · 2012-11-13 08:34 · Score: 1
  
  There are just as many horribly buggy, slow, and insecure Javascript/HTML sites. I've done some Flex work, and AS3 is a very solid platform. Mozilla's original Javascript JIT was an offshoot of the AS3 JIT, and I'm sure some AS3 features had a lot of influence on web standards such as WebWorkers. Now if the browsers could only agree on a standard for an efficient binary serialization format with object references like AMF....
19. Re:Sounds great, would prefer ActionScript / Flex by makomk · 2012-11-13 21:30 · Score: 1
  
  Don't worry, soon all those CPU-hogging animated advertisments and horrible "I wish I was a real application" user interfaces will be implemented as native HTML 5.
With a name like Shumway... by grouchomarxist · 2012-11-12 14:59 · Score: 3, Funny

...it's gotta be good.
1. Re:With a name like Shumway... by DudemanX · 2012-11-12 15:03 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  I think it's an ALF reference. ALF's "real" name is Gordon Shumway.
2. Re:With a name like Shumway... by surmak · 2012-11-12 15:21 · Score: 3, Funny
  
  ...as long as it does not eat your cat.
3. Re:With a name like Shumway... by deniable · 2012-11-12 16:54 · Score: 2
  
  Someone's getting Lucky tonight.
4. Re:With a name like Shumway... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 18:33 · Score: 0
  
  For many years, Smucker's (a brand of jellies and jams) has had the slogan: "With a name like Smucker's, you know it has to be good."
  The original Saturday Night Live crew had fun riffing on that. "With a name like 'Nose Hair', you know it has to be good." John Belushi: "Ten Thousand Nuns and Orphans!" Jane Curtin: "What's so bad about that?" John Belushi: "They were all eaten by rats!"
5. Re:With a name like Shumway... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-13 02:44 · Score: 2, Funny
  
  Before & After in Wheel of Fortune:
  Flash Gordon Shumway
6. Re:With a name like Shumway... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-13 10:42 · Score: 0
  
  Not to be confused with ShamWow, of course!
Now webpages can run like a dog by Kryptonut · 2012-11-12 14:59 · Score: 1

Without the need for a plugin?
1. Re:Now webpages can run like a dog by RaceProUK · 2012-11-13 01:34 · Score: 1
  
  JavaScript - slowing down the Web since 1994.
  
  --
  No colour or religion ever stopped the bullet from a gun
2. Re:Now webpages can run like a dog by jones_supa · 2012-11-13 01:47 · Score: 1
  
  Exactly. This sounds like horrible bloat. Browser interpreting Javascript, which in turn interprets SWF. Complete waste of resources.
3. Re:Now webpages can run like a dog by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-13 03:50 · Score: 0
  
  But I need to have a trail of animated cats chasing the mouse arrow on all my sites!
Oh, boy! by 93+Escort+Wagon · 2012-11-12 15:07 · Score: 2, Interesting

Having experienced just how slowly pdf.js renders documents longer than a page or two - I can't WAIT to see how well implementing swf in javascript goes!

--
#DeleteChrome
1. Re:Oh, boy! by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 15:19 · Score: 2, Informative
  
  This is simply not true.
  I read New Yorker magazine in pdf.js, every file is ~100MB and ~100 pages and it's not slow at all.
  In chrome, I should add.
2. Re:Oh, boy! by TheGratefulNet · 2012-11-12 15:46 · Score: 1, Insightful
  
  I won't get to know.
  I block flash and I block javascript. I only whitelist js for certain sites but mostly, its all blocked.
  (and nothing of value was lost...)
  
  --
  
  --
  "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
3. Re:Oh, boy! by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 15:56 · Score: 0
  
  I won't get to know.
  I block flash and I block javascript. I only whitelist js for certain sites but mostly, its all blocked.
  (and nothing of value was lost...)
  Obligatory Onion.
4. Re:Oh, boy! by Daltorak · 2012-11-12 16:15 · Score: 1
  
  Having experienced just how slowly pdf.js renders documents longer than a page or two - I can't WAIT to see how well implementing swf in javascript goes!
  Implementing SWF in Javascript can't possibly be more complicated than implementing A Javascript x86 emulator that boots into Linux and can run gcc .... could it?
5. Re:Oh, boy! by tlhIngan · 2012-11-12 17:58 · Score: 4, Interesting
  
  I block flash and I block javascript. I only whitelist js for certain sites but mostly, its all blocked.
  Which is why a browser-based method is better than a plugin-based method for stuff that Flash does. After all, if you allow Flash for one site, who knows what sorts of Javascript and resources it pulls from other sites?
  But a browser based version or HTML5 means site-specific restrictions are honored - a Flash video that wants to pull in javascript from ad trackers can do it via the Flash plugin, but if it was in HTML5 or a browser implementation, will still remain blocked.
6. Re:Oh, boy! by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 18:46 · Score: 0
  
  I somehow doubt the multimedia performance is adequate... if only startx worked!
7. Re:Oh, boy! by FithisUX · 2012-11-12 21:43 · Score: 2
  
  I second your opininion. I use it for my pdf needs more and more. I use Sumatra only for local files. PDf.js is used for previewing or online documentation reading. Much more convenient than adobe.
8. Re:Oh, boy! by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 23:34 · Score: 0
  
  You only block Flash and Javascript? Pfft, casual. I block Flash, Javascript, all inline audio and video (including MIDI files), XHTML, CSS, GIFs, force my browser to use HTTP 0.9 (fuck these "webmasters" and their fancy shamncy "virtual hosts"!) and pass all the HTML through a proxy that strips out any non-HTML 2.0 tags and finally render it in Lynx running on OpenBSD in a sandboxed virtual machine.
  
  It's just better that way.
9. Re:Oh, boy! by jones_supa · 2012-11-13 01:52 · Score: 1
  
  I won't get to know.
  I block flash and I block javascript. I only whitelist js for certain sites but mostly, its all blocked.
  (and nothing of value was lost...)
  I can't understand how you can get by. The modern web is too painful to use with JS blocked by default.
10. Re:Oh, boy! by bipbop · 2012-11-13 02:39 · Score: 1
  
  You do. RequestPolicy happily blocks cross-site requests made by the Flash plugin.
11. Re:Oh, boy! by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-13 03:00 · Score: 0
  
  I think "... in Javascript", is the new way to get a laugh after reading a fortune cookie.
12. Re:Oh, boy! by NJRoadfan · 2012-11-13 03:28 · Score: 1
  
  Heck, someone even emulated an Amiga in Javascript! http://janusamigaemulator.net/
Just what I need! More Adobe middleware! by DavidClarkeHR · 2012-11-12 15:37 · Score: 3, Insightful

Don't get me wrong, I love illustrator, and I don't think I could live without InDesign.

But I do REALLY like the idea of html5 instead of flash. Sure, it was funny for awhile to call apple products crippled because they couldn't have a full web experience, but I've been having problems with Shockwave / Flash products for years.

It does need to remain supported, I agree. And opened up? Great!

But developed? Encouraged? Promoted? No thank you. I'd rather see the [blink] tag supported in facebook.

--
- Nec Impar Pluribus, or so I'm told.
Awesome! by OhANameWhatName · 2012-11-12 15:47 · Score: 1

Just what we need, an efficient swf interpreter that doesn't have any memory issues!
What could possibly go wrong... by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 16:11 · Score: 1

You have one ECMAScript spawn (JavaScript) interpretting another (ActionScript), talk about redundancy.
Does this mean we could possibly have CONTROL? by fishnuts · 2012-11-12 17:13 · Score: 3, Interesting

Does this mean developers might actually implement 'MUTE', 'FORCE STOP', or 'RESTART' context menu items for shockwave apps? I despise going to read a page with ads and other shockwave sidebar widgets that make noise or chew up CPU cycles and have no way to pause/mute/stop them. It also bugs that you must reload the entire page to get a flash app to restart.
It's beyond me why Macromedia/Adobe never wanted us to have those essential controls. The only thing we get, in some rare cases, are the ability to prevent the app/player from looping, or to turn down rendering quality.
1. Re:Does this mean we could possibly have CONTROL? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 18:57 · Score: 0
  
  It's because you're not their customer, the people making those annoying ads are. So, you have the option of dealing with it, or blocking flash completely.
2. Re:Does this mean we could possibly have CONTROL? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 19:34 · Score: 1
  
  adblock, noscript, flashblock
Legacy game platform by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 17:42 · Score: 0

Emulation of such a legacy game platform should go to MAME instead
Legacy game platform? by ivanwyc · 2012-11-12 17:46 · Score: 1

Shouldn't emulation of legacy game platform go to MAME instead?
1. Re:Legacy game platform? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 18:36 · Score: 0
  
  But then where would we get moving ads? Oh, right, HTML5.
People bitch about html5 by kiddygrinder · 2012-11-12 19:02 · Score: 1

but the main reason people are all jumping on the bandwagon is because with html5 there is at least a light at the end of the tunnel. sure it's missing a bunch of features but at the same time it eats into flash's feature set it fixes a bunch of the flaws with html4/xthml. Also it's not the complete cluster fuck that is flash.

--
This is a joke. I am joking. Joke joke joke.
1. Re:People bitch about html5 by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-13 00:44 · Score: 0
  
  Also it's not the complete cluster fuck that is flash.
  You're correct. It's an even bigger clusterfuck than Flash is.
great.. by SuperDre · 2012-11-12 21:03 · Score: 2

Just when people want to ditch the old format and move over to html5... but then again, webpages are becoming more bogged down with useless junk which only means you'll have to wait until a page is loaded for like 5 minutes.. When will we actually go and try to optimize webpages and make them blazingly fast and not memory hogs like they are becoming, so we can actually enjoy our new fast hardware instead of having the same speed with new pages as we had on our old hardware with the old pages..
1. Re:great.. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 21:11 · Score: 0
  
  Latency from the dozens of scripts that modern sites seem to require is my biggest problem. You'll have scripts that depend upon other scripts and if you're on a high latency connection it can take forever to load. Not to mention what happens if Google goes down for the morning and all the sites that won't load without it.
Re:SWFDec - SWF Decoder - another SWF implementati by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-12 23:06 · Score: 0

Which even today still beats Gnash on quite a bit of content. Sad, since the FSF proclaimed Gnash the official Flash reimplementation and then proceeded to mismanage it into the clusterfuck that it is today, and SWFdec is now unmaintained.
but but but by superwiz · 2012-11-13 03:31 · Score: 1

the whole reason for doing it natively is to gain the speedup from decompression of all fft-based formats (jpeg,mpeg,mp3,etc.) in hardware instead of in software. If you lose that, then flash has no point.

--
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
No privilege to install a browser by tepples · 2012-11-13 03:33 · Score: 2

Please define "many browsers".
There are many PCs whose primary user lacks the privilege to install a browser. And on mobile, a lot of deployed Android devices are still stuck at 2.2/2.3, hence no Chrome.
1. Re:No privilege to install a browser by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-17 05:47 · Score: 0
  
  And on mobile, a lot of deployed Android devices are still stuck at 2.2/2.3, hence no Chrome.
  Firefox.
2. Re:No privilege to install a browser by tepples · 2012-11-17 05:52 · Score: 1
  
  I was under the impression that a lot of devices were still using an ARMv6 processor, hence no Firefox.
Canvas + JS = timelines and animation by tepples · 2012-11-13 03:35 · Score: 1

I think the idea was supposed to be that HTML5 would allow third parties to implement timelines and animation with JavaScript and the 2D . Does Flash Builder (not Flash CS) have timelines and animation?
BLT by Anonymous Coward · 2012-11-13 03:47 · Score: 0

Bacon, Lucky, Tomato.
It's 2012 by rinoid · 2012-11-13 05:30 · Score: 1

I sit here wondering why I still need to see an update to the Flash plugin, much less an alternative way to play a flash file. No thanks.