IMHO idiots like these manage to trick developers causing millions of dollars in potential revenue especially with independent developers.
You don't need to jump the ship, keep shipping for iPhone and add Android, Symbian and even Windows Mobile to your platforms. Ignore what those "blog writers" and fanatics (including some devs) say, see yourself...
Let me give a 2 applications as example: Nimbuzz and Fring. OK, they get great venture capital these days but it is likely 10 guys coding. They ship to any mobile platform available to buy, Fring guys even released a J2ME client. Do you believe these guys have some kind of insane setup like 1000 different handsets to debug on? Of course not. They just do simple things like seperating the core and ui, listening to vendor/os developer recommendations, using the free tools (Nokia even has actual hardware simulators with webcams) and don't go to deep level hacks area which will create problem on anything.
For example I am not a fan of Android but when I see something like "fragmentation" and "engadget", I directly ignore it. I'd listen to actual software developers instead and look at the products shipped.
These guys are trolling via blogs and counting their ad-click money, their BS really costs some developers and users, that makes me mad.
This is going on for years on Symbian scene and J2ME (Java Micro), same thing being said over and over and unfortunately some developers seem to actually believe it.
I will give one single title: Opera. Opera Mobile runs on ANY Symbian S60 and Opera Mini runs on ANY J2ME client. There is no "Opera Mobile for Nokia E71", the drop down menus on some download may confuse you. It is just, some developers, especially the ones directly selling (no trial) apps want to make sure the application will run instead of living hassle to give money back or bad feedback. Another thing is, root certs which devices have. Some have Verisign, some hove Thawte or both. They want to make sure (especially with J2ME) that application won't be treated as "unsigned", especially network aware apps.
Of course, if you see something like "S60 V3 FP2", it may confuse you. It just says "Devices with compass built in", much like iPhone 3G vs 3GS and I don't see anyone talking about fragmentation on iPhone scene.
So J2ME is really "write once,run anywhere" and Symbian is really device independent. Of course, the Developer makes the difference.
I had a bad luck enough having to buy Windows 7 for a company as Linux was really no-go for their needs. The machine runs cheap end AMD (cheap version) with 1 Gig RAM, EOL (ask ATI) semi integrated gfx with all kind of trouble making things attached like realtek internal sound.
I had to make sure their broken XP was really "broken", not backdoored or anything so I am sure it was clean machine with no spyware whatsoever. Windows 7 is almost 30% faster on that machine even with several services running. After seeing that, I give no credit to "Run XP" anymore. Not anymore... Even cheap hardware is beyond XP now. That machine has AHCI for example and that cheap amd is 64bit capable.
I wonder why we should be understanding to the lack of very important and standard features on VP8?
Google, just like Apple is a huge company with amazing amount of cash in hand. If they dare to replace H264, they better surpass it let alone barely having 10% of the important features of it.
I was mad to Apple for years for not supporting mpeg4-asp features on quicktime player/plugin but Apple wasn't really at shape of today and there was always an option like 3ivx/xvid components.
So, Google ships some junk (compared to others) and just because it is supposedly patent free, we will all support it right? Sorry but I'd care about some remote area guy having 1mbit shaky connection instead.
Unlike Q-Pel which is part of MPEG4-ASP and universally hated because of serious performance degradation in mobile World of today, B-Frames and Adaptive Quantization are seriously big deal for any codec shipping to this crazy World where people buys mobile devices and expect them to output 720P or even 1080P to their TV sets.
You must be a real Google or VP8 fanatic to ignore these as they exist since MPEG-4 ASP (not h264) standards in professional encoders/advanced open source encoders.
Here is one of the most advanced mpeg4-asp encoders in existence today, look at the "encoder" section for a reference. Note that is not even H264 which has its own extra features. A company sized as Google should come up with a way better codec if they want to replace h264. That is for easily updated desktops only, we haven't heard anything about custom chips yet. I mean there isn't anything like Broadcom Crystal HD (ships now) for VP8.
Steve Jobs may have his own agenda but seriously, you can't impress Steve Jobs with VP8 today. Guy rolled out H264 on Quicktime 7 years ago, while nobody cared. Same thing happened with mpeg4-sp.
IMHO if someone has problem with OpenBSD community/leader, he should hang at Mac community/websites/mags and especially IRC channels for a while.
I also think OpenBSD theocratic leader and hostile community could be the reason why OpenBSD has its unique and prestigious position today... We all heard how many users got banned for questioning inclusion of Mono to a "user friendly" Linux OS distro which has democratic leadership right?
Using Opera for my needs, such as 720P HDTV TV (try other browsers!), Nokia E71 Symbian S60 which Google didn't even bother etc.
When you use it in such conditions, you figure the sad fact. Even if Opera switched to open source, it would be some developer PR nightmare since most of the commits would be rejected. Even a single line in HTML renderer must be coded with a Symbian OS, some plane video terminal, some car dashbard, some SD gaming console "web channel" in mind. What amazes me is, they still manage to keep up with the trends and actually implement on impossible to count platforms equally. For example, their Android beta has JIT compiler for Javascript while Google couldn't manage/care enough to ship Chrome to PPC/OS X.
If Firefox really wants a truly mobile version, they should be ready to shave a lot of the code and reject a lot of commits. For example, if someone's super cool JIT patch doesn't work on ARM, the should reject it.
They should have started experimenting with Symbian right after "S60 V3" handsets started to ship. Calling Nokia evil or joking with others RAM (their so called supporters) didn't help of course.
Firefox isn't just some browser with "cool" extensions anymore, it is something which Netscape originally intended to do and messed up. It is something we can call as a "web operating system". Once Firefox is up and running (or compilable) on an Operating System, it becomes equal to other operating systems on behalf of sites and more importantly, intranets which supports it.
Especially the comparison to "Chrome" kills me... Chrome can't even provide a non X86 version of browser. Webkit was never designed to be "plugged in" by extensions, Safari still can't be "extended" without the risky Input Managers, Opera has to maintain a very tight and professional code to keep compatibility with all the crazy platforms it has to run/sell...
I am typing this on Opera and I have never been a huge fan of Mozilla but I am not really ignorant enough not to see what firefox/mozilla has become... Remember Netscape CEO's comment which was the turning point for MS, which drove them into panic: "An operating system will be just bunch of drivers soon, it will not matter".. Something like that. That was the time MS really decided to kill Netscape. It was never about that stupid netscape.com homepage.
If one can buy a netbook running linux without any questions today, it is half because of firefox, half (sorry to say) because of adobe flash. That equals "facebook" and "youtube" or several "cloud based" office applications. Dumb it down and see that advantage gone.
Newtek guys (they are still around, Video Toaster in Pro Video/PC) actually accomplished 4096 colours in high res by abusing the system which that patent troll claimed. I remember they were (rightfully) bragging about it on full page magazine ads but I haven't used it in production or seen it used....and people ask why Amiga can't be forgotten:)
Quicktime does have DRM, it is just Apple, knowing the human nature, named it differently. It is "Media Keys". It exists but of course, I didn't have a mad idea like using Quicktime DRM solution in production environment. iTunes DRM is actually built on it, not sure if it is something like "V2.0" or pure implementation.
Unlike Apple, GPU access (to the point of video decoding) is something existing since Windows XP on Microsoftland, they could use the time frame to ship a GPU decoder enabled Quicktime X for Windows, to shut up all "Quicktime for Windows is bad" trolls once and forever.
Even Adobe managed to code a GPU accelerated Flash plugin:) Imagine...
The reason I am mad to Quicktime department at Apple is: I know what kind of a powerful platform it is, it is wasted, plain and simple.
Well, what happens when you tell your customers not to bother? In my experience, unless you deal with self producing artist or a really modern producer who really knows about current trends, they said "they better struggle so we can keep the real pros responsible".
These guys are very powerful in video World and basically, whatever they don't want doesn't take off. If they see HTML5 as something they can't easily advertise on or protect (!), it doesn't take off. You know the lame things Apple does at their Quicktime Trailers page. That is the company who will truly support HTML5, down to their mighty popular trailers page right?
Lets say HTML5 becomes the perfect tool to a point that even Adobe starts to depreciate their own stuff for it... What will be done about the needs of professional content creators? DRM? Anti-rip? Today's media logic says "There has to be some sort of inconvenience and responsibility creating thing in a media framework". For example, everyone knows DVD CSS is dead,easily cracked but it is still implemented on movies especially to create a situation that user has to run "illegal software" to rip the commercial DVD.
How do you implement DRM "openly"? Remember Real Networks CEO suggested Linux/BSD guys should really think about a DRM standard and everyone (rightfully) laughed at him? HTML5 now has the same issue, globally.
As Apple is in perfect shape now, I would be questioning "Why on earth our own Quicktime, even with DRM since V5 not even considered as an option?"
Someone should really start asking these questions now, that great framework is really being wasted. They didn't even bother to ship Quicktime X for Windows. Before attacking other companies frameworks/players/plugins, he should check the shape and missed opportunities of Quicktime department in Apple.
Speaking of content security and HTML5 doesn't have it _yet_, as an extension... Options are: 1) Real Networks architecture 2) Quicktime DRM (yes, it exists, media keys) 3) WMedia DRM 4) Silverlight DRM
They got options and yet, I don't think they are less hated or feasible (Real Networks bad image, quicktime being gigantic windows app) than Adobe Flash.
IMHO they will even code an Adobe Air dedicated application in the future, Air already got actual direct TCP/UDP connection capability in V2+. HTML5 advocates should really give an option for content security aka DRM, that is how real World works for now... Unfortunately that is.
Perhaps, gnash would be in different shape today if more people used and contributed to it. Its mailing lists are interesting though, very promising things happened lately. As I am on OS X/PPC, I can't try/test and don't have enough time/expertise anyway.
If I was on Linux/BSD, I would definitely give it a try or at least provide some bug reports.
Of course, if Adobe management had brains and if they allocated couple of their own developers, at least people with @adobe.com mails to Gnash, their image would be different. Obviously, today's management would directly fire and suggest have his brain checked.
What purpose does Flash being closed source serves to Adobe anyway? Codecs? Use Real Networks model than, check https://www.helixproject.org/ . Player open, codecs not. Super cool patents are free to GPL code... It took some years for them to move to that model but they got saved from irrelevance and bankruptcy. I mean, they may be irrelevant to average/. user but very relevant to mobile users/content providers/device makers etc.
If HTML5 video becomes standard, I give 10 weeks for a kind of DRM to be implemented.
Want to bet? I would be surprised if there aren't XCode/MS Visual Studio projects in private alpha form _right now_.
You are targeting wrong guys, target who actually demands it from Adobe. You can start with number 1 DRM enabled Video distributor on the planet who these ads target, who abuses their own qt metadata to serve plain mp4 files, just to force people to install their player, who is afraid of what you can do with full flash on mobile so their fascist store will be irrelevant...
There are thousands of engineers, companies, universities, professionals work in the MPEG standards. It is not like some genius American engineer woke up one day and coded it and some evil lawyer named Mr. Mpeg La patented it.
Did you hear the price Google paid to acquire and open source VP8? You would be sure surprised at the price they paid to patent lawyers just to make sure it won't burn them. Consider this, Nokia, always called "owner of Symbian", having a huge stake, had to work with an army of lawyers just to make it open source. It took 1 year.
What kind of congress has the power to abolish an international patent and how do you plan to pay patent owners, the people who designed the codec/standard itself?
Was there a single platform in computing history (minus ENIAC era) that dictates you the languages you are supposed to use? I have read a lot of computing history and I can't remember seeing such thing.I have read a lot about mainframes both historical and current too.
Flash is already on near billion devices/computers and on its way (as in real form) to hundreds of millions of smart phones. Apple and their supporters are really pushing limits of delusion. The number is "0.5 of World's mobile phones", if Adobe really goes nuts and does a crazy thing as adding Flash to S40/J2ME hidden empire, I will really have a great laugh.
The media/blogs/fans are one thing, the raw numbers are another. Currently, nobody gives a shit about what Apple supports or not. At most, they would release some HTML5 video exporter for "iphone guys" and move on. Adobe did a big mistake by sparing time and energy to iPhone "hack apps" and giving way too much credit to Apple confusing everyone. MS on the other hand, shipped Silverlight SDK for Nokia/Symbian and native Business tools recently. They are always being compared to Nokia, their actual business rivals are Nokia and Blackberry (RIM), why are they sparing time to a competitor platform which has nothing to do with their culture? They seem to look at raw numbers and projections and take decisions based on them.
I think Adobe should have spared their time and energy to Symbian/Android/Blackberry/Win Mobile pre 7 instead.
After the iPhone, people started to look closely to OS X and figured it is one of the most closed operating systems ever. There are also rumors of "10.7 app store" which would be a true disaster in Apple's image and would cause some real big legal problems.
They have really lost focus recently to a degree of canceling almost traditional Developer awards for OS X. Eartlier times, iPhone/iPad didn't really effect the "real computer" side that much. Apple wasn't a company to drop support down to security updates, force developers abandon their own users via Developer tools tricks. Perhaps, it is time to leave Apple to Starbucks people and move on.
What happened to "do one thing and do it good" rule? Plugin architecture allows it. If Real and Apple quicktime department (ms is already hopeless) weren't complete idiots, we would be talking about 3 plugins competing each in performance, stability and support here.
I find it hard to believe that browser developers are advanced multimedia developers and current benchmarks between Flash and HTML5 sadly proves it. What happens to portable devices which we already own? Will Mozilla/Apple/Microsoft code HTML5 video decoder on a strange OS like Symbian S60? I can watch embedded flash videos on my Nokia E71 right now and actual Flash 10.1 is on its way.
GPU decoding H264 on hardware does exist since... 2007? Well, it was first advertised by ATI at that time. It is 2010 now, it is the very exact same chip, nobody invented any magical hack or anything, it was always there sitting idle as you say driver support needed and Apple wasn't supplying.
After they figured people comparing Windows Flash video using absolutely comical CPU thanks to always present but not used GPU acceleration support, they magically added support in 10.6.3 resulting in very strange situation as there are people using/have to use 10.4.x, 10.5.x, having same or way better hardware (GPU) won't have GPU acceleration.
Also, as you seem to know Mac platform, please review how an internet plugin perform in Windows compared to Mac. Lets say, someone coded a fresh plugin that will write "hello World" a million times in plain language, compiled with latest available developer tools. Why would it perform 1.5x/2x faster on Windows browser compared to OS X one? Adobe should stop this CEO fight with Apple and should start talking about these technical facts which will really convince users and push Apple in right direction.
iPhone users and Developers are really making me tired. Buy device or even buy an iPhone developer account, close your eyes to other platforms which perfectly work in their own ways and start bitching about Apple not approving your app or not allowing whatever you need to do.
Bought iPhone or only developing for iPhone? Shut up and enjoy it... If you don't? Well, there are other platforms, perhaps not "cool" as iPhone but... Just stop whining...
It really kills me when I see a developer whining about their app not approved while there are at least 4-5 other platforms to choose from. Lets see Apple not approving your application while you got 5-6 million downloads on other platforms. You can say "well, it is your loss".
Adobe could easily do the exact same thing with the new tools, e.g. why not "export to Symbian app/widget" instead of.app hack? Or J2ME 2 container (I just spoke about billion devices). They spent months/years and millions to a thing which people like me having no credentials have easily guessed that it won't be allowed by Apple, right when it was announced.
Slashdot Mirror
Who knows if Apple guys hunt him down and reject his next update nitpicking on some minor issue since he said "he wants to jump the ship" ?
Having an actual risk like that is worse than fragmentation, I bet even 8 bit era ASM coders didn't have such a risk.
IMHO idiots like these manage to trick developers causing millions of dollars in potential revenue especially with independent developers.
You don't need to jump the ship, keep shipping for iPhone and add Android, Symbian and even Windows Mobile to your platforms. Ignore what those "blog writers" and fanatics (including some devs) say, see yourself...
Let me give a 2 applications as example: Nimbuzz and Fring. OK, they get great venture capital these days but it is likely 10 guys coding. They ship to any mobile platform available to buy, Fring guys even released a J2ME client. Do you believe these guys have some kind of insane setup like 1000 different handsets to debug on? Of course not. They just do simple things like seperating the core and ui, listening to vendor/os developer recommendations, using the free tools (Nokia even has actual hardware simulators with webcams) and don't go to deep level hacks area which will create problem on anything.
For example I am not a fan of Android but when I see something like "fragmentation" and "engadget", I directly ignore it. I'd listen to actual software developers instead and look at the products shipped.
These guys are trolling via blogs and counting their ad-click money, their BS really costs some developers and users, that makes me mad.
This is going on for years on Symbian scene and J2ME (Java Micro), same thing being said over and over and unfortunately some developers seem to actually believe it.
I will give one single title: Opera. Opera Mobile runs on ANY Symbian S60 and Opera Mini runs on ANY J2ME client. There is no "Opera Mobile for Nokia E71", the drop down menus on some download may confuse you. It is just, some developers, especially the ones directly selling (no trial) apps want to make sure the application will run instead of living hassle to give money back or bad feedback. Another thing is, root certs which devices have. Some have Verisign, some hove Thawte or both. They want to make sure (especially with J2ME) that application won't be treated as "unsigned", especially network aware apps.
Of course, if you see something like "S60 V3 FP2", it may confuse you. It just says "Devices with compass built in", much like iPhone 3G vs 3GS and I don't see anyone talking about fragmentation on iPhone scene.
So J2ME is really "write once,run anywhere" and Symbian is really device independent. Of course, the Developer makes the difference.
I had a bad luck enough having to buy Windows 7 for a company as Linux was really no-go for their needs. The machine runs cheap end AMD (cheap version) with 1 Gig RAM, EOL (ask ATI) semi integrated gfx with all kind of trouble making things attached like realtek internal sound.
I had to make sure their broken XP was really "broken", not backdoored or anything so I am sure it was clean machine with no spyware whatsoever. Windows 7 is almost 30% faster on that machine even with several services running. After seeing that, I give no credit to "Run XP" anymore. Not anymore... Even cheap hardware is beyond XP now. That machine has AHCI for example and that cheap amd is 64bit capable.
I wonder why we should be understanding to the lack of very important and standard features on VP8?
Google, just like Apple is a huge company with amazing amount of cash in hand. If they dare to replace H264, they better surpass it let alone barely having 10% of the important features of it.
I was mad to Apple for years for not supporting mpeg4-asp features on quicktime player/plugin but Apple wasn't really at shape of today and there was always an option like 3ivx/xvid components.
So, Google ships some junk (compared to others) and just because it is supposedly patent free, we will all support it right? Sorry but I'd care about some remote area guy having 1mbit shaky connection instead.
Unlike Q-Pel which is part of MPEG4-ASP and universally hated because of serious performance degradation in mobile World of today, B-Frames and Adaptive Quantization are seriously big deal for any codec shipping to this crazy World where people buys mobile devices and expect them to output 720P or even 1080P to their TV sets.
You must be a real Google or VP8 fanatic to ignore these as they exist since MPEG-4 ASP (not h264) standards in professional encoders/advanced open source encoders.
Here is one of the most advanced mpeg4-asp encoders in existence today, look at the "encoder" section for a reference. Note that is not even H264 which has its own extra features. A company sized as Google should come up with a way better codec if they want to replace h264. That is for easily updated desktops only, we haven't heard anything about custom chips yet. I mean there isn't anything like Broadcom Crystal HD (ships now) for VP8.
Steve Jobs may have his own agenda but seriously, you can't impress Steve Jobs with VP8 today. Guy rolled out H264 on Quicktime 7 years ago, while nobody cared. Same thing happened with mpeg4-sp.
IMHO if someone has problem with OpenBSD community/leader, he should hang at Mac community/websites/mags and especially IRC channels for a while.
I also think OpenBSD theocratic leader and hostile community could be the reason why OpenBSD has its unique and prestigious position today... We all heard how many users got banned for questioning inclusion of Mono to a "user friendly" Linux OS distro which has democratic leadership right?
Using Opera for my needs, such as 720P HDTV TV (try other browsers!), Nokia E71 Symbian S60 which Google didn't even bother etc.
When you use it in such conditions, you figure the sad fact. Even if Opera switched to open source, it would be some developer PR nightmare since most of the commits would be rejected. Even a single line in HTML renderer must be coded with a Symbian OS, some plane video terminal, some car dashbard, some SD gaming console "web channel" in mind. What amazes me is, they still manage to keep up with the trends and actually implement on impossible to count platforms equally. For example, their Android beta has JIT compiler for Javascript while Google couldn't manage/care enough to ship Chrome to PPC/OS X.
If Firefox really wants a truly mobile version, they should be ready to shave a lot of the code and reject a lot of commits. For example, if someone's super cool JIT patch doesn't work on ARM, the should reject it.
They should have started experimenting with Symbian right after "S60 V3" handsets started to ship. Calling Nokia evil or joking with others RAM (their so called supporters) didn't help of course.
Firefox isn't just some browser with "cool" extensions anymore, it is something which Netscape originally intended to do and messed up. It is something we can call as a "web operating system". Once Firefox is up and running (or compilable) on an Operating System, it becomes equal to other operating systems on behalf of sites and more importantly, intranets which supports it.
Especially the comparison to "Chrome" kills me... Chrome can't even provide a non X86 version of browser. Webkit was never designed to be "plugged in" by extensions, Safari still can't be "extended" without the risky Input Managers, Opera has to maintain a very tight and professional code to keep compatibility with all the crazy platforms it has to run/sell...
I am typing this on Opera and I have never been a huge fan of Mozilla but I am not really ignorant enough not to see what firefox/mozilla has become... Remember Netscape CEO's comment which was the turning point for MS, which drove them into panic: "An operating system will be just bunch of drivers soon, it will not matter".. Something like that. That was the time MS really decided to kill Netscape. It was never about that stupid netscape.com homepage.
If one can buy a netbook running linux without any questions today, it is half because of firefox, half (sorry to say) because of adobe flash. That equals "facebook" and "youtube" or several "cloud based" office applications. Dumb it down and see that advantage gone.
Newtek guys (they are still around, Video Toaster in Pro Video/PC) actually accomplished 4096 colours in high res by abusing the system which that patent troll claimed. I remember they were (rightfully) bragging about it on full page magazine ads but I haven't used it in production or seen it used. ...and people ask why Amiga can't be forgotten :)
Quicktime does have DRM, it is just Apple, knowing the human nature, named it differently. It is "Media Keys". It exists but of course, I didn't have a mad idea like using Quicktime DRM solution in production environment. iTunes DRM is actually built on it, not sure if it is something like "V2.0" or pure implementation.
Unlike Apple, GPU access (to the point of video decoding) is something existing since Windows XP on Microsoftland, they could use the time frame to ship a GPU decoder enabled Quicktime X for Windows, to shut up all "Quicktime for Windows is bad" trolls once and forever.
Even Adobe managed to code a GPU accelerated Flash plugin :) Imagine...
The reason I am mad to Quicktime department at Apple is: I know what kind of a powerful platform it is, it is wasted, plain and simple.
Well, what happens when you tell your customers not to bother? In my experience, unless you deal with self producing artist or a really modern producer who really knows about current trends, they said "they better struggle so we can keep the real pros responsible".
These guys are very powerful in video World and basically, whatever they don't want doesn't take off. If they see HTML5 as something they can't easily advertise on or protect (!), it doesn't take off. You know the lame things Apple does at their Quicktime Trailers page. That is the company who will truly support HTML5, down to their mighty popular trailers page right?
Lets say HTML5 becomes the perfect tool to a point that even Adobe starts to depreciate their own stuff for it... What will be done about the needs of professional content creators? DRM? Anti-rip? Today's media logic says "There has to be some sort of inconvenience and responsibility creating thing in a media framework". For example, everyone knows DVD CSS is dead,easily cracked but it is still implemented on movies especially to create a situation that user has to run "illegal software" to rip the commercial DVD.
How do you implement DRM "openly"? Remember Real Networks CEO suggested Linux/BSD guys should really think about a DRM standard and everyone (rightfully) laughed at him? HTML5 now has the same issue, globally.
As Apple is in perfect shape now, I would be questioning "Why on earth our own Quicktime, even with DRM since V5 not even considered as an option?"
Someone should really start asking these questions now, that great framework is really being wasted. They didn't even bother to ship Quicktime X for Windows. Before attacking other companies frameworks/players/plugins, he should check the shape and missed opportunities of Quicktime department in Apple.
Speaking of content security and HTML5 doesn't have it _yet_, as an extension... Options are:
1) Real Networks architecture
2) Quicktime DRM (yes, it exists, media keys)
3) WMedia DRM
4) Silverlight DRM
They got options and yet, I don't think they are less hated or feasible (Real Networks bad image, quicktime being gigantic windows app) than Adobe Flash.
IMHO they will even code an Adobe Air dedicated application in the future, Air already got actual direct TCP/UDP connection capability in V2+. HTML5 advocates should really give an option for content security aka DRM, that is how real World works for now... Unfortunately that is.
apologies for forgetting the right url, here is the Helix Community. See the stats they have too.
https://helixcommunity.org/
Perhaps, gnash would be in different shape today if more people used and contributed to it. Its mailing lists are interesting though, very promising things happened lately. As I am on OS X/PPC, I can't try/test and don't have enough time/expertise anyway.
If I was on Linux/BSD, I would definitely give it a try or at least provide some bug reports.
Of course, if Adobe management had brains and if they allocated couple of their own developers, at least people with @adobe.com mails to Gnash, their image would be different. Obviously, today's management would directly fire and suggest have his brain checked.
What purpose does Flash being closed source serves to Adobe anyway? Codecs? Use Real Networks model than, /. user but very relevant to mobile users/content providers/device makers etc.
check https://www.helixproject.org/ . Player open, codecs not. Super cool patents are free to GPL code... It took some years for them to move to that model but they got saved from irrelevance and bankruptcy. I mean, they may be irrelevant to average
If HTML5 video becomes standard, I give 10 weeks for a kind of DRM to be implemented.
Want to bet? I would be surprised if there aren't XCode/MS Visual Studio projects in private alpha form _right now_.
You are targeting wrong guys, target who actually demands it from Adobe. You can start with number 1 DRM enabled Video distributor on the planet who these ads target, who abuses their own qt metadata to serve plain mp4 files, just to force people to install their player, who is afraid of what you can do with full flash on mobile so their fascist store will be irrelevant...
Anyway, enough bandwidth wasted...
There are thousands of engineers, companies, universities, professionals work in the MPEG standards. It is not like some genius American engineer woke up one day and coded it and some evil lawyer named Mr. Mpeg La patented it.
Did you hear the price Google paid to acquire and open source VP8? You would be sure surprised at the price they paid to patent lawyers just to make sure it won't burn them. Consider this, Nokia, always called "owner of Symbian", having a huge stake, had to work with an army of lawyers just to make it open source. It took 1 year.
What kind of congress has the power to abolish an international patent and how do you plan to pay patent owners, the people who designed the codec/standard itself?
Was there a single platform in computing history (minus ENIAC era) that dictates you the languages you are supposed to use? I have read a lot of computing history and I can't remember seeing such thing.I have read a lot about mainframes both historical and current too.
Flash is already on near billion devices/computers and on its way (as in real form) to hundreds of millions of smart phones. Apple and their supporters are really pushing limits of delusion. The number is "0.5 of World's mobile phones", if Adobe really goes nuts and does a crazy thing as adding Flash to S40/J2ME hidden empire, I will really have a great laugh.
The media/blogs/fans are one thing, the raw numbers are another. Currently, nobody gives a shit about what Apple supports or not. At most, they would release some HTML5 video exporter for "iphone guys" and move on. Adobe did a big mistake by sparing time and energy to iPhone "hack apps" and giving way too much credit to Apple confusing everyone. MS on the other hand, shipped Silverlight SDK for Nokia/Symbian and native Business tools recently. They are always being compared to Nokia, their actual business rivals are Nokia and Blackberry (RIM), why are they sparing time to a competitor platform which has nothing to do with their culture? They seem to look at raw numbers and projections and take decisions based on them.
I think Adobe should have spared their time and energy to Symbian/Android/Blackberry/Win Mobile pre 7 instead.
After the iPhone, people started to look closely to OS X and figured it is one of the most closed operating systems ever. There are also rumors of "10.7 app store" which would be a true disaster in Apple's image and would cause some real big legal problems.
They have really lost focus recently to a degree of canceling almost traditional Developer awards for OS X. Eartlier times, iPhone/iPad didn't really effect the "real computer" side that much. Apple wasn't a company to drop support down to security updates, force developers abandon their own users via Developer tools tricks. Perhaps, it is time to leave Apple to Starbucks people and move on.
What happened to "do one thing and do it good" rule? Plugin architecture allows it. If Real and Apple quicktime department (ms is already hopeless) weren't complete idiots, we would be talking about 3 plugins competing each in performance, stability and support here.
I find it hard to believe that browser developers are advanced multimedia developers and current benchmarks between Flash and HTML5 sadly proves it. What happens to portable devices which we already own? Will Mozilla/Apple/Microsoft code HTML5 video decoder on a strange OS like Symbian S60? I can watch embedded flash videos on my Nokia E71 right now and actual Flash 10.1 is on its way.
GPU decoding H264 on hardware does exist since... 2007? Well, it was first advertised by ATI at that time. It is 2010 now, it is the very exact same chip, nobody invented any magical hack or anything, it was always there sitting idle as you say driver support needed and Apple wasn't supplying.
After they figured people comparing Windows Flash video using absolutely comical CPU thanks to always present but not used GPU acceleration support, they magically added support in 10.6.3 resulting in very strange situation as there are people using/have to use 10.4.x, 10.5.x, having same or way better hardware (GPU) won't have GPU acceleration.
Also, as you seem to know Mac platform, please review how an internet plugin perform in Windows compared to Mac. Lets say, someone coded a fresh plugin that will write "hello World" a million times in plain language, compiled with latest available developer tools. Why would it perform 1.5x/2x faster on Windows browser compared to OS X one? Adobe should stop this CEO fight with Apple and should start talking about these technical facts which will really convince users and push Apple in right direction.
iPhone users and Developers are really making me tired. Buy device or even buy an iPhone developer account, close your eyes to other platforms which perfectly work in their own ways and start bitching about Apple not approving your app or not allowing whatever you need to do.
Bought iPhone or only developing for iPhone? Shut up and enjoy it... If you don't? Well, there are other platforms, perhaps not "cool" as iPhone but... Just stop whining...
It really kills me when I see a developer whining about their app not approved while there are at least 4-5 other platforms to choose from. Lets see Apple not approving your application while you got 5-6 million downloads on other platforms. You can say "well, it is your loss".
Adobe could easily do the exact same thing with the new tools, e.g. why not "export to Symbian app/widget" instead of .app hack? Or J2ME 2 container (I just spoke about billion devices). They spent months/years and millions to a thing which people like me having no credentials have easily guessed that it won't be allowed by Apple, right when it was announced.