OSNews: http://www.osnews.com/story/19699/Mozilla_Warns_of_Flash_Silverlight_Agenda_ Exploring the Future of Computing en-us Copyright 2001-2009, David Adams adam+nospam@osnews.com Tue, 10 Nov 2009 10:33:31 GMT http://www.osnews.com/images/osnews.gif OSNews.com http://www.osnews.com Comment by morph http://osnews.com/thread?312177 http://osnews.com/thread?312177 "...that Adobe's Flash is not compatible with the open web, and that Adobe may open source it if Silverlight's competition becomes too fierce."

So, ironically, perhaps one should use MS Silverlight, to foster the competition, to encourage Adobe to open-source Flash? Hah ;) Wed, 30 Apr 2008 17:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Morph) Comments People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312178 http://osnews.com/thread?312178 While I am no fan of Flash or Silverlight, they definitely fill a market, such as YouTube, and will therefore be used by developers. It does not matter that they may have an "agenda" or aren't well supported on alternative platforms because they are the only choice.

Unfortunately, there is no open source equivalent, and complaining about the proprietary-ness of what exists doesn't get us any closer to having an open source option.

If Mozilla wants to save us from these, they need to start releasing solutions. Telling us that HTML 5 may compete with Flash when it comes out in several years does not help developers or users now. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 17:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (jpobst) Comments RE: Comment by morph http://osnews.com/thread?312180 http://osnews.com/thread?312180 no, html5 and ogg...

the major use of flash these days are media related (youtube and similar). the rest are just bling for the sake of it (imo). Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:16:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments I would say http://osnews.com/thread?312181 http://osnews.com/thread?312181 It's better than before where you needed Realplayer, Quicktime or WMP for media, you still do to some extent.

I'd prefer flash than have them proprietary codecs which were not on Linux or others OS's. I've seen quiet a few sites now move to Flash for videos and I'd rather not go back to all them formats again. I do wonder though, will Adobe even entertain the idea of Opensourcing their flash if Microsoft rule the web with Silverlight. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:20:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (SlackerJack) Comments How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312182 http://osnews.com/thread?312182 Flash is bloated, and has a propriatary file format, meaning that there is no way to create a flash movie that hasn't been blessed by adobe. Not only that, but the plugin has years of history of poor support for alternative platforms.

On the other hand, we have Silverlight which is XAML (an xml format) and .net (an open standard), that is supported on all major platforms, includes a LGPL version sanctioned by microsoft (developed by novell), and designed for the needs of RIAs, unlike flash which was designed for the needs of small time animators.

Sure, a totally open standard would have been ideal. But it is not like this is springing up out of nowhere, this is something that has been a bigger and bigger issue over about the last 20 years now. Mozilla had more then enough chance to implement something. Now that the gap is being filled by big companies, they are telling us to keep on waiting for something they may or may not do in some unspecified time frame in the future?

At this point, the onus is on them to put up or shut up. Flash has become a de-facto standard, even though (IMO) it has a very limited scope in which it performs well. MS has just put out a product that will compete based on its ability. When Mozilla has something better then both flash and silverlight, THEN they can start preaching about the open web. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:21:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments RE: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312184 http://osnews.com/thread?312184 but at least putting a spotlight on potential issues will make people work harder on getting that open source equivalent ready. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:23:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312185 http://osnews.com/thread?312185 i just wonder what kind of media formats will be contained inside those silverlight containers (thats what flash basically is, a container for the video content).

its as if each video file would come with its own player...

hmm, sounds like a mpaa utopia... Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:26:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments Flash works http://osnews.com/thread?312188 http://osnews.com/thread?312188 I'm a Linux and FOSS guy. And I tend to steer clear of proprietary stuff when possible. But I'll bet I'm not alone in being FREAKING TIRED of years and years of clicking embedded media links and having nothing happen. I used to think that it was just that the codecs were not supported. But then I came to realize that the real problem was javascript, activeX, whatever. But the reasons don't matter. These days, I click on embedded media links with confidence... because they are Flash, and I know that Flash links work. So here I am, a dyed in the wool FOSS advocate who is actually thankful for Flash. Of course, that does make Flash all the more dangerous. But years of missing out on what others take for granted wears one down. Even Linux related sites like linux.com sport big, friendly looking flash movies, with a convenient start button at the center of the Window, and then provide, as an afterthought, a "download ogg theora" link, which sometimes has small problems, like them forgetting to include sound in the ogg version.

People can talk about the Flash agenda until they are blue in the face, and it is not going to sway any significant number of people. Provide something that works as well, and that is cross-browser and cross-platform, and then, and only then will it even have a chance on non-Microsoft platforms.Edited 2008-04-30 18:36 UTC Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:33:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (sbergman27) Comments RE: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312194 http://osnews.com/thread?312194 Wrong, it does. I've written a site in HTML5, and both Firefox and Safari have support for the video and audio tags. It's backwards developers that are necessitating flash & silverlight. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Kroc) Comments A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312195 http://osnews.com/thread?312195 GNASH Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (chemical_scum) Comments RE: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312201 http://osnews.com/thread?312201 There were some solutions involving use of free video/audio solutions in HTML5 but they were blocked by major software/hardware companies - we (computer literate users and regular ones even if they don't konw it yet ;) ) might want Theora, OGG but they lack DRM and other restrictions that make people earn money in traditional way. This is a showstopper to everybody who has a say in this. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (miscz) Comments RE[2]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312204 http://osnews.com/thread?312204 Isn't there a problem with video tags when it comes to codecs? Various browsers on various operating systems include different media backends that do not standarise on single and open audio/video standard. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:01:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (miscz) Comments RE[2]: Comment by morph http://osnews.com/thread?312205 http://osnews.com/thread?312205 It's true the majority of Flash use is media related like YouTube. But then it's a little more than just playing media.

Let's take Youtube videos as an example. The video it plays is of course in the Flash piece. The video *control* is also in Flash. And at the end of videos, it shows related videos, or you can replay the video or share it, which are also part of the Flash.

Of course, you can do it another way with a change in design (in case of youtube, they really don't need to change design because all these functions are available outside the Flash piece), but then, that's their design. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:03:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (ljgshkg) Comments RE[3]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312209 http://osnews.com/thread?312209 Yes, there absolutely is that problem. But we must take one step at a time; having a proprietary video codec in a non proprietary container is still a great stride forward than having a proprietary container et al.

An .h264 video is still playable by all platforms (inc.64-bit), but a flash file isn't at all, regardless of what codec the video is in.

Plus, without a binary blob in your page, it's safer and can be interpreted better by varying user-agents, such as RSS readers and mobile browsers. If a user-agent knows that it's looking at a video or audio tag, instead of a flash-blob that could be anything, it can provide screen controls appropriate to the display technology. (small screens for instance), or interpret the information in any variety of other means. (mashable content). Mozilla have even talked about "copy & paste" for video, which could not be done (universally) with flash-blobs. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:17:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Kroc) Comments RE[3]: Comment by morph http://osnews.com/thread?312214 http://osnews.com/thread?312214 i dont know how often i have made use of those available "features". but i suspect that the number would be single digit. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:27:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[3]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312216 http://osnews.com/thread?312216 and that was what the suggestion for ogg formats where supposed to fix. yes, it was not the best in quality, but it was best in how freely it could be implemented on some random platform out there in present or future. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:29:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[2]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312217 http://osnews.com/thread?312217 as if flash video has drm.

i have been using apps to rip youtube videos to local storage for quite a while now...

"security thru obscurity" more like it...Edited 2008-04-30 19:30 UTC Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:30:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[4]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312218 http://osnews.com/thread?312218 what is the licencing requirements for h264 again? Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:31:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE: Flash works http://osnews.com/thread?312219 http://osnews.com/thread?312219 activex was/is a proprietary microsoft system. if you will, the forerunner to silverlight.

and javascript was not much better at one time, it was a netscape centered solution iirc. but these days its standardized as ecmascript, again iirc... Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments Agenda http://osnews.com/thread?312221 http://osnews.com/thread?312221
Nitot warned that companies like Adobe and Microsoft might have an agenda with their Flash and Silverlight technologies. Even though at the moment these technologies are free to download, this might change in the future. "But maybe they have an agenda," Nitot said, "they're not here for the glory; they're here for the money."


Oh gee, ya think? This guy must've gotten a visit from Captain Obvious. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (WorknMan) Comments RE: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312222 http://osnews.com/thread?312222 I modded you up.
However I'd hate to see an old story repeating itself: for years we have tried to catch up with WMP and we never really got there.
If Microsoft offered WMP codecs for Linux tomorrow as they did with OS X (Flip4Mac) I'd start using them immediately. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:43:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous Penguin) Comments RE[2]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312226 http://osnews.com/thread?312226 You can host whatever kind of video you want, you just gotta write a provider for it. AFAIK moonlight (the LGPL silverlight) comes with Ogg Theora support built in. This is very different from flash, which is tied to propriatary codecs. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments RE[5]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312229 http://osnews.com/thread?312229 I don't know, but MPlayer/VLC plays it, right? I haven't finished downloading Ubuntu yet to find out. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Kroc) Comments RE[2]: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312230 http://osnews.com/thread?312230 MS liscenced the "Silverlight Media Codecs" (i.e. wmv and related tech) for moonlight to use.

ScottGu (manager of devdiv at ms) talked about it with his 1.0 blog post http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2007/09/04/silverlight-1-0-r... Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:02:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments RE[3]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312231 http://osnews.com/thread?312231 hmm, either microsoft dropped the ball on that one or they have some trick or other up their sleeve as that just made things much more interesting...

this is, if someone can make a ogg provider for silverlight...

or can the one in moonlight be simply copied over?Edited 2008-04-30 20:05 UTC Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:04:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[6]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312234 http://osnews.com/thread?312234 hmm, videolan (vlc) lists it as a supported codec indeed.

but then there is this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H264#Patent_licensing

the mplayer page does not list h264, and ubuntu does not come with either of those apps installed pr default if im reading the page right...

so implementing it directly into say mozilla may be a issue if they have to pay for a patent license on each download...

i dont know, it seems like a legal minefield... Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:14:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[3]: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312235 http://osnews.com/thread?312235 licensed how? ms licenses have a habit of turning into coiled snakes when one isnt looking... Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:24:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[2]: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312236 http://osnews.com/thread?312236 indeed, and thats why the dropping of ogg from html5 is such a sad state of affairs... Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[3]: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312237 http://osnews.com/thread?312237 Great, thanks! I wasn't aware of it. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:27:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous Penguin) Comments RE[4]: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312239 http://osnews.com/thread?312239 I am not a Microsoft fan, just the exact opposite.
However they have been offering WMP for OS X for years (first WMP 9, then Flip4Mac) and Mac users have just enjoyed WMP content without problems. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous Penguin) Comments RE[5]: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312242 http://osnews.com/thread?312242 as we see with flash, i think its simply easier to do so on osx as its a more static target... Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE: Flash works http://osnews.com/thread?312243 http://osnews.com/thread?312243 Great comments. Mozilla would have more of a point if it was offering some kind of alternative -- but they're not. Until that happens, the competition between Flash and SilverLight is actually GREAT for customers. Ultimately, I predict, one or both of these technologies will become open source. It's just a question of time. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (tomcat) Comments RE[4]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312246 http://osnews.com/thread?312246 Well, you can thank Apple and Nokia for shooting down OGG support in the HTML5 spec. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:53:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (intangible) Comments open source Flash players http://osnews.com/thread?312247 http://osnews.com/thread?312247 Besides Gnash there is also swfdec. In both open source engines the video part is not quite up to speed yet. I'll be honest and just say I am running Fedora 9 with Adobe's Flash 9 plugin so I can watch youtube videos. I am hoping by the time Fedora 10 comes out the video with play better in swfdec.

http://swfdec.freedesktop.org/wiki/ Wed, 30 Apr 2008 21:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (buff) Comments RE: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312250 http://osnews.com/thread?312250
Flash is bloated, and has a propriatary file format, meaning that there is no way to create a flash movie that hasn't been blessed by adobe.


That is 100% incorrect. There are tons of tools which produce Flash. What Adobe doesn't allow is the creation of alternative players. Neither does Microsoft.

From the Player licensing page on adobe.com (http://www.adobe.com/licensing/developer/)

This license grants the Licensee access to the SWF file format specification to aid in the creation of software which creates SWF files.

This license does not permit the usage of the specification to create software which supports SWF file playback.

The SWF output from the Licensee software must create content which renders error free in the latest publicly available version of Adobe Flash Player.

Get your facts right. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 21:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (unitcircle) Comments RE[2]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312251 http://osnews.com/thread?312251 MS is working with Novell to develop Moonlight, which is an OSS version of Silverlight based on mono. So I guess MS does allow alternative players.

Get your facts right. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 21:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (BluenoseJake) Comments RE[2]: Comment by morph http://osnews.com/thread?312253 http://osnews.com/thread?312253
the rest are just bling for the sake of it (imo).


This is mostly true, except you are forgetting about the many games that are developed in flash, and the fact that Flex is becoming more popular Wed, 30 Apr 2008 21:50:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Matt Giacomini) Comments RE[2]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312254 http://osnews.com/thread?312254
There were some solutions involving use of free video/audio solutions in HTML5 but they were blocked by major software/hardware companies


Screw HTML5 if it is going to be dominated by the needs of big companies. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 21:53:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Matt Giacomini) Comments Comment by zizban http://osnews.com/thread?312256 http://osnews.com/thread?312256 People who trumpet Gnash haven't actually tried to use it 100%. When they say it works with YouTube, it's a very loose definition. You may or may not get controls for the video; the video may not start up or it may just stop playing.

For simple stuff, Gnash is fine, but for flash video...well, there is work to be done. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 22:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (zizban) Comments RE[4]: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312257 http://osnews.com/thread?312257 Liscenced as in MS giving a grant for the windows media stuff, and paying whoever owns VC-1 to allow novell to use it in Moonlight. In both cases the liscence only applies to moonlight.

Just out of curiosity, when have microsoft licenses turned into coiled snakes? Wed, 30 Apr 2008 22:03:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments RE[3]: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312258 http://osnews.com/thread?312258 Theora is really not that impressive. Theora = a slightly modified VP3 that doesn't really compare to VP6/7 (what adobe uses), or VC-1 (what microsoft, bluray, hd-dvd, and the rest of the world use for hd video) Wed, 30 Apr 2008 22:04:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments RE[4]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312260 http://osnews.com/thread?312260 The question is why would someone want theora in silverlight? Theora started as VP3, the commercial version is used by adobe and is at VP7 now, and out performs it in every way. Not only that, but VC-1 (the silverlight codec) does 720p, and is currently the standard for hd video compression.

Anyways, aside from that, MS has said that it currently isn't really looking at providing the ability to swap out video codecs, because they want to keep the runtime size small, and they have a bunch of features that would be really hard to provide in a more generic way (like automatic downgrading of quality for slow connections) I haven't really looked at the content distribution side of silverlight that much yet (been having too much fun XAML UIs), but i wouldn't be suprised if you were able to hack it Wed, 30 Apr 2008 22:26:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments Comment by Luminair http://osnews.com/thread?312262 http://osnews.com/thread?312262 a FOSS alternative to flash will arise eventually, just like we've seen with every other software product. it might go unused, but as soon as there is a reason to switch, people will. like with IE->firefox.

That said, if the proprietary system is well-moderated like microsoft likes to do, then they may never give people a reason to switching, always maintaining the foothold with the proprietary technology. like windows or mp3 today.

So if you want to further the FOSS agenda the most, you'll try to make the FOSS alternative popular ASAP. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 22:40:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Luminair) Comments Since when.... http://osnews.com/thread?312264 http://osnews.com/thread?312264 was the web "NOT" proprietary? Did I miss the memo that said Real Media was open-sourced sometime in the late 90's? Wed, 30 Apr 2008 22:44:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Phloptical) Comments RE: I would say http://osnews.com/thread?312265 http://osnews.com/thread?312265
It's better than before where you needed Realplayer, Quicktime or WMP for media, you still do to some extent.

I'd prefer flash than have them proprietary codecs which were not on Linux or others OS's. I've seen quiet a few sites now move to Flash for videos and I'd rather not go back to all them formats again. I do wonder though, will Adobe even entertain the idea of Opensourcing their flash if Microsoft rule the web with Silverlight.


100% agree - today it is alot better than years ago, when one had to have 1/2 dozen different players installed to support the huge number of formats that provided nothing in terms of quality to the end user - and the stability and security issues; imagine trying to keep track of all that junk installed just to have a reasonable internet experience?

I'd love to see Flash opensourced - fully opensourced and then Adobe creating and selling development products - the money isn't in the technology itself but the software which allows people to taken advantage of that technology. If they opensource it tomorrow, Adobe would still be raking in the money today in terms of content creation tools.

Now, if Microsoft did that to Silverlight before Adobe, I'd put my money behind silverlight. I'm always surprised over just how stupid managers are when they become fixated on the technology rather than realising that you can bleed your customers dry with the stuff that sits ontop of the technology. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 22:47:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (kaiwai) Comments RE[5]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312272 http://osnews.com/thread?312272 apple i can understand, but nokia is downright confusing...

and their internet tablet do not help with that confusion... Wed, 30 Apr 2008 23:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[5]: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312275 http://osnews.com/thread?312275 "shared source"... Wed, 30 Apr 2008 23:14:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[4]: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312276 http://osnews.com/thread?312276 in this regard, quality is less important then freedom of usage... Wed, 30 Apr 2008 23:14:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[5]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312279 http://osnews.com/thread?312279 so in other words "sure you can use anything else then wm formats, when we get around to making that feature available"...

sounds like another "you can get the model t in any color, as long as its black" statement.

and when it comes to codecs for online use, quality is secondary to the ability to use it where one wants, when one wants as developer as well as user. Wed, 30 Apr 2008 23:18:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[6]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312285 http://osnews.com/thread?312285
sounds like another "you can get the model t in any color, as long as its black" statement.

and when it comes to codecs for online use, quality is secondary to the ability to use it where one wants, when one wants as developer as well as user.


Actually, that is pretty much completely wrong. When it comes to personal use, quality is secondary to being able to use it wherever you want. When distributing media online, compatibility turns in to browser compatibility, and performance and quality generally outweigh it.

VC-1 is in the top tier of video codecs, as is VP7. VP3 isn't even that well supported by major applications, the only thing it really has going for it is that it is the only streaming video format under the gpl. Thu, 01 May 2008 00:24:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments RE[7]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312286 http://osnews.com/thread?312286 and thats the big one imo, as its the only one thats as free to implement as html itself... Thu, 01 May 2008 00:27:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[2]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312290 http://osnews.com/thread?312290 wait... creating rich user applications that does not rely on anything from the browser maker and is rendered exactly the same from user to user, browser to browser, and platform to platform is backwards? Thu, 01 May 2008 00:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (modmans2ndcoming) Comments RE[2]: I would say http://osnews.com/thread?312291 http://osnews.com/thread?312291 perhaps if they opensourced it we could turn Flash into a useful runtime like silverlight will be once it hits 2.0

Actionscript is a pain in the ass and the library support could be a lot deeper IMHO. Thu, 01 May 2008 00:51:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (modmans2ndcoming) Comments RE[5]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312292 http://osnews.com/thread?312292 lets no forget that VC-1 also has a free as in beer encoder that is damn powerful. Thu, 01 May 2008 00:54:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (modmans2ndcoming) Comments RE[3]: I would say http://osnews.com/thread?312293 http://osnews.com/thread?312293
perhaps if they opensourced it we could turn Flash into a useful runtime like silverlight will be once it hits 2.0

Actionscript is a pain in the ass and the library support could be a lot deeper IMHO.


From what I understand, that is what AIR is attempting to do - what I find the most disappointing is Adobe's lack of foresight. If they keep acting the way they do Microsoft will eventually make them another victim of the juggernaut. Too bad Adobe have this, "we'll succeed because we're Adobe" instead of facing the reality - they're up against a stiff competitor with very deep pockets. Thu, 01 May 2008 00:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (kaiwai) Comments RE[5]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312294 http://osnews.com/thread?312294 not to mention that VC-1 has a free as in Beer encoder that is damn powerful.

woops... double posted.Edited 2008-05-01 00:56 UTC Thu, 01 May 2008 00:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (modmans2ndcoming) Comments RE: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312298 http://osnews.com/thread?312298
On the other hand, we have Silverlight which is XAML (an xml format) and .net (an open standard), that is supported on all major platforms, includes a LGPL version sanctioned by microsoft (developed by novell), and designed for the needs of RIAs, unlike flash which was designed for the needs of small time animators.


Ahh, so you're proposing that we use .net and suck up to Novell.
I'd rather sell my soul to the devil than do that.
And although Adobe is just Microsoft in a different coat, it's the lesser evil right now.
So we'll see what other alternatives come up in future.
Meanwhile, let's just concentrate on hating Microsoft.

P.S. Maybe Apple will opensource Quicktime and make OSX available for all computers. [j/k] Thu, 01 May 2008 01:08:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (shapeshifter) Comments RE[2]: Comment by morph http://osnews.com/thread?312302 http://osnews.com/thread?312302
no, html5 and ogg...


Yes.

the major use of flash these days are media related (youtube and similar). the rest are just bling for the sake of it (imo).


As it has been mentioned before, this is the main playing field of "Flash", but not its only one. Of course, regarding multimedia content, we seem to share the same ideas. Video playback should be handled at the user's site (i. e. from within the browser), just like libraries and plugins to it with any other content (images, audio files, Java applets). The user should be able to use whatever player he likes, for example, ebmedded inside the web page, playing in an external player, maybe in fullscreen, or maybe just save the file onto disk. Encapsulating and streaming techniques for video and audio content existed before "Flash", even good free alternatives, but as long as they are not widely used, users (or, to be more correct, the creators of web browsers and plugins) won't adopt to free standards.

Furthermore, "Flash" seems to have developed into an "HTML replacement"; this makes web content (if you can call it that way) completely unusable for disabled people. For example, blind users win't see anything. This is not entirely a problem of "Flash" itself, no, it's a problem of web developers unable or unwilling to encapsulate "Flash" content in a correct manner. HTML (and scripts) to allow to do it correctly. And what animated GIFs have been years ago, that's "Flash" today: a means to make web pages look ugly, overloaded with blinking, jiggling, beeping and blurring animations, oh what a joy - if you suffer from ADS. :-)

Things that are important to see should be put into a form that allows anyone to see it, or at least get a clue why it isn't possible to see. Todays browsers handle nearly any web content out of the box - you don't need an OS-specific plugin to see a PNG image or to connect to a web page that requests an SSL connection. And if your OS comes with the proper codecs, plugins and programs, you can play music files, watch movies and run Java applications. No big trouble.

In my opinion, anything that isn't entirely free (and "Flash" isn't, I'm sure we don't need to discuss this) has no place within a free (and barrier free) web. Don't get me wrong: There are places where "Flash" is a great solution, but as long as its availability is restricted, ... I think you get my idea. (A personal note: I'm living fine without "Flash" for years.)

One important argument seems to be that "Flash" hooks so deeply into the system that it cannot be implemented in an OS agnostic manner. That's poor. Even Java can run on any system. Why can't "Flash"? (I may give the answer just right now: Because it is not intended.) Should something that seems to see itself as a "standard" be allowed to decide what OS a user has to run? Thu, 01 May 2008 02:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Doc Pain) Comments RE: Since when.... http://osnews.com/thread?312303 http://osnews.com/thread?312303
was the web "NOT" proprietary? Did I miss the memo that said Real Media was open-sourced sometime in the late 90's?

Not the late '90s but RealNetworks did open source some of their stuff in the form of Helix Player and the "Helix DNA Client" in 2003. Not that I've used it much. Last time I did, it was to try to play a .rm file in Ubuntu. As is often the case with media players and .rm files in Linux, it failed. Thu, 01 May 2008 02:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (benmhall) Comments RE[2]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312309 http://osnews.com/thread?312309
Ahh, so you're proposing that we use .net and suck up to Novell.
I'd rather sell my soul to the devil than do that.
And although Adobe is just Microsoft in a different coat, it's the lesser evil right now.
So we'll see what other alternatives come up in future.
Meanwhile, let's just concentrate on hating Microsoft.


I'm proposing we use technology based on technological merit rather then some sort of distorted morality.

the CLR is an open standard. If you feel using an LGPL implementation of an open standard, written by one of the most open source friendly companies on the planet taints you in some way, our views of the world are so wildly different I don't think theres much point talking much more about it. Thu, 01 May 2008 03:18:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (google_ninja) Comments RE[3]: I would say http://osnews.com/thread?312316 http://osnews.com/thread?312316
Actionscript is a pain in the ass and the library support could be a lot deeper IMHO.


Before ActionScript3 and Flex came out I would have agreed. But things have changed quite a bit. Thu, 01 May 2008 04:57:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Matt Giacomini) Comments RE[3]: Comment by morph http://osnews.com/thread?312317 http://osnews.com/thread?312317 thanks, i was starting to feel a bit alone...

btw, can one reliably develop flash based content without some kind of tool from adobe?

i think that is the classic plan for all these systems. give away the "player", charge a fee for the "recorder"...

its been done that way in one form or other since the first realplayer plugin...Edited 2008-05-01 05:04 UTC Thu, 01 May 2008 05:04:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[3]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312318 http://osnews.com/thread?312318
MS is working with Novell to develop Moonlight, which is an OSS version of Silverlight based on mono. So I guess MS does allow alternative players.

Get your facts right.


Here are quotes from from MS:

No code has been contributed to a community under a liberal license. (As Miguel says, "Microsoft will give Novell access to the test suites for Silverlight to ensure that we have a compatible specification.") No IP has been contributed to a community under a liberal license. ("The codecs will be binary codecs, and they will only be licensed for use with Moonlight on a web browser".) Thu, 01 May 2008 05:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Matt Giacomini) Comments RE: Since when.... http://osnews.com/thread?312319 http://osnews.com/thread?312319 realplayer and quicktime got mmore or less crushed by windows media, and it would not surprise me if silverlight do the same to flash... Thu, 01 May 2008 05:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[3]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312326 http://osnews.com/thread?312326 Sorry, your OS does not support the binary-blob required to view this comment. Thu, 01 May 2008 06:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Kroc) Comments RE: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312327 http://osnews.com/thread?312327 It's not quite true that there's no open-souce equivalent. Check out JavaFX:

http://www.sun.com/software/javafx/index.jsp
https://openjfx.dev.java.net/

It's still in its relative infancy (the NetBeans plug-in is still in beta, there's no Eclipse plug-in yet, and it's interpreted-only for now, with a compiled version on the way), which probably explain why it hasn't been more extensively marketed. But it looks promising.

In combination with upcoming changes to the way the JRE is downloaded:

http://java.sun.com/developer/technicalArticles/javase/java6u10/ind...

and the fact that many Linux distros will be bundling Java by default in the near future, we might have a real open-source contender to Flash/Silverlight in the works. Thu, 01 May 2008 07:13:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Moochman) Comments what are the so called "alternative operating systems"? http://osnews.com/thread?312328 http://osnews.com/thread?312328 what are the so called "alternative operating systems"?
linux? 1%
mac? 3%
who cares? Thu, 01 May 2008 07:37:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (casuto) Comments Adobe opening up flash?! http://osnews.com/thread?312332 http://osnews.com/thread?312332 just saw this in the news:

http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/04/30/Adobe-opening-up-Flash_1.... Thu, 01 May 2008 08:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (dean_fry) Comments RE[4]: Comment by morph http://osnews.com/thread?312339 http://osnews.com/thread?312339 > btw, can one reliably develop flash based content without some kind of tool from adobe?

Adobe have open-sourced the Flex SDK, so yes, actually.

To me that seems the wrong way round. They should've opened up the Flash format and kept the authoring tools proprietary. That's where there strength is and it's a model that's been shown to work for Photoshop, Acrobat and so on.

The short-sightedness of this plan will show if people start using Silverlight, thinking that Moonlight makes it a more open format. To me, Moonlight is a disaster waiting to happen.

I support Mono because you are always in control of the apps. Banshee or F-Spot will not break because of what Microsoft or some web developer did. If Mono and .Net ever diverge, who cares?

I can't support Moonlight because you are never in control of the app/content. Someone else compiles and stores in their own server. They have free reign to change something that breaks compatibility whenever they want, as do Microsoft.

It seems that most people ever support both or neither, but there's a huge distinction there. Thu, 01 May 2008 10:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Cymro) Comments RE[4]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312352 http://osnews.com/thread?312352 I hope you know that Java faces a similar situation on new platforms as well.

Come on, you can't really expect HTML5's multimedia tags to replace Flash let alone Silverlight.

Try using it yourself before you give a handful of HTML tags feature parity with Silverlight/Flash.

Silverlight2 includes a lightweight version of the CLR, and the ability to use WPF/XAML for content presentation.

It's much more than a video player platform. Much more.

You preach these new multimedia tags, yet you fail to realize they're not supported in any incarnation of Internet Explorer. Sort of throws your cross-platform argument right out of the Window (no pun intended) doesn't it?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silverlight#Silverlight_2

Educate yourself.Edited 2008-05-01 11:04 UTC Thu, 01 May 2008 11:03:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Nelson) Comments RE[4]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312360 http://osnews.com/thread?312360 So they are helping to make sure that Moonlight is compatible. Exactly my point. By helping Novell create Moonlight, they are helping to create an alternative player. Regardless of the codecs, the player is free. Thu, 01 May 2008 11:21:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (BluenoseJake) Comments RE[4]: Comment by morph http://osnews.com/thread?312363 http://osnews.com/thread?312363
btw, can one reliably develop flash based content without some kind of tool from adobe?

Yes, even using only open-source software: http://osflash.org/ames Thu, 01 May 2008 11:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (XemonerdX) Comments RE: Adobe opening up flash?! http://osnews.com/thread?312368 http://osnews.com/thread?312368
just saw this in the news:

http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/04/30/Adobe-opening-up-Flash_1....


Looks that way.

The Open Screen Project:

http://www.adobe.com/openscreenproject/

... appears to have a bit of support. Thu, 01 May 2008 12:11:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (lemur2) Comments RE[5]: Comment by morph http://osnews.com/thread?312375 http://osnews.com/thread?312375 well i quick guess is that by keeping flash locked like they do they can sneak in new features in updates, and then release a dev tool that introduce this new feature at the same time as they announce it. any third party tools however will then have to catch up while adobe is working on new features again... Thu, 01 May 2008 13:09:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[2]: Adobe opening up flash?! http://osnews.com/thread?312376 http://osnews.com/thread?312376 well ill be...

anyone spotted some flying pigs yet? Thu, 01 May 2008 13:12:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[4]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312377 http://osnews.com/thread?312377 so they are no better then a kernel binary blob for some hardware.

heh, i would not be surprised if videos played by said blobs ended up showing a lesser quality video... Thu, 01 May 2008 13:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[5]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312400 http://osnews.com/thread?312400
so they are no better then a kernel binary blob for some hardware.

heh, i would not be surprised if videos played by said blobs ended up showing a lesser quality video...


The format has been opened up ... open for implementation by anyone.

Open source players such as swfdec - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swfdec and
gnash - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnash will benefit greatly.

IMO it won't take long and Adobe's binary blob won't be appreciably better than open source alternatives such as these. Thu, 01 May 2008 14:11:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (lemur2) Comments RE[5]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312411 http://osnews.com/thread?312411 the big question will be what format will be used for the content...

if the player cant play the content, then the player is worthless... Thu, 01 May 2008 14:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[6]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312412 http://osnews.com/thread?312412 i was specifically referring to microsoft making the codecs for silverlight available as binary only for moonlight. Thu, 01 May 2008 14:37:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[4]: Comment by morph http://osnews.com/thread?312419 http://osnews.com/thread?312419
thanks, i was starting to feel a bit alone...


Don't mind. Most who are tired to be bombarded by unusable "Flash" overloaded pages are tired to open their mouth, too. And if they do, they get modded down, because "Flash" is cool and you cannot exist without it. :-)

btw, can one reliably develop flash based content without some kind of tool from adobe?


Well, I think there are encoders that are free - for example the port swftools, p5-SWF-Builder, -Filer, sswf, vnc2swf (taken from FreeBSD's ports collection), as well as there are fre "alternatives" such as gnash or swfdec. Sadly, the last two mentioned are not 100% capable of what the OS-pedantic "Flash" players are, and furthermore, I'm not sure how good the free "Flash" encoders are - I have to admit that I'm avoiding "Flash" since I (1) didn't find any use for it and (2) the format isn't compatible to the OSes I use.

i think that is the classic plan for all these systems. give away the "player", charge a fee for the "recorder"...


Would work vice versa, too. "You need to by (insert name of application) to view this important and entertaining adverdizing content." :-)

its been done that way in one form or other since the first realplayer plugin...


Hmmm... Realplayer... I think I heared this word years ago... :-) Thu, 01 May 2008 14:48:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Doc Pain) Comments RE[2]: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312439 http://osnews.com/thread?312439 WMP on OS X sucks. You can forget about playing any DRM or WMP 10 media.

The WMV components that MS releases are next to useless. Thu, 01 May 2008 16:31:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (evangs) Comments RE[5]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312488 http://osnews.com/thread?312488 I'm educated plenty thanks; that's why I'm using HTML5 to begin with. Thu, 01 May 2008 21:35:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Kroc) Comments RE: Flash works http://osnews.com/thread?312493 http://osnews.com/thread?312493 Linux becomes more and more a copycat of Windows. It's a pity .... Thu, 01 May 2008 22:17:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Oliver) Comments RE[6]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312525 http://osnews.com/thread?312525 if it uses Windows codecs, should be fine, every distro has a way to install them Fri, 02 May 2008 00:30:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (BluenoseJake) Comments RE[6]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312526 http://osnews.com/thread?312526 That's nice but what your learning is completely irrelevant to the discussion.

What's important is what you've yet to learn, which are the fundamental differences between simple markup and multimedia platforms.

HTML5 is nice and I sincerely see it as a step forward, but it's not replacing Silverlight/Flash anytime soon. It's simply not powerful enough, and I'm not sure if it's smart for it to be.

Silverlight is as cross-platform as it gets, and it's a joy to work with. It provides superior multimedia capabilities to even flash, though I believe in later versions Flash has stepped it's game up a bit.

Binary Blobs don't always equate evil, there's a lot of good to be had from both Flash and Silverlight -- competition is healthy and it will ensure that neither makes boneheaded decisions. Fri, 02 May 2008 00:31:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Nelson) Comments RE[7]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312527 http://osnews.com/thread?312527 even if they are a lawsuit waiting to happen... Fri, 02 May 2008 00:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[2]: Flash works http://osnews.com/thread?312571 http://osnews.com/thread?312571 Linux is a Kernel, Windows is an operating system, therefore Linux couldn't be considered a copycat of Windows. Fri, 02 May 2008 14:41:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Stephen!) Comments RE[3]: A Word http://osnews.com/thread?312573 http://osnews.com/thread?312573 Windows media doesn't seem that great anyway. For example, the majority of the TV and movies that people download seems to be either DivX or Xvid.

If Windows Media was a superior format, wouldn't more people be encoding their TV and Movies to that instead? Fri, 02 May 2008 14:46:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Stephen!) Comments RE[3]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312576 http://osnews.com/thread?312576 Maybe Microsoft feels that they could never been seen to be porting Silverlight to Linux themselves, since it would undermine the "anti-Linux" attitude they seem to portray. Such as "Get The Facts", their supposed funding of SCO, the so-called patent violations etc Fri, 02 May 2008 15:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Stephen!) Comments RE[8]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312638 http://osnews.com/thread?312638 Not in places with sane IP laws. Like Canada Sat, 03 May 2008 03:27:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (BluenoseJake) Comments RE[4]: I would say http://osnews.com/thread?312643 http://osnews.com/thread?312643 Sorry, still based on ECMA, Actionscript is Flex's VBscript.

lets get some real languages on the runtime and we can talk. Sat, 03 May 2008 04:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (modmans2ndcoming) Comments RE[9]: How is silverlight worse then flash? http://osnews.com/thread?312690 http://osnews.com/thread?312690 true that, but when it comes to this kind of stuff, the world seems to revolve around the usa. Sat, 03 May 2008 14:38:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (hobgoblin) Comments RE[5]: People Use What is Available http://osnews.com/thread?312860 http://osnews.com/thread?312860 If it's on Wikipedia than it's probably kinda right, or at least a mislead consensus. But it doesn't matter, this week I'm introducing the last remaining fukced-up computer in my friendship to the free world.

And it's viral, you know? People use what is available. Mon, 05 May 2008 10:03:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (marafaka) Comments