Adobe Flash player for iPhone
- Tuesday, September 30, 2008, 18:10
- Headline, Tools Apps
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Adobe is nearly done with a version of its Flash Player for the iPhone that could be released ‘in a very short time’ if it passes Apple’s App Store screening process, an Adobe official said this week.
By Slash Lane
Speaking at the Flash On The Beach (FOTB) conference in Brighton, Sr. Director of Engineering at Adobe Systems Paul Betlem was asked by an audience member for an update on Flash support for iPhone users.
Betlem reportedly responded by saying his team is “working on Flash on the iPhone” but given that the iPhone is a closed and closely guarded system, Apple will have final say over whether the application makes its way onto the App Store.
Should Apple approve the software, it would be available “in a very short time,” Betlem added.
In March, Adobe chief executive Shantanu Narayen publicly confirmed that his engineers had begun work on a version of Flash for the iPhone. Three months later he said he was pleased with the ongoing progress. Therefore, the only new information to come from Betlem’s comments is word that the first version of the software is nearly ready for submission to Apple.
Betlem offered no further details, leaving several unanswered questions , such as how the player would function within websites given Apple’s current iPhone developer guidelines, or how it would prove useful in accessing Flash media as a standalone application.
Earlier this year, Apple chief executive Steve Jobs panned Flash on the iPhone, arguing that its fragmented architecture offered no middle ground suitable for use on his company’s mobile products.
Specifically, he said Flash Lite “is not capable of being used with the web” because it doesn’t support the same types of Flash media accessible by the traditional version of Flash player on the PC. On the otherhand, the version built for PC was dubbed a resource hog that “performs too slow to be useful” on the iPhone.
“There’s this missing product in the middle,” he said.
It remains to be seen whether Adobe’s most recent efforts are suited to fill that gap.
For more on Apple’s broader resistance to embracing Adobe’s Flash technology, please see AppleInsider’s three-part series: Flash Wars.
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Our friend Jens Chr Brynildsen, a Flash expert who maintains a number of resources for the standard including Flash Magazine, has reportedly confirmed with Adobe Systems’ senior director of engineering, Paul Betlem, that Flash is coming to the iPhone. However, Betlem says that “Apple calls the shots as to when it’ll be available.”
Brynildsen got the confirmation at an Adobe Town Hall meeting session. He reports:
“Upon a direct question from the audience, Paul Betlem for the first time publicly confirmed that Adobe is actively developing a Flash Player for Apple’s popular phone. He said (not direct quote) ‘My team is working on Flash on the iPhone, but it’s a closed platform.’ He noted that Apple makes all the decisions, so in other words, the ball is in Apple’s yard at this time. If Apple says yes, Adobe will have the player available in a very short time.”
In mid-June, Adobe’s CEO said that company already has Flash running on an iPhone emulator (presumably the same emulator included with Apple’s iPhone SDK).
As we’ve pointed out several times, Flash performance and usage is abysmal on current mobile devices that support playback. Mobile device processors–including the iPhone’s–simply aren’t fast enough to handle most Flash-laden sites. Flash Lite, the scaled-down standard designed specifically for mobile devices, is even too much for most devices, and isn’t widely used.
Will this Flash Player also work on the iTouch iPod?
I hope us iPod touch/iPhone users will able to have adobe flash player and such!!!
Could games like addictinggames be played. I hope so or I will start hating apple. I think apples is being so babyish.
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as of 12.22.09 itunes has blocked blackra1n 3.1.2, tried was unable!