Flash 7 for Linux Released 471
molarmass192 writes "Looks like Macromedia has finally made good on their word and provided Linux with a current version of Flash player. Improvements over Flash 6 include a speed boost and support for SOAP. Here's the requisite download link. I took a few seconds to get it set up and the response is noticeably snappier than version 6. In particular, the audio/video sync problems in version 6 seems to have been taken care of. Now, I wonder where they hid that Shockwave player for Linux?"
Now if only... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Now if only... (Score:5, Insightful)
Hate to sound like I'm trolling here, but in order to get Macromedia to make authoring tools for Linux, you guys gotta prove you're willing to buy it. All this free-software movement probably puts the taste in a lot of people's mouthes that nobody wants to spend money on software.
What about never ? (Score:3, Insightful)
This is the proprietary magic : you just don't have the control or the possibility to see them come unless Macromedia themselves choose to release one.
A simple and good reason not to use neither encourage or support this kind of proprietary, non-standard format.
Still not syncs completely (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Flash + Wine is on its way, they claim (Score:3, Insightful)
No, Seriously. . . (Score:3, Insightful)
Why would you want it?
Flash is internet pollution. (X)HTML is lighter-weight and thus faster, more accessible for people with disabilities, and just generally less crap. Plus, Google can tell you about the content of (X)HTML pages, but nothing, from Google to grep, can parse the content of a Flash movie. Flash has a nice little niche for silly animations and games, but it has become a cancer on the web as a navigation and content-presentation interface. An increase in its reach isn't something to celebrate.
i'm so happy! (Score:5, Insightful)
Now seems a good time to introduce flashblock [mozdev.org]. Very ironic, isn't it?
Re:Read the EULA? (Score:5, Insightful)
IRIX version? Open Source? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, yeah, I know, flash sucks. But sometimes you need to have it to visit certain sites. Sure beats having to fire up my PC just o look at the newest movie site.
And yes, SGIs are oldschool. But Octanes are pretty cheap on eBay and are becoming common with we hardware collectors (if you're not that type, you probably know one... house full of computers with at least one working Amiga and probably a NeXT cube too). And it makes for a great main workstation!
Re:Um, Dude (Score:3, Insightful)
It is for x86 GNU/Linux, remember that. (Score:5, Insightful)
GNU/Linux works on various platforms although the x86 port is the most common. I don't see x86 anywhere in the announcement, do you? If we had the source we had the freedom to compile it on any arch and OS we wanted to. A proprietary software package isn't a contribution to us if our goal is freedom.
Re:Please can we GNU/Linux on PPC peeps have one t (Score:2, Insightful)
How lovely (Score:1, Insightful)
Of course this isn't the only problem, trolls such as the GNAA are known to use this in their browser crashing Shock Sites [wikipedia.org]. Which force users of MSIE to end the entire process to stop the endlessly respawning windows. And this is just the tip of an iceberg of security issues.
As a result of this (and this "last measure" especially) I decided to abandon windows altogether and become another convert to *nix. So I think you can forgive me for not celebrating the porting of this pesterware to Linux, nor will I be letting it anywhere near my linux box. Regular banner ads are annoying enough thank you.
Re:Now if only... (Score:3, Insightful)
Look, the difference is that with most open enviroments, your have many ways to get the job done. On most closed systems, there's one way, the way one group of programmers decided.
The expectations are higher & the code needs to be better, more flexible and more reusable. I want to generate flash from all sorts of files and data. I want to have filters that can be piped into, and out from. I want command line and GUI options, so I can use cron and X. That's software value.
Re:Now if only... (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe they should ask Oracle whether anybody buys high quality software for Linux if they don't know. Some years ago this would have been a pretty good troll, but nowadays...?
Re:Where's the source? (Score:3, Insightful)
It's impossible that your connection to Slashdot or whatever is only accomplished through "Free" software.
Re:Flash + Wine is on its way, they claim (Score:1, Insightful)
Not only would it make the Wine project better, but it would also make most of their own programs Wine-compatible. Most of the things that make Wine incompatible with Flash right now are probably the same as the other Macromedia programs, and that would be a lot cheaper in development costs.
Re:It is for x86 GNU/Linux, remember that. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Sweet!!! (Score:2, Insightful)
I dunno. I'm not even that old; I'm 21. I've been programming since I was 9, and compared to a lot of people that's still nothing to how long they have been. Either way, I absolutely cannot stand that damn program.
How does it pay for itself?? I can understand the color coding helps, but you can get a much less bloated program to do color coding.
WYSIWYG editors for true website design are a waste.
I stand by my theory that you put up your best Dreamweaver man, and your best hand coder, and ask them to fix a problem and then see who pays for themselves.
Re:Where's the source? (Score:3, Insightful)
I suppose you never look at Macromedia's 10-Q filings and don't have stock in this company?
If you did you'd note that the concern about bankruptcy is not one listed.
At any rate, the close source of their tool which is becoming ubiquitous within the Web Communities gives Macromedia a business advantage. Why the hell would they open source this? This makes as much sense as Apple open sourcing Quartz/Quartz Extreme or QuickTime.
You don't base your company around a non-open-source model and then when you are strong give away your crown jewels of technology, just to satisfy the ideology of the open-source community.
Perhaps if they redesigned flash to leave a necessary portion open-sourced and then made money off of custom tools than we might see a change of business.
Re:Sweet!!! (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't see a reason to use it- if you have enough skill with (X)HTML/CSS, you should be able to create a webpage that takes up half the bandwidth and works on all browsers. Sure, it may take a little longer but I'd rather take the 2min to make an efficient page instead of building a hacked up one in 1min.
You, sir (madam?) are a buffoon... (Score:5, Insightful)
HTML is a lead lined cudgel with which talentless unfunny people can create their poorly designed and impossible-to-navigate websites. (or, if they're really talentless, they just ship them off to sites like geocities.com) I have personally lost count of the number of times I've had my browsing experience ruined by an annoying as hell animated gif banner ad spawning in the middle of my screen, or a homepage so slowed and crippled by dynamic HTML that I left and never returned.
I suspect most of us would agree with that to an extent, but we don't vow never to look at a webpage again.
Some Flash is very good [jolt.co.uk]. Deal with it, move on, use the appropriate browser/plugin to make Flash content optional.
Re:Now if only... (Score:4, Insightful)
It warrants repeating. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:SuSE Works (Score:3, Insightful)
My system-wide corporate deployment tool can do this, too. It's called cp and tar.
Re:Um, Dude (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Now if only... (Score:5, Insightful)
Obviously for server use it's a different story where vendors just treat Linux and a cheap UNIX and porting is easy.
I use Linux everyday and have for years, but I see no software market at all for desktop apps until things change. Compare this with almost an uncountable number of apps for Windows and Mac.
Re:mod parent up (Score:3, Insightful)
In defense of Flash. (Score:3, Insightful)
Why would you want it?
Because I happen to enjoy silly [badgerbadgerbadger.com] animations [homestarrunner.com] and games [globulos.com].
You say that as if there is something wrong with enjoying 'silly animations and games'. I do. So do many other people.
It may also be inaccessible, but every day people enjoy things that aren't globally accessible, from various forms of media and art to sports and recreation. How do you make animation accessible to those with vision difficulties?
One could write a story instead, but then you have something totally different. Hypertext has been around for decades, and text itself for millennia, and they serve their purpose. Animation serves another.
There will always be people who choose a poor method of presenting their content on the web. Even without Flash, it's still possible to have poorly-navigable sites with too many fonts, and garish colours, et cetera.
The way to solve it is not to discourage the use of Flash, as if it were inherently wrong, but to encourage and show examples of good design and presentation when Flash is not called for.
This may be a niche, but I for one am quite happy that such a niche exists, and is available to Linux users. I'd like to think that one day SVG will be a better alternative and we can all switch to that, but for now there's Flash.
If you don't like it, don't install it. But don't expect others to do the same.
Re:Now if only... (Score:1, Insightful)
i've bought more software after switching to linux and donated alot of money to GPLd software. maby i've been sucked in to some sort of cult or maby i care about other peoples work.
i agree that the market is not as big as windows' and that it can justify not to port the authoring tool, but not that linux people is a bunch of hippies who hate business.
in my opinion they better hurry before a good GPL alternative shows up.
Well... (Score:4, Insightful)
Because HTML/XML can't play movie trailers, whereas Flash's Sorenson codec, native on Linux, can?
Because unlike Java, Flash UI is responsive. unlike DHTML its actually designed for forms, and unlike ActiveX, its cross platform.
Macromedia showing lack of Linux commitment (Score:4, Insightful)
Macromedia still don't care about Linux in any meaningful fashion - wake me up when Flash 8 comes out simultaneously on Windows and Linux (Mozilla can do it with a Web browser that's 1,000 times more complex, so why not a browser plug-in?), when Shockwave Player finally appears on Linux and when Macromedia's entire Windows product range is available natively on Linux. Only then can you finally say Macromedia is taking Linux seriously - Oracle switched (albeit from Solaris)...c'mon Macromedia, make the same move...
Re:mod parent up (Score:4, Insightful)
Apparently not- or, as a greedy company, they would've done so.
This could mean one of several things:
(1) Macromedia plans for Flash players to become a profit-center in the future, maybe by licensing players to mobile-phone companies or something
(2) Macromedia profits from selling Flash-authoring tools, but those tools would be easily replaced by Open Source versions if there was a good Open Source flash player to work from.
(3) Macromedia is afraid that an Open Source flashplayer would lead to someone distributing a modified version, effectively forking the file-format and confusing web-browsers who can no longer view all flash-based content the same way.
Re:Now if only... (Score:2, Insightful)
Linux has a LOT of free software, like Windows used to have, but recently, A LOT of Windows freeware, IMO, is pretty much crap or bad, except for the stuff that's on Linux that's been ported to Windows.
Don't get me wrong, WinAmp and other software is great, but there's a lot of crap too...
Ok, I feel like I've run myself in a corner...
A little short on the badger side (Score:5, Insightful)
So to clarify:
badger badger badger badger badger badger badger badger badger badger badger Mushroom! MUSHROOM!
Matt Fahrenbacher
Shockwave player for Linux (Score:5, Insightful)
Go to the Macromedia 'wish form' [macromedia.com] and tell them you want Shockwave Player for Linux! Development over there seems to be demand-driven, so fill out the form. If they get enough requests, they might just do it.
Re:Sweet!!! (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Now if only... (Score:3, Insightful)
New products never catch on. Old products never die out. Advances in science and technology never bear real fruit.
People are all the same.
The past is identical to the future.
It's not happpened so it never well.
Re:Now if only... (Score:3, Insightful)
The future is SVG + ECMAScript. And that's an open format. Let's keep the closed, proprietary shiny objects away from Linux, eh?
Re:Now if only... (Score:5, Insightful)
Wrong. You can pipe in word documents and get a PDF (or something else) out. So yes, OO.org fits into the Unix philosophy. It also fits into the "big app that does lots" philosophy. Amazing how something can be in two groups, eh.
Re:Um, Dude (Score:3, Insightful)
No. Copyright gives them the ability to control reproduction, preparation of derivative works, distribution of copies, public performance and public display of their work. Period. If I have legally obtained a copy, I can view and experience it however, whenever, with whatever, and at whichever volume and quality I want. They can build technical barriers, but DMCA notwithstanding, those barriers are neither legally nor, in my opinion, morally binding.