Slash LaneSpeaking 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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71 Comments
No!
Nothing against Flash, but Flash is a platform for bad programmers to eat up CPU usage like crazy. My CPU (C2D) goes to close to 100% when I visit some websites. Even youtube.com requires about 800mhz to 1Ghz to play.
And I have not missed Flash a bit on iPhone.
I would like Flash support if the contents can be played by clicking on it, much like how Safari launches YouTube app. That would probably require hacking into Safari though, or Flash app having WebKit of its own (like 1Password app).
As long as you can block Flash as an option, that should be OK.
No!
Nothing against Flash, but Flash is a platform for bad programmers to eat up CPU usage like crazy. My CPU (C2D) goes to close to 100% when I visit some websites. Even youtube.com requires about 800mhz to 1Ghz to play.
And I have not missed Flash a bit on iPhone.
So, that doesn't mean that everbody else should not have the option to have it. Many of us want it. And there are bad progammers that don't use flash besides.
Well something is wrong with your computer. BRING ON FLASH!
No!
Nothing against Flash, but Flash is a platform for bad programmers to eat up CPU usage like crazy. My CPU (C2D) goes to close to 100% when I visit some websites. Even youtube.com requires about 800mhz to 1Ghz to play.
And I have not missed Flash a bit on iPhone.