Adobe: No Linux Flash Player Till 2007

Question

see
http://www.crn.com/sections/custom/custom.jhtml?articleId=192501179
>>
Adobe: No Linux Flash Player Till 2007
By Stacy Cowley, CRN
2:25 PM EDT Fri. Sep. 01, 2006
Impatient Linux users will have to wait till the end of the
year for even a
preview release of Adobe's Flash Player 9.
The company's lead Flash for Linux engineer, Mike Melanson ,
reported this
week in his blog that Adobe won't release any alpha versions
of its Flash
port, holding out instead for a full-featured beta scheduled
for release
sometime late this year.
Adobe recently released a major Flash overhaul, version 9,
for Windows and
Macintosh clients. For Linux users, the release lengthened
the Flash gap
between them and other users: Adobe skipped Flash Player 8
for Linux and
hasn't released a Linux update since mid-2004. Because Flash
is not fully
backward-compatible, Web content developed for the newer
Flash players often
won't run in version 7, the most current Linux version.
Adobe's market
research shows that 86 percent of U.S. computer users are
able to view Flash
8 content.
"I have to question a cross-platform strategy that has a bias
against one
platform," RedMonk analyst Stephen O'Grady, a Linux user,
gripped in his
blog. The lack of a modern Flash player leaves him unable to
view content on
a number of Web sites, including major destinations like
ESPN.com.
An Adobe spokesman said the company expects a full release of
Flash Player 9
for Linux in early 2007. Because of the "short" cycle between
Flash Player 8
and 9 -- ten months -- Adobe opted to skip version 8 for
Linux and move
directly to version 9, he said.
Melanson's blog tracks the day-to-day progress and decisions
Adobe is making
on Flash for Linux. A full-time Linux user since 1999,
Melanson shares the
frustration of his comrades about Adobe's Linux lag.
"In September, 2005, I happened [across a blog that]
mentioned in passing
that Macromedia was looking for someone to port Flash Player
to Linux. I
applied for the job and now here I am," he posted.
"When I started at Adobe, I found out that there is a shadow
cabal of
engineers that very much want to see the current Flash Player
run on Linux,
and would even try their hand with the current codebase from
time to time.
But there are only so many hacking hours in the day."
>>

Answer 1

> It sounds to like Adobe are using outdated development
practices.
> The kinds of systems multiplatform developers use these
days
That's the point .. 'these days'.
Much of the problem is older code, must be over a decade old
now) which was
not well written. That is not an uncommon occurence in
products that have
such a long existence as flash player. Supported platforms,
development
techniques, developer guidelines, management etc all change
over the years
and things that seemed 'a good idea at the time' end up
becoming a problem.
In hindsight there would be many things that should have been
done
differently in the past .. but without a working time-machine
that cannot be
fixed, without an enormous investment in development to
rewrite the code
base in a manner that can be more easily ported .. which is
what is
happening.
Also the low level optimisations required for such
cpu-intense real-time
graphic processing are difficult to port, as they rely on
optimised assembly
code for different cpus and chipsets
And further there is the issue of different operating systems
and libraries
to link against on different platforms.
> nightly/daily automated builds
Anyone who thinks supporting new platforms its just a matter
of re-building
or doing daily builds is naive. There is no indication that
Adboe does not
make use of these practices. But continuous integration and
nightly builds
are only tools to maintain a port once it is done .. it
doesn't help you DO
the port in the first place.
> From a marketing point of view you want a simultaneous
release on all
> platforms
I'm sure Adobe DO want simulataneous release .. if it were
possible. But
that is not possible if the software is not ported to all the
platforms.
With it ported to the platforms the vast majority of people
use (windows and
mac) it makes sense to release the newer versions that are
required in order
to release other major revenue-earning products like Flex.
That is a valid
and sound marketting and financial decision.
> In the case where assembly
> programming is used compiler intrinsics are more
maintainable and portable
> than
> inline assembly, I can vouch for their high performance
vs hand tuned
> assembly.
You simply cannot get the performance demanded using
intrinsics.
> Note that Apple uses gcc and Linux uses gcc and so I
can't see many
> incompatibilities at the compiler tools level?
> Maybe it is lack of experience
> with Linux, or maybe there have been lots of programmers
leaving since
> Adobe
> took over?
It may be worth your while reading the blogs by the adobe
developers where
they discuss the issues and get feedback from people such as
yourself.
> On the subject of buisness priorities, the number one is
that the customer
> comes first.
Exactly .. so MM/Adobe got the player out as quickly as
possible for the
majority of their customers. Making EVERYONE have to wait
while the player
was ported to all the other minority platforms would NOT have
been good for
the majority.
As they say .. you can't please all the people all the time.
You have to
pick you battles.
> In particular where websites are concerned you want to
get access
> to as many users as possible.
Exactly .. and FlashPlayer penetration and usage stats reveal
that it IS
availble to the vast majority of users and moreso than most
other
multi-media technologies
> The quoted 86 percent of users able to view flash 8
content is probably
> an over estimate and this figure is only stated for the
US
> as most of work in a global marketplace these days
figures like this are
> not very usefull.
Have you even looked at all the figures (which you don't seem
to believe
anyway) .. its worldwide and broken down into regions.
> The internet is all about maximising your potential
customer
> base and anything which prevents a siginificant minority
just makes no
> buisness
> sense at all.
Its only significant when you are part of it :) The vast
majority of
people, and those with the money to spend, are using Windows
and Mac.
That's where the customer base is.
> The bad publicity that Adobe has generated from
delaying/canning
> a Linux version of flash player is cumulative and the
internet is all
> about
> word of mouth. I hope for Adobe's sake they don't
neglect their customers
> needs
> in future.
I'm sure they won't .. which is why they are still activly
porting to other
platforms.
I would much rather see them take the time to do it right,
rather than let
quality slip in order to rush out a half-done product to
satisfy the demands
of the few.
Jeckyl