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IPhone Flash prototype got 30 min battery life

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Re: IPhone Flash prototype got 30 min battery life

#41

Post by jsz0 »

kwantam wrote: post #25
kwantam wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, this "story" smells fishy. How is it that flash works acceptably on other platforms but not the iPhone? A much more likely explanation is the one everyone has been assuming, viz., Apple doesn't want any code they haven't approved running on the phone, period.

Wow, I'm being downvoted into oblivion for observing that other mobile devices can run flash apps and pointing out that Apple keeps tight control over their platform. Neither of these are particularly controversial, as I see it. I realize that Flash is annoying, and of course I'd expect to be able to turn it off on any reasonable platform---most of the time, I really don't want it. But when I do, let me make a big-bo…

I believe the only mobile version of Flash for ARM available today is Flash Lite which is based on Flash 7. Is that really useful at all? Seems like Flash 9 is a requirement for almost every thing these days. IIRC Flash Lite isn't even a full implementation of Flash 7. I've never used it myself so I could be wrong. I don't see how useful that would actually be. When Adobe actually ships a modern mobile ARM version of Flash the issue becomes more relevant. I'm not really too keen on Flash in general so I don't mind Apple playing some politics with the iPhone to promote open web standards over proprietary Flash that has historically been an incompatible slow moving mess on just about every non-Windows platform.

Re: IPhone Flash prototype got 30 min battery life

#42

Post by ynniv »

kwantam wrote: post #38
ynniv wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Are you really under the impression that Apple is in a better position to decide whether the tradeoffs are worthwhile than I am? On my phone? Yes, I am under that impression. If Apple shipped with Flash, people would constantly complain about the battery life of the phone. I have been working on user interfaces for a couple of years now, and I can tell you that my user interface code is constantly at fault. Every s…

Flash on every device is not diversity. And Apple's walled garden does nothing to promote either diversity or interoperability. Separate your dislike of Flash from your reasoning on this subject for just a moment. What if it were Sun wanting to deploy a JVM for the iPhone? How about a .NET CLR? These certainly promote both interoperability and diversity. Now, would Apple allow them? Why not? Because they'd impact bat…

I never downvoted your comments, and do not I think that my points are fanboyism.

> And Apple's walled garden does nothing to promote either diversity or interoperability.

I want diversity of full device stacks. Many competing operating systems. Microsoft's business plan and the previously high cost of computers has convinced people that hardware and software are separate things. Apple's take is that they are not - they come together to form one device. Apple produces devices that while internally sealed, interoperate with well understood file formats like HTML, Doc, PDF, and MP3/AAC. This is better for the consumer, who honestly shouldn't care how these complicated systems work.

> What if it were Sun wanting to deploy a JVM for the iPhone?

Well thats great, they can, just like Adobe can release Flash for the iPhone [ http://labs.adobe.com/technologies/flashcs5/appsfor_iphone/ ]. The issue at hand is whether MobileSafari has a Flash plugin. I personally do not care for one, and Adobe hasn't gone the extra mile to make it compelling.

> The bottom line is, Apple's business model with respect to the App Store relies on being the only game in town.

Silly, unsubstantiated remarks aren't as interesting as they sound in your dorm room. Apple doesn't need to make any money at all from the AppStore, they're sitting on a $40b pile of gold. From what I can see, they're trying to make a great product, and everyone else who failed to do so on their own wants a piece.

Re: IPhone Flash prototype got 30 min battery life

#43

Post by [deleted] »

tjogin wrote: post #33
yumraj wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- I guess since it's on the Internet it must be true. - All the other smartphones which have Flash must have 30 min battery life. - Apple is saint and Adobe is evil. - iPhone is such an open platform.

Adobe can't even make a performant flash plugin for Mac OS X or Linux, why on god's green earth would it be any different for lesser hardware?

[deleted]

Re: IPhone Flash prototype got 30 min battery life

#44

Post by cloudwalking »

tjogin wrote: post #33
yumraj wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

- I guess since it's on the Internet it must be true. - All the other smartphones which have Flash must have 30 min battery life. - Apple is saint and Adobe is evil. - iPhone is such an open platform.

Adobe can't even make a performant flash plugin for Mac OS X or Linux, why on god's green earth would it be any different for lesser hardware?

Apple won't let Adobe make a decent Flash plugin for OS X. Apple restricts APIs that the plugin needs to run well--things like access to hardware video acceleration.

A lot of people at Adobe use Macs. A lot of people at Adobe work on Flash player. They don't just sit around screwing off all day; Flash on OS X is lousy but there isn't much they can do about it.

I don't know why Apple does it. Stability? Stubbornness? You're right though. If Apple won't let Flash player work well on OS X, they sure as hell aren't going to let it run on iPhone.

Re: IPhone Flash prototype got 30 min battery life

#45

Post by holdenk »

kwantam wrote: post #26
veemjeem wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Flash doesn't run "acceptably" on OSX or Linux. It uses around 30% of my cpu on either platform, compared to using only 3% of the cpu on my windows machine. Clearly they have some work to do before they can make flash as efficient as running on their core platform. Adobe should make flash work decently on other platforms before making one for the iphone... Running any flash app on my macbook causes the fan to turn on…

Adobe should make flash work decently on other platforms before making one for the iphone... Do you believe that this opinion both motivates and justifies Apple's refusal to allow Flash on the iPhone?

Well since the iPhone platform is similar to Apple's desktop platform, if I were Apple, before I went ahead and made concessions to Adobe I'd want to see some proof that they wouldn't mess up the user experience. So far Adobe has shown they aren't either willing or able to write quality Unix flash players.

Re: IPhone Flash prototype got 30 min battery life

#46

Post by ams6110 »

icefox wrote: post #7
X0nic wrote: post #3

For 90% of the sites that I visit, I would prefer no flash. Not to mention the battery, last thing I want is flash chewing through my battery for flash that I dont even want to see. I wouldnt mind the ability to click on a flash movie that isnt youtube, and have it launch a player.

You can install click2flash plugins on most browser that wont load the flash until you click on it.

Or do what I do, browse with all plugins disabled.

Re: IPhone Flash prototype got 30 min battery life

#47

Post by sjs »

icefox wrote: post #7
X0nic wrote: post #3

For 90% of the sites that I visit, I would prefer no flash. Not to mention the battery, last thing I want is flash chewing through my battery for flash that I dont even want to see. I wouldnt mind the ability to click on a flash movie that isnt youtube, and have it launch a player.

You can install click2flash plugins on most browser that wont load the flash until you click on it.

But there's no way Apple and Adobe will bundle it with Flash so it will remain a curiosity for geeks like us.

Re: IPhone Flash prototype got 30 min battery life

#48

Post by sjs »

nuclear_eclipse wrote: post #12
veemjeem wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Flash doesn't run "acceptably" on OSX or Linux. It uses around 30% of my cpu on either platform, compared to using only 3% of the cpu on my windows machine. Clearly they have some work to do before they can make flash as efficient as running on their core platform. Adobe should make flash work decently on other platforms before making one for the iphone... Running any flash app on my macbook causes the fan to turn on…

Wow, it only uses 30% cpu? On my Q8400 in Ubuntu, it pegs an entire core the moment flash launches...

Playing a flash video almost brings my Core Duo macbook to its knees and uses around 40% of each of my 4 cores on my hackintosh (Q9450).

Re: IPhone Flash prototype got 30 min battery life

#49

Post by ajg1977 »

viraptor wrote: post #22
ajg1977 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I call bullshit. Some of the most intensive games out there are using about 100% of the iPhones power and still get several hours of battery life. Even if the app used some pathological combination of CPU/GPU/Disk/Network resources you wouldn't get it down to 30 minutes,

How do you know it uses 100%? If it has smooth animation, it most probably doesn't. It's easy to check if you're really interested - just run a typical busy loop in your app and measure the time until it the battery runs out.

By running Instruments and profiling them. Even if I didn't it's pretty easy to spot games that are maxing out the iPhone - dropped frames, slowdown, animation glitches,

Re: IPhone Flash prototype got 30 min battery life

#50

Post by godDLL »

cloudwalking wrote: post #44
tjogin wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Adobe can't even make a performant flash plugin for Mac OS X or Linux, why on god's green earth would it be any different for lesser hardware?

Apple won't let Adobe make a decent Flash plugin for OS X. Apple restricts APIs that the plugin needs to run well--things like access to hardware video acceleration. A lot of people at Adobe use Macs. A lot of people at Adobe work on Flash player. They don't just sit around screwing off all day; Flash on OS X is lousy but there isn't much they can do about it. I don't know why Apple does it. Stability? Stubbornness?…

Please explain how OpenCL fits in with that idea.

What Adobe probably means by "restricting tech" is that Apple does not allow alternative code interpreters on their device, as to not facilitate AppStore circumvention.

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