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Adobe issues emergency Flash fix

bbc.com

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Re: Adobe issues emergency Flash fix

#41
post #36
post #3

I uninstalled Flash a few months ago and don't miss it. I mostly use Firefox, but I do keep Chrome around, so I could use Chrome's Flash if I wanted to, but I don't think I have so far. The only site I commonly visit that doesn't work is BBC News, funnily enough. It's a little annoying because it will work if I change the user agent to iPad, but instead I just don't watch BBC News videos.

I find that "click to play" works well enough. So it's always off by default, but you still have the option to make exceptions in the very rare cases where it's needed. I always wonder why is this not enabled by default in all majors browsers in fact.

My problem with click to play — which I used for a few years on Safari, Chrome, and Firefox, with extensions before it was built-in — is that your browser still reports to the website that you have Flash installed. At this point, most sites work without Flash, but only if the site thinks you don't have it. (Or, like Youtube, by requesting the HTML5 player in a setting.)

Re: Adobe issues emergency Flash fix

#42

If you don't have Click-to-play enabled for Firefox, you should, and here's how you do it: Open Firefox and navigate to about:config. You will be sarcastically warned that you about to void your warranty, just click on the “I’ll be careful, I promise!” button to move on. Now search for: plugins.click_to_play Next you need to right-click and toggle the setting so that the value is true. Once you are done restart Firef…

As I posted elsewhere in this thread, with click to play your browser still reports to the website that you have Flash installed. Sites still often don't send non-Flash content unless they thinks you don't have it installed.

Re: Adobe issues emergency Flash fix

#43
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sort of. http://www.pcworld.com/article/250455/for_flash_on_linux_chr... > Adobe and Google have now created a “Pepper” implementation of Flash Player for all x86/64 platforms supported by the Google Chrome browser, Adobe said.

To clarify, Pepper is not a rewrite of Flash. It's a browser plugin sandbox API.

And Google maintain a Pepper port of Flash.

Re: Adobe issues emergency Flash fix

#44

Love how this is posted tut-tuttingly on the BBC's website -- which went from Real Player to Flash to -- eventually -- mp4 video, but only as a last resort. (Motto: "as a public entity we've never found a proprietary format we don't love".) Indeed, I had a Realplayer One "subscription" that took me something like a year to shut off (they'd claim it was off and then keep sucking money out of my account) which I blame…

Playing devil's advocate a little: But a lot of this was down to which streaming format their media partners would sign off on (they wanted certain DRM guarantees). Real Player was the market leader in DRM-ed video, until Flash improved and took over.

Why the BBC was so keen to use DRM-ed video (and audio) escaped me. Slap a copyright notice on it and be done with it.

Re: Adobe issues emergency Flash fix

#45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Playing devil's advocate a little: But a lot of this was down to which streaming format their media partners would sign off on (they wanted certain DRM guarantees). Real Player was the market leader in DRM-ed video, until Flash improved and took over.

Why the BBC was so keen to use DRM-ed video (and audio) escaped me. Slap a copyright notice on it and be done with it.

License holders are generally to blame for forcing DRM onto consumers, not the streaming provider (based on experience working for Lovefilm.)
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