iPad users and the lack of flash

by 50 replies
58
I keep on reading that the iPad doesn't run flash.

How will that effect me. Is it a big deal? Are there any situations where you wish it would run flash?

Thanks,
Adam
#off topic forum #flash #ipad #lack #users
  • All the time! However, that's just me...I like flash. I program in it and I use it a lot more than the average person. This is one reason why I didn't get an iPad or iPad 2.

    Have you looked into Android based tablets such as the Motorola XOOM or Samsung's Galaxy Tab?
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  • Yes, it will. I personally love flash, it can be used for everything from video coding to banner marketing, but sadly Apple is slowly "snuffing" out Flash even thought it might not be apparent more and more websites/company's are switching to HTML5 (Which Apple fully supports). Even thought more and more websites are moving to HTML5 for that very reason, you should still buy a tablet that does support flash. Flash is so widely spread across internet from Flash games, to video players you will only notice the difference once you don't have it.

    My personal opinion
    Regards,
    -Matt
  • As far as I know the last time I ran a new computer and intended to watch youtube it asks me to install flash. Then so does the games in facebook requires flash as well.

    Andrea
  • Only if you're trying to create flash games or flash apps will you be affected. If not, then you can just use electronic devices that have flash. In these times we have to either keep up with the current technological trends or set them ourselves.
  • Personally, I think the iPad is crippled out of the box since it cannot run Flash. All other Android and Windows devices (tablets, smart phones) will run Flash. Of course it is also on 99% of all computers.

    Steve Jobs has banned Flash from all Apple devices because he says it takes too much battery power and for others reasons. Other devices by other companies have the power to run Flash, but you only get a blue box where Flash should be with Apple.

    Many people think users should have the option to either view Flash or turn it off if you want on Apple devices, but that is not an option. There have been many suggestions that Jobs is using technology to censor the web since Flash is so ubiquitous.

    Flash is good and getting better. There is an emerging technology called HTML5 that Jobs likes and will run on all devices. However, there is a commission setting HTML5 standards, and they say the final standard being set is still a few years away.

    The Apple market seems big at 15 million iPads being sold, but so far they have no competition. Once all the new tablets are released by other companies this year, that number may seem tiny. All will run Flash except the Apple stuff, so you will have to make some decisions about that. Jobs is definitely making more work for us all by his bias against Flash.
  • Ipad owner here. I don't miss flash at all. Everything on YouTube plays fine. Almost all marketers and video sites have ipad detection enabled to serve videos. The games in the app store kill the flash games out there.

    Again...not missed at all. Even EVP 2.0 and S3FlowShield now support ipad video.
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    • Not really. Most marketers use flash videos embedded on their sites. How are the games in the app store going to kill flash games? They are only usable on apple devices, so I can't see them killing flash games anytime soon.

      I also own the ipad and get tired of seeing the "blue boxes" all around the net.
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    • I'm happy that you don't miss Flash on your iPad. However, even if you did miss it you couldn't do anything about it since Steve Job personally decided, he said, to eliminate it on all Apple devices. Many of us like Flash and that's why it is on 99% (literally) of all computers.

      Most of us would like the choice to use Flash and not have Jobs make it for us. Jobs sold 15 million iPads... he probably could have sold 30 million if the iPad could run Flash. The rest of us are waiting for tablets that aren't Flash crippled.

      There is no such thing as "iPad Video." There is only HTML5 used by iPad and others... as I mentioned, a standard that is a mish-mash right now that is not going to be formalized and released for a couple years. Since there are no HTML5 standards yet, it will be causing browser problems for years to come, and that will affect IMers.
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  • That is why I bought an Android Tablet. Lots more features for half the money. Works great.

    I got this one:
    ARCHOS

    Didn't want 3G because my Android phone turns into a wifi hotspot. No point in having to pay for service for more devices.
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    • First my rant and then my iPad and Android device reviews...

      <rant>
      Steve Jobs has not been completely honest about the reasons behind not allowing flash. It actually has nothing to do with battery life. There are other unstated market positioning reasons behind it. And for now they are not providing any additional consumer or publisher benefits by not supporting it. They are simply positioning themselves and aligning themselves and trying to bully the market. This is a strategy that has worked well for them and one that they continually employ not just in regards to flash but also in many markets where they have bullied other industries such as the Music and Magazine and Newspaper industries into playing by Apple's rules. Its interesting, frustrating, and... its just business.
      </rant>

      I own an iPad. My company has actually purchased 2 so far. I also have developed a product that serves video in both flash and html5.

      With the extensive research and development that we have done and the understanding that we have about the limitations of html5 and about the huge demand for flash based content and flash based publishing I will make this statement:

      Not having flash causes a huge impact on the usability of the ipad.

      From my own personal opinion I would say this:

      Surfing the web without flash is like surfing the web with a labotomy.

      I also own/use the Droid Incredible... I would not trade it for an iphone if someone paid me. Why? Because it has flash. Its also a slightly better phone than the iPhone.

      Now having said that... the iPad is a great device.

      Android tablets can vary widely in quality and user experience like the Galaxy which is a complete piece of junk or the Motorolla Xoom which just came out on the verizon network and which actually has a lot to offer and does compete on the same level as the iPad.

      The Xoom is heavier though than the iPad 1...

      And well the iPad 2 is a lighter device and introduces some things that the zoom brought to the table that the iPad 1 did not have such as video camera and front and rear facing cameras.

      As Tim points out below you can use your phones these days as hotspots so it may not be necessary to get the 3g plan with your tablets if you are ok with the speeds that you get on a wifi hotspot from a phone.

      So if you ask me "which device I would rather use" what would my answer be?

      The new iPad 2 is incredibly light, the iPad offers a better users experience and I believe a more stable browsing experience... but again no flash...

      The Xoom with my limited tests of it did not perform well when trying to load flash content... this was not because of the browser but was because the one that I was testing on continually had network connectivity problems for some reason when I tried to load a flash video. The web loaded fine but it killed the connection every time I tried to test on a flash video. This was probably a very limited experience and I plan on testing again.

      The Xoom browsing experience and operating system and everything about it was much more impressive than the Galaxy tab. The Xoom runs on Android 3 and is about the size of a an iPad with a great looking display...

      But its heavy. If you are going to be carrying this thing around and using it all day that may get old.

      Also if you are planning on getting 3 g compatibility you are going to need to compare the different plans ATT vs Verizon. I am not sure if Verizon has the iPad 2 or when they will get it but there are differences in price and overage costs and how they bill overages etc.

      In the end it comes down to just what you are going to be using the iPad for. I purchased a 3g one as a bonus for one of my employees. He does not care so much about flash. He uses it every day all day to listen to radio, podcasts, monitor servers, test sites, entertain himself and his kids, and he even made a voip call to his wife on it while we were at a drive through getting lunch. He loves it. He will be upgrading to the iPad 2 simply because the iPad 2 3g is lighter than his Ipad 3g.

      If its for the kids to play with, for family entertainment use, if you want to watch netflix, if you want to get access to the Apple app store, and if you are just going to consume video... then the iPad 2 will be the best choice. Its really a nice device.

      The html5 video experience does suck sometimes. There are lots of formats that do not work on html5. Its not as good as a flashplayer video experience... but for the most part it works.

      There will be video content that is not available on the iPad though.. for example rtmp and true streaming content is out. Its not supported in html5.

      If you are a flash developer, love flash sites, must have your flash... iPad wont do. Go with something like the xoom.

      For me I use the iPad every day, a little... i browse facebook, the warrior forum, and use apps...

      The one I have I purchased for testing purposes because we developed our player Transparent Video Player - h.264 Flash Video Player - html5 Video Player - Alpha Channel Video Player to deploy html5 fallback for compatibility.

      If I left the iPad at home my kids would constantly be on it watching netflix, playing angry birds, and playing other apps.

      For me the iPad was a testing necessity... its really a toy. Its something handy to have when you need quick access to view a page (not flash) or check some notifications etc. But for me it will never be the device of choice over a notebook or desktop PC.

      Its a great coffee table item. Its not a necessity... in fact I can do more on my Android phone than I can do on the iPad 1.


      • [ 2 ] Thanks
  • It's occasionally an issue, but overall I wouldn't say it has affected my experience of surfing the internet etc

    As others have said, Youtube videos play fine and I can do almost everything I normally do on the internet.

    It isn't suitable for doing any serious work though IMO, I do serious work on my PC.
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    • Unfortunately for publishers the same is not true. Html5 video has limited functions and behaviors available and some things you can do with flash... like actual rtmp streaming and direct response functions are not supported in html5.

      You cannot even auto play an html5 video on your webpage.
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  • Flash is good.
    Here's a link that was posted on WF some where..
    Thoughts on Flash

    There's new apps that provide flash on their browser. I know Skyfire for one.
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    • I haven't tried these apps personally, after almost a year of owning an iPad I've not felt it's been a big deal in terms of my user experience.

      I agree with Josh, it isn't a necessity and it doesn't take the place of a PC or a laptop.
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  • hey man, there's a web browser that actually has a pretty nice flash support, I can see videos from any website on my iPad. it's called Skyfire, you should give it a try.

    Skyfire for iPad | Skyfire
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    • While it does work with a lot of flash videos it does not work with all or "any" flash videos as you put it. This is because they transcode videos on their servers which can also be a slow process. Also other types of flash content are not supported. Cool browser... But not a good alternative to flash. Better to watch video in safari in html5 since most are supporting html5 video fallback now.
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  • I bought an Ipad 2 and was disappointed. I could not download many things, nor open them. Had to keep buying apps. I had it for less than a week and sold it on ebay for a profit on Thursday. To me its a glorified kindle with internet. Does not fit me. I am sure it may good for students and others who just browse. I wanted to be able to use it an substitute for laptop at times. It is more work, as it has no usb and you have to sync files on itunes, or use an app to upload all your files to. I will be getting an android. Looking and the Xoom or Samsung
  • I won my iPad Few weeks ago on an internet contest and I'm really happy.
    As Jesus said, all YouTube and other videos work perfectly and the AppStore games are awesome. The iPad has a great autonomy too.
    PS: I'm actually typing from it
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    • I don't have an iPad but I regularly browse the Internet with plugins disabled, which includes Flash.

      Doesn't affect me much at all. Perhaps 95-99% of the sites I visit don't use Flash or don't use Flash for anything important.

      So, I don't imagine browsing the Internet on an iPad would be any different.
  • I own an iPad and it's never been an issue for me. Can't think of a single site I visit that uses flash still.
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    • Flash? Hand me the gun and I´ll shoot it.

      Consider how much long-term damage it did for siteowners when it was the rage and everyone wanted a flash site. Probably 90% (more?) of those sites have been redisigned away from flash because in the end it limited the site potential. Big and small sites. Private and multinational corporate entities. Same story. It may have been easy to make it look good but it was equally easy to clobber the visitor with bandwidth drain and shackle them into timed sequences when all they wanted was the contact info to make a purchase.

      Complex sites required the owner to keep both a content team and a dedicated flash team and dedicated flash development tools. Flash was a conspiracy.

      It sucked. It still sucks. Kill it. :p
  • Apple is just falling behind in leaps and bounds and this is represented in their sales falling off to the android market.

    Apple sold 7.3 million iPads in the last quarter, and the device accounted for 75% of global shipments in Q4 2010, which is quite a fall from the 96% it had in Q3 2010.

    Of course they are not going broke and I would like those sales however their continuing lack of support or providing their customers with viable alternatives will hurt their business for sure.

    Not allowing their customers to choose what they want like flash has to hurt their bottom line and with Android Honeycomb about to be released they could see even a greater fall.

    Android 3.0 Platform Highlights | Android Developers

    Do you think the iphone and Ipad will give way to the android market like Mac did to the PC?

    Quentin
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    • Apple products are toys. In 5 years we'll be laughing that consumers let Apple out of their box again.

      Apple products are high quality ego-boosting art pieces for it's head narcissist. Their cell phone has been dominated in short order by Google and their PC line has had nothing really spectacular to differentiate itself from WINBoxes.
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  • I've been using an iPad for close to a year now. The lack of flash hasn't bothered me. When I do come across a flash site I use a product called Cloudbrowse. You can find it in the App store - runs flash no problem. We also recommend this to our sports and entertainment celebrities who want flash on their sites.
  • Flash does suck a lot of processor power, probably could impact battery life, though Job's fueled with Adobe seems to be the underlying factor. (Adobe had an iPad on their home page image adobe.com)

    There was a service that provided translation of flash content to iPad compatible form, I believe they shut it down after server overload problems.

    Interestingly the Flash development package can export iOS applications, now that Apple opened the store to apps created with 3rd party tools, this is handy for someone familiar with as3 but aren't up to speed with the Apple SDK, it's like creating an Adobe Air app, but it compiles native iOS code.
  • Flash is a huge downside of Apple products. It is just convenient to have it as many sites have yet to fully adopt HTML 5. It is not a deal breaker, just very annoying.

    I heard that Apple has been forced to open their system within 2 years, I'll believe it when I see it, but that may be the end of this walled garden.

    That being said, Flash is a horrid system, very slow and flaky, but it is the way of the world and there is no avoiding.
  • Flash is sooo 1985.
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    • LOL - good one.

      Technically, it wasn't even around in 1985 (you sure you aren't talking about Atari?), but you could say it's sooo 1996 since that's when it first appeared on the scene.
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  • Yeah Apple is clueless, they may surpass ExxonMobil in stock-market value this year, making Apple the most valuable company on earth.
  • Frankly, I HATE flash! OH, it is a nice product and what it ADDS it does well, but too many use iot for SIMPLE stuff! I wonder how much business they lose! BTW Flash does NOT support 64Bit Windows! I HATE going deep into a site and then seeing a message saying you have to upgrade flash, and then flash says "WE DON'T SUPPORT 64Bit"! And then I am like OH YEAH, I slipped up and ran 64 bit IE! LUCKILY, I have 32 bit software that DOES support flash, or rather that flash supports!

    Steve
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