Steve Jobs calls Flash a 'CPU hog' in meeting with WSJ - rumor - Page 5

I agree, flash sucks.

ClickToFlash saved my life.

outside of video, Flash really hasn't changed since the days of a 800Mhz cpu and 256MB Ram on a windows 2000 or Mac os9/SX10.1 laptop. Most cell phones now have that horse power of those old ass PCs and if the video its self can be played by the phones hardware, then the flash encapsulation is not a big deal.

Lets face it, it plays annoying ads and uses action script to disguise IE generated pop outs to look like Symantec AV windows so hyjackware can jump in, it is the nut cancer of the internet and if Mr Jobs can kill it, he will have the eternal gratitude of this guy who makes his living supporting and deploying Windows in huge corporations.

edit to be more specific about my claim: the actionscripts just make the windows look like a stand alone app. a link within the app calls an Activex script to install the malware payload. But other than huklu, thats the only real innovative use of flash ive ever seen, Can some one show me an example of flash making information easier to access and not just hiding the information behind visual noise that isnt needed?

Maybe he read this:

http://finance.yahoo.com/banking-bud...d=bb-budgeting

When is that vacation occurring that we keep hearing about every other post?
I guess he can't travel with that eMac he uses that can't play flash!

Wrong. Flash worked back in the old days on the 225 Mhz 604e. The problem is that Flash has not progressed at it's core in 10+ years. Steve is right, it is a processor hog. Because it is old technology. Like the floppy disk. And Apple was the leader in killing that worthless technology, just as they will be in killing Flash.

I don't know why you're bothering to argue with these guys. Almost everyone on this thread is just a troll or a hater and you are arguing with three at once.

While I admire the effort, it's not likely that the likes of "Angus Young," "DaHarder," "extremeskater," "grking," "teckstud" or "TEKSTUD" will ever change their spots. These guys only come here when there is some sh*t to spread, or someone to laugh at. They are all exclusively concerned only with their own flapping gums and none of them could argue their way out of a paper bag. Most of them have no experience in the field, no knowledge of what they speak and certainly nothing new to say IMO.

Total waste of time arguing with those guys.

Then why the hell is there and entire site, if not multiple sites saying the exact opposite and showing evidence the opposite is true?

For the record, Steve Jobs is not exactly a saint, but he is more than correct when it comes to adobe. They are one trick ponies remembering those good ol high school days when they got high in the garage, rather than making something new, or even fixing what they got.

You're absolutely right, but I'm stuck waiting for a flight and pushing the ignorant TSA's buttons isn't exactly a smart move, so I'll push the buttons of even less perspicacious people.

I don't care how much money you have, you are behaving like a troll and all we have to go on is your behaviour so ... ipso-facto you're a troll as far as I'm concerned.

Even if I agree with your assertions about the performance of iTunes on Windows (I don't, I think you are wildly exaggerating, and I think there is ample evidence out there that you are), there is a huge logical flaw in your assertion that iTunes on Windows is essentially the same situation as Flash on the web. I'm not going to point it out to you because it's so f*cking obvious. If you don't see it, then you are really not the computer genius you are making yourself out to be are you?

Whatever "qualifications" or credibility you think you have, all I've seen from you so far, is that you come here when there is a contentious issue like this and just dump all over everyone who doesn't agree with you in a very aggressive fashion. You don't engage others in debate, and you always think you are 100% right and never back down even when it's obvious you are not. You also make many provocative posts that are basically just insults.

So even if you are some rich fancy-pants in real life with some expensive "lab" that you own ... here, you are still just a disagreeable troll poster revelling in what you perceive as Apple's failures and doing nothing constructive.

Take a long look in the mirror, Troll.

It's about time someone called out Flash for being the crash-prone, bandwidth and resource wasting bane of the Internet that it is. 99% of Flash is used for insipid advertisements that I don't want clogging my system and and don't want to pay for. On the rare occasions that Safari hangs, it's due to Flash. Flash also completely crashes Firefox on both my Macs and PCs. Bang, crash, sorry but Firefox has experienced a problem. Firefox isn't easy to bring down but Flash does it with ease, to the point that my IT department is on the verge of blocking Flash plug-ins completely.

Sure Flash advertisements are slick-looking... oooh look at the nice flowy, spinny graphics and fuzzy fade ins. Wow aren't those Flash animators clever. They scream LOOK AT ME!!!! Who wants that garbage?

Flash adverts are nothing but Web narcissism - when's the last time you've clicked on a Flash advert that grabbed your attention anyway? Google gets it - clean, simple ads that actually work. All Flash has done is to steer me away from web sites that use too much of it.

Flash is the graffiti of the Internet. It's visual and resource-environmental pollution. The faster it disappears, the better off we'll all be.

I still can't believe Steve Jobs actually had the chutzpah to go the Wall Street Journal and troll them to get rid of Flash. As if they would care that less then 10% of users can't utilize their content and that they should change it for them.
And it's hysterical he got Punk'd by that WSJ reporter for his trolling!

However, Steve is right. Flash is a CPU hog.

This isn't an Apple-Adobe thing. The Mozilla folks dumped Flash support shortly before releasing Firefox Mobile for Maemo.

Flash sucks. Not just Flash on Mac OS X. Not just Flash on iPhone OS. Flash sucks pretty much all around, regardless of platform.

You're right. You're not a programmer. The messaging systems between the XNU Kernel and the traditional monolithic based Linux Kernel are different.

However, this is the least of the issues.

The APIs in OS X are mature and Adobe knows what they are, but they refuse to fork and make a 64 bit clean solution until they have no choice.

Linux ABI has been in flux for 10 years. Adobe spent the past 5 years whining about it to the point that on the Penguin.SWF blog even Linux Developers are sick of reading about the excuses that it's hard to develop for OS X and Linux.

I think this sums up what I was going to say and totally agree. I read all the discussions thread and certain people (mentioned above) only post , when have a negative opinion on Apple. Please I not saying Apple is all GREAT and glorious, but do not post like everything is the opposite as well.


P.S. You forgot iGenius

[CENTER]The issue with this little tirade/temper tantrum is that...

It appears that anyone who does not completely and unquestioningly conform to some fan(atically) Apple ideal is automatically labeled a 'troll' in this forum, when it's really just case of those who have elected themselves the AI Elite being intollerant of opinions different than their own.

Some see issues with the manner in which both Apple and Adobe are behaving regarding Flash, and are posting opinions accordingly.

If the aforementioned opinions/posts are so troubling to you, then there's always the [IGNORE] option.[/CENTER]

When Steve Jobs is angry, outcome is not good.

Microsoft crossed SJ and Apple targeted it for some years. Now, MS is irrelevant. MS is only dominant on Desktop market but cannot penetrate any other market. Apple killed MS's other businesses.

Now, Apple can divert its resources to handle Adobe. Adobe used to ignore the Mac but Apple could do nothing because it was fighting a World War with MS and need 110% of its resources. Given that MS is no more relevant, Apple can divert its attention to Adobe now.

Adobe could have treated Apple better in the past and SJ would have embraced it. But that is not the case. Now, Adobe has to face the consequences for offending SJ.

Any other company who still treat Mac like dirt, such as AutoCad, beware.

Good luck with Adobe.

Yet everyday the AI elite see FLASH up and running on AI itself!

And if extremeskater would have written, "The rest of the world couldn't care less" it would even be correct!
As written, the rest of the world does care somewhat because they have to care somewhat in order to care less than they do now

Not sure where he was going on vacation but I think they sent him back. They didn't want him either.

Sublime demo looks interesting. But when I went to see the CPU load, I was surprised to see it in the 110% to 140% range on both Firefox and Safari on G5. That's not much better than Flash!

Recipe for success.

Tek, why are you here? Every quarter Apple proves you wrong.

You are entitled to your opinion.


What would that evidence be. My iTunes music collection is a little over 400 GB, on an external drive. Under Mac OSX, it loads pretty quickly. On my wife's laptop, under Windows 7, it takes several minutes to load. I switched my wife over to SongBird and it loads about as quickly as iTunes under Mac. YMMV.



You need to read the whole thing. The original poster wanted to eliminate software based on three criteria proprietary, closed and a hog. Those were the sole reasons he gave for eliminating software and closing the company. Whether the software was a program or a web plug in is irrelevant. The poster stated that the software should "die" for those three reasons. He is entitled to his opinion, but if those are the sole criteria for eliminating software from existence, then a lot of software should go.


I never claimed to have any "qualifications" or credibility. I even said I was not a programmer. I asked a series of questions, largely prompted by statements such as those above, that Flash should be removed from existence, pretty much because it does not run well on Macs.



Show me a post of mine where I have "dumped", insulted, or called anyone a name.



What is provocative about asking someone to justify their statements? the only context in which that is provocative is where there is an official dogma that has to be maintained, not unlike Stalinist Russia, Maoist China, or Cambodia under Pol Pot. Again, show me where I have insulted anyone.


All I can say to this is that Freud would have a field day with this. Where in the world did you get the idea that I was a rich fancy-pants? Academics does not pay particularly well, so rich couldn't be further from the truth.

My lab is not terribly expensive in the grand scheme of things. It is rather on the small side.

Show me a post where I said that Apple failed at anything. I simply asked why Flash should be removed from the face of the Earth, and the company closed. Again, the only way your assertion is even remotely correct is if one assumes that there is a dogma that Apple is infallible, and that the computer industry should do whatever Steve Jobs says.

I asked why it was Adobe's responsibility to either (1) Fold the tent and close their business, or (2) Spend the time and effort to fix it.

YMMV, but in my experience, Flash on Firefox on my Mac has never crashed. It takes a lot of CPU cycles and the Mac heats up, but then again, the same thing happens with FSL and Matlab. Flash on Safari on a Mac crashes. Flash on a Windows 7 Dell XPS laptop runs fine, no real increase in heat, and not that much of a hog. So, given my experience, Flash is not that bad, and yet people here want it gone, they want web sites to spend millions of dollars and countless number of man hours to recode in HTML 5, whose standards will not be finalized for another 10 years.

So, given that situation it is reasonable to ask, why should Adobe be closed.

Flash is a piece of... hey, perhaps this is one of those rare situations where we ought to give kudos to Microsoft? If open standards don't spook Adobe into remaking flash, Microsoft eating some of Adobe's pie with Silverlight just might. I've found Silverlight to be fast and reliable. I know, Microsoft, but let's give credit where credit is do.

And if Adobe fixes Flash, well shoot, that should be enough to gain access to the iPad. Look, as much as it often seems otherwise, Flash isn't all about simple animations that add nothing to a website. It's Flash games that have me worried, as for some inexplicable reason, a good half of my family is addicted to Flash games and this addiction is sure to factor into their iPad assessments.

My mom and Farmville, an evil game. It is also one that does a number to her late 2006 2GHz Intel Core 2 Duo MacBook. I often wonder, is this really the same lady who was so very adamant that I not play as many NES games as I did? I also wonder, who does she blame for a slow MacBook, Apple or Adobe? I haven't had the courage to ask, but I fear it isn't Adobe.

There are five pages here but I don't recall anyone saying that Adobe "should be closed". Closed by whom? The claim was that Adobe should have fixed Flash on the Mac a long time ago and that now the demise of Flash is to be welcomed, for the reasons that you mentioned. Personally I would like to see Adobe thrive by becoming a much, much better company

There are numerous posts in this thread stating that Flash should "die", be gone, gotten rid of, etc. Adobe was a mistyping on my part, I meant Flash.

What got me called a troll was when I questioned LukeSkyMac's assertion that Flash should "die" because it was proprietary, closed and a hog.

People need to think about the consequences of their statements and the consequences of eliminating flash are apparently pretty significant.

Wanting Flash gone means that all those sites that currently run flash have to be recoded, because Flash will no longer be around. This will cost huge amounts of money, and man hours, and potentially be highly disruptive.

The HTML 5 demo is nice, but since the standards have not been set, I am not confident that different browsers, companies, etc. will implement it in a consistent manner, which will be disruptive to the surfing experience.

Is Flash perfect, no. Could it be better, yes. But calls for the elimination of entire set of software tools that are used to deliver approximate 75% of the video, and a huge portion of the free games on the internet, because it is not perfect on a Mac, is a bit extreme, especially when there is no clean replacement.

Interesting post. In my view, Adobe is solely to blame for the poor performance of Flash on the Macintosh. After all, it's their software. Some will blame Apple's "small" marketshare as the reason, but that is only the reason why Adobe hasn't invested the resources to fix it, not the reason that it sucks. The reason it sucks is that Adobe hasn't placed enough value in the Macintosh market to fix it.

How's that working for them now?

As to your comment about Silverlight.. Ummm, maybe that's proof that there's no good reason that Flash is so terrible on the Mac? More generally, I have no love for Flash or Silverlight. Why is it that in 2010, we are enslaved by proprietary technologies for delivery of multimedia content over the web?

It's nonsense.

Flash exists because it was the answer to a problem that no longer exists, or conversely, a problem that only exists because unscrupulous companies want to own things that should be publicly accessible. The internet should not be shackled to unnecessary proprietary solutions. What began as a solution has turned into a problem.

Bottom line: Adobe, nor Microsoft, deserve to have any kind of monopoly on internet delivery of multimedia. They both have proven their lack of worth, Microsoft by a judge's decision, and Adobe through their own incompetence.

Farmville. That's a whole 'nother story unto itself. I would suppose that Flash games like Farmville are possibly a reason for Flash to survive. It's not an area that I really care about that much. I'm way more concerned about the importance of multimedia content delivery over the internet, which can be handled very well by emerging open standards. I really don't know if there is a suitable alternative way to develop Flash type games. Don't really care either, but I'm really not a crusader for the death of Adobe. I'm a crusader for the death of Flash as the preferred method for delivering multimedia content over the internet. As for Flash games though, isn't it really in Adobe's interest to make sure that Flash runs well on the Macintosh, considering Apple's regained significance?

I'm just sayin'..

Overall an excellent post, and very well put. However, if Adobe made the decision that Mac was not worth the effort, is that a reason to kill it off if it runs reasonably well on other systems, and given my wife's experience, it seems to work just fine on Windows 7. Or is much of this just sour grapes, so to speak.



Well said, which is why I use open source when possible - OpenOffice, Miro, Addium, etc. But this applies to all companies, and not just Adobe or MS, nor should it apply only to the internet.



Again, well said, and you are entitled to your opinion. But the question you raised, has to be answered. What about all those people addicted to Flash games (and my daughter is one of them). If Flash were to "die" as many people here want, all those "millions?" of other people would be denied their entertainment, at least until an alternative were found.

I totally agree with you. Those guys are all in my ignore list. There's no point to waste time arguing with those trolls.

Don't forget sharing all your contacts via Buzz, which you apparently have to opt out of.


To all the trolls having the most marvellous experiences ever with Firefox and Flash, explain this:-

From the release notes of Firefox for Maemo:-


Source

Steve Jobs is 100% correct on this matter, Adobe Flash™ IS A CPU HOG especially on anything that isn't running Windows.

It's up to Adobe to fix it or they will get rolled off to the side like Real Player.

Since HTML5 is just adding another tag for video, similar to showing a JPG, it's actually just as easy as the "embedded" tag. Rather hard to screw up I would think. The Canvas tag could add some difficulty though(???)

The sample code from the Sublime Video:
<div id='video_wrap'>
<video class='sublime' height='255' poster='http://assets3.jilion.com/02182010172704/images/embed/sublime/video/poster.jpg?1266510394' width='600'>
<source title='http://medias.jilion.com/sublimevideo/dartmoor.mov' type='video/mp4' />
<source title='http://medias.jilion.com/sublimevideo/dartmoor.mp4' type='video/mp4' />
<source title='http://medias.jilion.com/sublimevideo/dartmoor.ogv' type='video/ogg' />
</video>
</div>

I also don't understand why in this day and age, that you need a plug-in to show video or multimedia.

Selection lists are FAR easier with static code or Java/AJAX code.

As for games... that will be taken care of with Flash CS5 being able to port the code as a properly coded APP. I expect that Farmville will be one of the first to jump on that train... if they're that popular(?)

The only thing left, is what to do about ads. I say, leave 'em static as in JPGs or animated GIFs. Regardless, I will do my best to block 'em...even though I'm in the industry. Unfortunately, I have a very slow internet connection.

PS. As I understand it, the main concern happens to be with Hulu (for the Americans) being able to play on the iPod (similar to the American only service of Pandora Radio not multi-tasking). Hulu has already announced that they are working on an app for Apple's i-devices. But for other sites out there, where is the problem of breaking up say, a TV show into parts/slices... and then using a Java rotating script to throw in the video ads in between? This is the old school way with JPGs, so I can't imagine that this would not be available using the "video" tag.

I should note, that I can't use Hulu to know how they subsidize their service. If I understand it, they use Flash overlays for ads...?

HTML5 is currently a CPU hog too. I don't think Canvas content is hardware accelerated yet so when adverts come on that can't be blocked by say ClickToFlash, there will be a whole other group of people complaining about HTML5.

Flash is of course buggy and slow and the support for HTML5 isn't complete yet and I believe HTML5 will certainly get better implementations that are more efficient for the CPU but there will always be people who don't know how to use it and will drop high resolution 1MB+ image content into a dynamic animation and it will slow the machine down.

Flash did cause most of my browser crashes and I can't in fact remember the last time Safari crashed since I've had Flash blocked - hopefully HTML5 won't have similar issues. I agree with the decision not to support it, it's just a shame that Apple always has to be the one to drop support for things before the industry wakes up and makes some changes.


This I find really dubious. Are they trying to convince us that this is the first of them hearing about these problems? Flash on the Mac has always been poor and they've had over a decade to do something about it but chose not to. All improvements like hardware acceleration always go into the Windows version first. This is anti-competitive as it's software that large companies rely on to deliver content but for platforms other than Windows, companies have to wait on Adobe building some unoptimized makeshift plugin.

The one thing Flash did right was offer a solution to the limitations in the HTML spec and that's really why it exists in the first place. If anyone should be called lazy, it's the HTML spec developers. It's 2010 and there's still no support for multiple uploads and we're only now getting vector animation and cross-platform video. Why wasn't this introduced 5 years ago or when Youtube was introduced? Youtube has grown our dependence on Flash considerably.

1) I made it a little clearer for those not familiar with HTML formatting.

<div id='video_wrap'>
. . . <video class='sublime' height='255' poster='/path/poster.jpg' width='600'>
. . . . . . . . <source title='/path/filename.mov' type='video/mp4' />
. . . . . . . . <source title='/path/filename.mp4' type='video/mp4' />
. . . . . . . . <source title='/path/filename.ogv' type='video/ogg' />
. . . </video>
</div> 2) The HTML is simple, but the controller is certain a lot of clever code. The good thing is once it's been worked out it won't have to be reinvented again. As i'm sure you know, the Sublime video can do full screen with the latest WebKit builds. I have no idea what changed in WebKit to allow that feature

3) Some Canvas demos aren't processor intensive while other are. It's hard to tell if it's too early in its development o be coded efficiently for complex effects or if it's just poor coding. Either way, it holds a lot of promise for the future.

4) I think Mozilla is going to eventually fold on supporting H.264, but before that I think Firefox will get a plug-in for H.264. H.264 and HTML5 video tag are hear to stay.

5) The games are an interesting argument for Flash on the iPhone since most games won't play without a mouse and/or keyboard. Adobe's SDK to convert them to iPhone apps is pretty cool and I'm surprised Adobe jumped on that so quickly.

6) In a few years we might start seeing Canvas replace Flash ads, perhaps even on all these mobile devices running WebKit. I fear what that will do to system resources.

That is a valid point and I think Canvas will be the new Flash eventually, but there a few things that will likely minimize its impact... hopeful. By the time Canvas gains any traction on the internet WebGL will likely be entrenched in browsers, mobile devices will considerably more powerful by then, and it will hopefully be much more efficient than it is now.

Not when you come here on an iPhone.

The blank boxes click to flash presents on my MacBook are quite good, you see any webmaster worth their salt will be watching for ad blockers such as "Click to Flash" and when advertisers get wind of their ads not being seen, then they will start asking for alternatives so their ads are noticed.

The same goes for Flash based sites, if I was an advertiser, spending money to support such a site I would like to know how many visitors come along, load nothing and then leave.

If you aren't watching such stats you're throwing money away.

Savvy web developers will be prepared for this with alternatives and ever so slowly Adobe's little empire will crumble.

I'm having a hard time understanding why you are arguing what you are arguing if you are not just trolling and I'm trying hard to be sympathetic here. Look at it this way: everyone could see six years ago at the least that mobile computing was the way of the future. For the last three years, at the very least, it has been clear that Apple would be a major player in this mobile computing future. But all this time Adobe have sat on their hands and done nothing to improve Flash nothing to improve Flash on the Mac even on conventional laptops and desktops. Just nothing. Apple have done the only thing they can do in this circumstance they have shut Flash out of the iPad and iPhone. Mac users are understandably angry at this treatment from Adobe and look forward to the day when this will no longer be a problem: the demise of Flash on the web. In the midst of this you front up and defend this lazy-ass Adobe with the argument that they aren't obliged to make Flash work well on the mac because there just aren't enough Macs to make it worth their while. So it is ok as far as you are concerned for Adobe to degrade the experience of Mac users, and maybe try to drive the company out of business by making their computers not work on a large number of web sites, but is not ok for Mac users to wish that this plug-in be relegated to the dust-bin and be replaced across the web with something non-proprietary. Don't you see the screwiness of your own logic?

You are like the spectator on a fight who has stood by and watched one guy get pummeled for years by the other guy and then when the underdog throws a decisive punch back suddenly yells out "Hey no fair, that guy is nice to my wife!"

Just stand back from this for a minute and you can see where the calls of "troll" are coming from.

bingo
f..flash

I'm thinking Apple should launch a Flash studio clone for HTML5 then, something that can do animations, maybe compile into html5, css3, javascript/jquery, json encoded animation paths.

Well, given that mobile devices are the future of computing (whether or not you care to admit it), you've just more or less proved SJ's alleged point.

OTOH Snow Leopard is a perfect example of a piece of software that simultaneously gets more efficient as it gets faster, something that Flash has never done, at least on a Mac.

I think it's hard to compare Flash directly to HTML 5 except in regard to video. They do things differently, and as I understand it, Flash can do a lot of things programatically that a markup language just can't do. That said, I've always enjoyed my browsing experience on my iPhone. I actually think the whole issue may be partially due to Steve's desire for things to "just work" and the way a Flash UI would respond to touch, as I recently blogged about here:

http://www.whatthehellisappledoing.c...so-flashy.html