Adobe to end new Android Flash installs on August 15

Posted:
in General Discussion edited January 2014
Adobe's mobile Flash days are now numbered, as the company has announced that it will no longer accept new Flash Player installations through the Google Play application store after August 15 and will not support the upcoming 4.1 Jelly Bean version of Android.

Following up on the announcement last November that it was discontinuing development of Flash for mobile browsers, Adobe published (via The Verge) a blog post on Thursday detailing deprecated support for the player on Android.

"Beginning August 15th we will use the configuration settings in the Google Play Store to limit continued access to Flash Player updates to only those devices that have Flash Player already installed," the post read.

Adobe also said that there will not be any Flash-certified Android 4.1 devices. Though in the past unsupported devices were sometimes able to get Flash Player working, the company said that this is "no longer going to be the case" because it has not developed or tested the player for the upcoming version of Android and its browsers.

Adobe Flash on Android
Adobe Flash Android screenshot. Source: Google Play


Android users who want to keep running Flash as legacy software will need to download and install Flash before the August 15th deadline. Adobe also recommends that they stay on Android 4.0, as Flash Player on 4.1 Jelly Bean could exhibit "unpredictable behavior."

"We recommend uninstalling Flash Player on devices which have been upgraded to Android 4.1," the company wrote.

Last year, an Adobe manager put part of the blame on Apple for the demise of mobile Flash. Mike Chambers acknowledged that the software would never reach "anywhere near the ubiquity" of its install base on desktops because Apple would not allow Flash Player in the iOS browser.

"No matter what we did, the Flash Player was not going to be available on Apple?s iOS anytime in the foreseeable future," he said.

Late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs set off an intense debate about the merits of Flash in 2010 with his open letter criticizing the format as outdated and needlessly proprietary.

Android makers decided early on to advertise Flash as a differentiating feature of their devices as compared to Apple's own. The move ultimately backfired on companies like Motorola, as Flash support ended up being postponed due to technical issues.

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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 78
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    "But… But how will we have the REAL web without Flash?!

    How… how will we feel superior to everyone else?!"

    And on another note, how much longer does everyone think we'll even have Flash for desktops? 2015?
  • Reply 2 of 78
    markbyrnmarkbyrn Posts: 661member
    So Adobe is blaming Apple for removing Flash from Android devices? Didn't Google just get through telling us there's 1 million daily activations? Now Adobe, even if Apple doesn't want your flash mess, why would you decline the opportunity to include Flash on hundreds of millions of Android devices? I'll tell you why - it performs like crap regardless of the mobile platform, and you finally raised the white flag of surrender.
  • Reply 3 of 78
    sr2012sr2012 Posts: 896member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post



    "But… But how will we have the REAL web without Flash?!

    How… how will we feel superior to everyone else?!"

    And on another note, how much longer does everyone think we'll even have Flash for desktops? 2015?


     


    Bloody amazing. Just watching the recently released All Things D full Steve Jobs interviews. 110% Vindication for Steve.


     


    So sad he wasn't around to see it. Ah well, I guess Buddha and Moses are enjoying their iPads. 


     


    Steve:


     


    "The problem with humans was that you didn't make them user-friendly enough"


    "So, let's create an entire sentient race that's insanely great..."
  • Reply 4 of 78
    sr2012sr2012 Posts: 896member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by markbyrn View Post



    So Adobe is blaming Apple for removing Flash from Android devices? Didn't Google just get through telling us there's 1 million daily activations? Now Adobe, even if Apple doesn't want your flash mess, why would you decline the opportunity to include Flash on hundreds of millions of Android devices? I'll tell you why - it performs like crap regardless of the mobile platform, and you finally raised the white flag of surrender.


     


    It's hilarious isn't it. Android is arguably the most popular mobile platform ~of all time~ and Flash on Android had, oh, I don't know, about five years? (Not including Apple asking them to come back with something decent for iOS).


     


    And Flash on Android... Why doesn't it work? Or does it? Or does anyone care? Why are most people still on Android 2 and not ICS? Why is this such a cluster****?

  • Reply 5 of 78
    gregoriusmgregoriusm Posts: 513member


    And so it comes to pass.

  • Reply 6 of 78
    aizmovaizmov Posts: 989member
    Excellent
  • Reply 7 of 78
    flabberflabber Posts: 100member


    All I can say… "well whaddaya know. neeever saw this one coming".

  • Reply 8 of 78
    And justice prevaile's again.
  • Reply 9 of 78
    sflocalsflocal Posts: 6,090member
    Well, the Flash jockeys infesting AI are nowhere to be found. Guess they're stuffing their faces full of crow.

    They're going to hate hearing this, but STEVE JOBS WAS RIGHT YOU JACKA$$E$!!
  • Reply 10 of 78
    zunxzunx Posts: 620member


    Flash is obnoxious. Get rid of it!

  • Reply 11 of 78
    robogoborobogobo Posts: 378member
    It's almost worth crawling back through all the hundreds of forum posts I made in response to moron fandroids whose number one knock on the iPhone was its lack of flash. The last one was l less than a week ago.
  • Reply 12 of 78
    mac.worldmac.world Posts: 340member
    robogobo wrote: »
    It's almost worth crawling back through all the hundreds of forum posts I made in response to moron fandroids whose number one knock on the iPhone was its lack of flash. The last one was l less than a week ago.

    Good god, really. You all sound like a bunch of little girls. Everyone knows Adobe was a resource hog and Adobe could never get it to run insanely great on mobile devices. Why does this even bother you guys? Do you really need to post on here saying, "ha ha ha. We were right and you were wrong!"?

    By the way, I just picked up a Samsung S3 and it appears to run flash 11 just fine. Doesn't give me any problems. Doesn't mean I want Flash to stay or that Adobe made a good product, but Samsung was somehow able to get Touchwiz and Android to play nice with it.

    Mobile Flash is dead... Long live what-ever-the-hell-replaces-it.
  • Reply 13 of 78
    thepixeldocthepixeldoc Posts: 2,257member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Mac.World View Post





    Good god, really. You all sound like a bunch of little girls. Everyone knows Adobe was a resource hog and Adobe could never get it to run insanely great on mobile devices. Why does this even bother you guys? Do you really need to post on here saying, "ha ha ha. We were right and you were wrong!"?

    By the way, I just picked up a Samsung S3 and it appears to run flash 11 just fine. Doesn't give me any problems. Doesn't mean I want Flash to stay or that Adobe made a good product, but Samsung was somehow able to get Touchwiz and Android to play nice with it.

    Mobile Flash is dead... Long live what-ever-the-hell-replaces-it.


    Was?! The entire new CS6 Suite is a pig-stye to behold!

  • Reply 14 of 78
    sr2012sr2012 Posts: 896member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sflocal View Post



    Well, the Flash jockeys infesting AI are nowhere to be found. Guess they're stuffing their faces full of crow.

    They're going to hate hearing this, but STEVE JOBS WAS RIGHT YOU JACKA$$E$!!


     


    Steve Jobs was right on so many things, on so many levels. Vindication, is a dish best served with spicy curry. 

  • Reply 14 of 78
    You're all getting nutty happy about the discontinuation of "Flash," but I'm sorry to advise you that Adobe will still be seen on these devices through their Air runtime.
  • Reply 16 of 78
    sr2012sr2012 Posts: 896member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by kustardking View Post



    You're all getting nutty happy about the discontinuation of "Flash," but I'm sorry to advise your that Adobe will still be seen on these devices through their Air runtime.


     


    *Sigh* Adobe Air...

  • Reply 17 of 78
    robboxrobbox Posts: 9member


    game...set...match...'nuf said

  • Reply 18 of 78

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by ThePixelDoc View Post


    Was?! The entire new CS6 Suite is a pig-stye to behold!



    Understatement of the century!


    I'm still on CS5.5 but I can still run all 10GB of RAM in my iMac into the floor with one relatively large drawing.

  • Reply 19 of 78
    monstrositymonstrosity Posts: 2,234member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sr2012 View Post


     


    Bloody amazing. Just watching the recently released All Things D full Steve Jobs interviews. 110% Vindication for Steve.


     


    So sad he wasn't around to see it. Ah well, I guess Buddha and Moses are enjoying their iPads. 


     


    Steve:


     


    "The problem with humans was that you didn't make them user-friendly enough"


    "So, let's create an entire sentient race that's insanely great..."



     


    If I believed in an afterlife, I would like to think Steve is up there crafting Human 2.0 right now :)


     


    Or "The New Human" I should say...

  • Reply 20 of 78
    coolfactorcoolfactor Posts: 2,230member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Mac.World View Post



     Long live what-ever-the-hell-replaces-it.


     


    Your credibility just went out the window with that last statement. CSS3 and CSS4, plus JavaScript and SVG, are replacing it.

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