Artefact puts Flash on your iPad 'In A Pinch' (video)
By Joseph L. Flatley 
posted June 11th 2010 6:46PM
posted June 11th 2010 6:46PM
Despite Steve Jobs's ethical reservations, it's clear that people want Flash on their iPads (or at the very least, developers want to find ways put it there). Recently we saw Smokescreen, a browser plug-in that pulls apart SWF binaries and reassembles them into something Apple-friendly. Taking a slightly different tack, the kids at the Artefact Group have been working on a service called Flash In A Pinch. Right now, it's but a proof-of-concept, but it's a pretty sweet concept at that: Flash is rendered on Artefact's servers, which streams the images to the user's Safari browser. By placing a Javascript layer on top of the content, the user's touch interactions can be sent back to the server, making the whole megillah fully interactive. At present, the whole affair is a little too slow to use, and as of yet there is no sound, but all in all it's a great start. Video after the break. Hit the source link for more technical details (and yet more videos).
@Benjulious
That's windows 7 based, not android. It's also not due out for almost another year.
@Benjulious
You mean all of those android tablets you can walk into Besy Buy and purchase? Oh wait, you can't. As of this moment they might as well be vaporware.
Also, Hulu app is coming
Doesn't skyfire already do this and have been doing this for years now?
Why is this news...
@DoctarPeppar
Can you get skyfire for the iPad yet? No, hence why it's news.
Why are you even here commenting if it's not newsworthy enough for you?
CloudBrowse does the same thing and it has sound and it's on the App Store now.
this concept might only help those small ads to play which doesn't require much bandwidth and will run on the side silently but things like games and video cannot run because it will take insane amount of bandwidth to interface with this alternative.
Now you can see what the decision of ONLY ONE man could produce. Crippled devices and ugly workarounds. Yay Steve!
@antibala
They're getting a lot better though.
Similar method to Skyfire, a server-based web-browser for Android, WinMo and Symbian devices - which enables you to view pretty much any web-site and its content as intended.
If they made a version for iPhone it would go gangbusters .. can't see Apple letting it through some-how.
http://get.skyfire.com/ for those wanting to read more.
Wow, it's like using dial-up!
the video has been speeded up so much.
Look how the home button moves rapidly.
It's a good start though.
@greekpete94
only the part where he types in the url. Goes back to normal speed when he hits "Go"
So, how about letting you set it up to render on your own computer?
@IGLAW
I'd love that!! oh wait!! I don't have an iPad
Based on the article, this sounds like a really complicated method to view a slideshow.
There's no certitude this app will get approved.
Apple is a dictatorship company, as long as Steve is around, so don't get your hopes up...
There is a new browser app called Cloud Browse also provides Flash also with sound and everything!
Someone needs to invent a "basic" SWF-to-HTML5 converter, and I don't mean that in a simple-minded way, I mean it in a big way. Most flash that my customers want done for their own sites we just call "attractor loops" - nice floating pics and images with writing that dominate the home page. It's basically just slide-in-from-left, fade in, fade out, show image, hide image - perhaps a mouse-over event or two. Very basic basic stuff. If this can still be done using flash development tools and then just "converted" into a html5-friendly equivalent, this would solve a whole heap of problems.
I've got customers NOT wanting flash on their new sites because they are hearing from tech-geeks (there are a few in every office) that it won't show up on an iPad. It really is getting into a turf war, on a global scale.
I'd rather hear both sides of the tale.
Umm... Skyfire does this, and uses compression so it's less bandwidth intensive...
I don't think many people here are technologically proficient enough in Flash or development in general to have valid opinions.
Flash is a super rich interactive platform. It is so advanced in programming, APIs, 3d, physics, video, live streaming, IDE environment etc..that not other tools will replace it for a loooong time, if ever.. it might eventually morph into something even better and evolve the plugin but it will be still be ages ahead of html5 or anything else.
Flash 10.1 runs pretty fantastic on mobile devices.. the reason we see some things run slower is because developers just got the 10.1 and new Flash CS5 authoring tools so they have to adopt their desktop class applications that ran in browsers to mobile devices. This has nothing to do with Flash itself. Flash today (10.1) supports multitouch, gestures, geolocation and many other APIs that are modern and mobile device friendly. It's up to developers to update their code to use these new APIs and make sure their apps are mobile friendly as well.
What's great about Flash is that it's very easy to do so.. with tons of websites getting updates daily to support new 10.1 features and mobile devices, devs only need to update small amount of their code base to make it run great on mobile devices.
If anyone is living in a delusion that everything HTML5 works great on mobile devices I got some sad news for you. It doesn't. HTML5 doesn't even have support for multitouch but relies on JS libraries to emulate it. Let's not get into performance issues with more complex animations and similar.
Anyone who tried to build webites that take advantage of more advanced webkit transforms to animate stuff knows how messy this whole ordeal is.. and it works nowhere great or compatible as some people are trying to make it out to be.
As for HTML5 video goes, even though fine for regular user page videos, it really has no advanced features like drm or live streaming or variable bitrates or a ton of other things, it's not even close to Flash video capabilities and it's really a looooong way from catching up. I'd say it will be at Flash level from a few versions ago in maybe few years.
The blind and uninformed hatred is really starting to be annoying. Especially coming from people who are technically not proficient enough or have no knowledge what Flash as a platform offers.
I am all for HTML5.. I think it's a great step forward, but just as Flash isn't meant to replace everything on the web and is appropriate for highly specific implementations (more advanced and interactive apps, games and so forth), HTML5 will be great for informative sites and blogs and e-commerce.
Flash isn't going anywhere and Adobe is going to great lengths to make sure that new versions of Flash, AIR and mobile support is better than ever. I should know because i'm a development partner and am involved in all these new things coming.
So don't get your panties in a bunch, Flash is here and it will get better. To deny it, like Apple does, only makes Apple look stupid and closed up more than ever.
@Bozster
I'm a Flash/Flex developer, and Bozster is 100% correct. The idiotic opinion that Flash sucks and will be replaced by HTML5 seems to permeate this site. It's completely incorrect. Flash is exponentially better suited to RIA development than HTML5, and is actually a BETTER performer than HTML5. I'm sure people will realize this in time once people actually try to write real RIA's in HTML5 and fail miserably. Flash does not equal bad sites, slow sites or annoying banners. That is all due to BAD DESIGNERS AND CODERS. Those same bad designers and coders will also get their hands on HTML5.
Just as you couldn't take any desktop application and port it to mobile with no changes, writing Flash and AIR apps for mobile requires different coding practices than what you would use in desktop development. Again, that isn't Adobe's fault. It's just due to the weaker processors found in mobile phones and developers who have no idea how to properly utilize them. With time, Flash will win this war. I have absolutely no doubts about this. I really wish that people would actually educate themselves before making ridiculous claims that Flash sucks just because Steve told you so.
Why would anyone want Flash for anything?
@Tombio ...why does your question make you look like a troll...let me count the ways.
Am I the only one thinking that Apple is right not supporting Flash in iOS? Maybe if they can make Flash work properly with OS X first, I might reconsider my position..
@Jolst ...maybe if you drop the Flash trolling meme perpetuated by the cult leader...maybe then you will understand who is at fault.
What people do for Flash...
Hey Apple, if you complained of multi-tasking, and then "managed to make it work without draining the battery", can't you do the same with Flash?
Don't you realize you're missing a public favorite here?
Oh noes! Flash is on teh iPhone! Hurry, Steve, do something before people start watching videos!
why is flash so important on a phone with one button?
I love and hate Flash. But, I am exciting see Flash getting better.
I continue to siding with Flash. The chief reason is Flash will make closed captioning works on youtube or any youtube-like. I tried html 5 and the closed captioning feature disappeared. As of now, there are no code for accesibility in Html 5. I hope there will be one in near future.
I am deaf and I want to be on an equilvalent scale as you are. So, Flash rules in lieu of accesibility issue.
better with remote control a PC with flash installed! =))
Why doesn't apple just use silverlight? I'm not joking...I try to stream Hulu videos that use flash on my netbook with 1gb RAM and it stutters, but I can watch NetFlix streaming on it which uses silverlight and it runs as smooth as butter....I mean, isn't Steve more willing to work with other Steve or Gates, than Narayen?