Adobe Air peer-to-peer video call concept Android app hands-on (video)

If you recall, a few days ago we stumbled upon a cheekily-named concept app (which has since been renamed for obvious reasons) from Adobe that does video-calling on Android. This is pretty rad considering it's just Qik and Fring offering the same service for the green bot right now, so we trotted along to Adobe's London office to get a closer look at this demo. As with many things in life, not all went as planned as you can see after the break -- the video stream froze up on several occasions, but then again Adobe's Mark Doherty only spent three days cooking this simple app. Regardless, this should still help Android developers understand the beefed-up peer-to-peer capabilities in the forthcoming Air 2.5 runtime, which is now "feature-complete" and undergoing extensive testing ahead of launch later this year.

Things are less positive for Flash availability on other mobile platforms, though. While Nokia's just waiting for a Linux SDK before it can start porting Flash apps to its devices within 2010, Adobe implied that it's still waiting for two other vendors to respond -- Palm's already been shown a Flash build running on webOS devices, and it's just a matter of the company signing up for Adobe's device certification system; RIM, on the other hand, is a bit more vague, but we were told it's definitely interested in both Air and Flash. And here's the surprise of the day: no comment on Flash for iOS (not to be confused with its digital publishing tools for the iPad), but there's no stopping you from hacking it in yourself.

Update: Adobe's Mark Doherty has sent us a statement to emphasize the industrial backing of the Air and Flash platforms for mobile. We've posted it after the break.

"Flash Player 10.1 and AIR have received a huge amount of positive industry support. All of our Open Screen Project partners have received Flash Player 10.1 and are working towards certification. We expect a wide range of platform support including Android, BlackBerry, webOS, future versions of Windows Phone, LiMo, MeeGo and Symbian OS. Delivery to consumers has already begun with Android 2.2, and we expect many more smart phones and tablets in the coming months."

Mark Doherty, platform evangelist, Adobe Systems.

[HKCally Posted Jul 25th 2010 3:21PM]

@Andork

Apple didn't invent video-call either. It's ancient. But you didn't know that because you don't know anything.
Now run along and give Steve more money. Good dog.

[mdoherty Posted Jul 27th 2010 5:52AM]

@Andork - This is only one example of an application that can use P2P and Direct Routing with Flash and AIR. The same feature is capable of some very different use cases, including multi-player gaming, live video/webcam streaming, VOIP and even grid computing.

All of this happens over a very secure encrypted UDP using the extremely efficient RTMFP.

P2P functionality will work on Windows, Mac, Linux, Solaris, Android - Windows Phone, WebOS, Blackberry, MeeGo and Symbian on any form factor presented, where Adobe AIR 2.x or Flash Player 10.1 are present.

I hope this explains the purpose of the demo more clearly.

Mark Doherty - Adobe

[iZach Posted Jul 24th 2010 9:40PM]

FaceTime looks better IMO.

[Openwave Posted Jul 25th 2010 11:26AM]

@iZach facetime looks awful in person. Maybe it was the wifi in the apple store. *kanye shrug*

[Mike10010100 Posted Jul 24th 2010 10:06PM]

@HighestRanked2

Then again, Adobe never made any claim that it was "Revolutionary" or "magical" or that it "changes everything, again." This was an app whipped up in about 3 days.

Don't feed the troll, folks. Only a matter of time till he gets banned again.

[Stone632 Posted Jul 25th 2010 2:47AM]

this is going to be nice.

I just signed up for truphone and wish they somehow integrated this to it

[grindking Posted Jul 25th 2010 9:19AM]

Uh, why would there be a comment on flash and ios? Apple has made it clear that they want to control that area and shut it down not only to the consumers and end users, but to framework developers, the individual developers of applications using those framework and building applications and so on. Why did you even mention ios? We know Apple hates flash, and therefore I hate Apple. 'Lets make good hardware but have horrible policies, I like that idea.'

[iCranberry Posted Jul 25th 2010 1:49PM]

Without a front camera. Very usefull.

[Arithmetic Posted Jul 25th 2010 9:40PM]

Umm why are we using N1? I understand it's thee "android" phone but why not use a phone that has a front facing camera that can put this app to better use like the Evo? Cmon Engadget, where is the Evo or Epic 4G?