Why is flash closed?

[Matthewthegreat]

I'm just curious as to why flash isn't open. If they are not selling it what is the financial incentive in keeping it closed? I think it would be better for everyone if it was open because there would be less bugs and anyone could port it to any platform.

[nrs]

I'm just curious as to why flash isn't open. If they are not selling it what is the financial incentive in keeping it closed? I think it would be better for everyone if it was open because there would be less bugs and anyone could port it to any platform.
Viewers may not have to, but aren't creators required to buy expensive software?

[sandyd]

I'm just curious as to why flash isn't open. If they are not selling it what is the financial incentive in keeping it closed? I think it would be better for everyone if it was open because there would be less bugs and anyone could port it to any platform.

if it was open, anyone could create a version of flash professional, so technically they are selling the product that is used to create everything flash.

[dtfinch]

The Flex SDK is free, and there's an open source version.

[Matthewthegreat]

if it was open, anyone could create a version of flash professional, so technically they are selling the product that is used to create everything flash.

Oh, That makes sense.

[Frak]

Open Source != Less Bugs, first off. Larger projects have more bugs than smaller projects, the license doesn't affect that.

Secondly, you don't have to pay for expensive tools. If you can write Actionscript, you can create Flash files for free.


if it was open, anyone could create a version of flash professional, so technically they are selling the product that is used to create everything flash.

There are plenty of Free and Commercial flash creation environments.

[McRat]

Adobe Flash Pro is $700. It comes in the Adobe CS for $1900, which is how most buy it.

Adobe CS is what keeps Adobe in business. They internet license it now. When you open it up, it checks with Adobe's server to insure it's a legal copy.

[lovinglinux]

Because then everyone one would know why it sucks :)

[Xianath]

if it was open, anyone could create a version of flash professional, so technically they are selling the product that is used to create everything flash.

Unlikely. SVG is an open format but I don't see anyone creating Corel Draw or Adobe Illustrator anytime soon. Camera raw formats are also well known but we don't have Lightroom. These are multi-million dollar software titles, the FOSS community can't just jump in and spend tens of thousands of hours for free in order to duplicate them. As someone recently said, developers like to eat food :)

[zaphod777]

Lightspark (http://allievi.sssup.it/techblog/?p=359&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+sssuptech+(Tech+%40+Allievi+SSS UP)&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher) is an opensource project working on creating an open source flash player. It looks like they are coming along nicely.

They are building from the ground up using the specs from the documentation of the flash file format no reverse engineering.

They are already seeing a lot better performance.

[dragos240]

Lightspark (http://allievi.sssup.it/techblog/?p=359&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+sssuptech+%28Tech+%40+Allievi+S SSUP%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher) is an opensource project working on creating an open source flash player. It looks like they are coming along nicely.

They are building from the ground up using the specs from the documentation of the flash file format no reverse engineering.

They are already seeing a lot better performance.

What about Gnash and SWFdec?

[zaphod777]

What about Gnash and SWFdec?

I never saw those ones before I will need to take a look.

[lancest]

Are we gonna get a Flash update for this issue?
Adobe details zero-day exploit, affects Windows, Mac, Linux, Unix, and Solaris (http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2010/06/05/adobe-details-zero-day-exploit-effects-windows-mac-linux-unix-and-solaris/)

[MooPi]

Actually the version that isn't affected is the Adobe Labs 64 bit version that I must use for flash enabled pages. Not certain if a 32 bit version is available through Adobe Labs.

[andrewabc]

Are we gonna get a Flash update for this issue?
Adobe details zero-day exploit, affects Windows, Mac, Linux, Unix, and Solaris (http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2010/06/05/adobe-details-zero-day-exploit-effects-windows-mac-linux-unix-and-solaris/)

Good question. It affects the flash I currently have installed on ubuntu 9.10.

The only way so far to 'fix it' is to upgrade to 10.1RC
But I don't think ubuntu will do that. But they have to fix it somehow...

[Frogs Hair]

Every version of flash contains a new security patch , which only lasts a short time . Adobe does allow old versions of flash to be used for development only. Adobe flash needs some competition or we will have to live with the on going cycle of patch after patch.