I recently discovered that Flash 10 for Firefox on Mac OS has some pretty serious redraw problems. This is a pretty small subset of users, but nonetheless troubling. One of the main selling points of Flash, and maybe the main reason why I got interested in the platform in the first place is the idea that developers don’t have to deal with the mess that is cross-browser development. For those of you unfamiliar with the situation, development in HTML means toiling away to get your design look halfway decent in your browser of choice, and then seeing it look completely crappy in other browsers.With Flash, supposedly no more such problems!
OK, so I’m complaining, but in most cases Flash does what it says on the tin and does a good job of keeping Flash version problems out of your face. But obviously here there has been some slip ups. Maybe the team has gotten sloppy? Any feedback on what’s going on is welcome.
This post is available in French here
[...] J’ai récemment découvert que Flash 10 pour Firefox sur Mac a des problèmes assez sérieux de rafraichissent. C’est un groupe assez réduit d’utilisateurs, mais c’est tout de même troublant. Un des points forts de Flash, et peut-être la raison principale pour laquelle je me suis intéressé à la plateforme, c’est l’idée qu’avec Flash les développeurs n’ont pas besoin de gérer les problèmes des différents navigateurs. Pour ceux qui ne connaissent pas la situation, le développement en HTML veut qu’on se donne un mal de chien pour avoir un design à peu près potable sur le navigateur sur lequel on a l’habitude de bosser,et de pleurer dés qu’on l’essaie dans un autre. Avec Flash, plus de problème! euh… Bon d’accord je râle, mais dans la plupart des cas Flash fait ce qu’il faut et généralement on n’a pas à s’embêter avec des problèmes de version, d’OS, de navigateur etc. Mais de toute évidence ici il y a eu des dérapages. Peut-être l’équipe se laisse aller. Tout retour sur ce qui se passe est bienvenu. Ce billet est publié en Anglais ici [...]
I second that. Over the years, we have seen differences between the platforms as well. Even within the same platform and using the same browser, we see differences with different OS versions.
It seems that the team was so eager to deliver new versions of the Player and move to the Flex framework that some attributes were overlooked.
One of the strong selling points of Flash when we started producing apps in 98 was that we did not have to worry about testing and debugging across different platforms.
Flash / Flex are becoming less attractive with every new release!
Hi, does your mention of Firefox imply that the same project displays as you expect in other browsers on the same machine? Do you see it in every Firefox/Mac installation, or just your own? And is it only one particular piece of content, or many varied sites?
jd/adobe
@Charlie,
it’s interesting, do you really get the impression that it’s getting worse? I mean Java has the same kind of issues, I just don’t get the impression it’s the same magnitude.
As for the relationsip with Flex, as I understand it’s a separate team that handles Flex, so hopefully it doesn’t impact on Flash itself. What is happenning though is that Flash and Flex are both growing, so it’s getting arder to keep things under control. Feature creep I guess…
Ariel
@John,
the same project displays well on other browsers on the same machine. I have seen it on 3 different Firefox/Mac installations. What cinches it is that one of them had Flash 9 and it worked fine, then when we installed Flash 10 it worked as badly as the others. We don’t see any problems on Firefox PC, Internet Explorer or Safari. If you want, take a look http://www.pearltrees.com/
In the top left hand corner there is a navigation bar. Click around with Flash 10 Firefox Mac, you will see some serious redraw problems that you won’t see with another setup. And it’s a cool app, check it out you’ll like it
@john again, as for other sites, I don’t know for sure because I have a PC, but my colleagues have told me that yes moving back down to Flash 9 helped also on other sites. Take it with a grain of salt though.
Sorry, I’m not yet sure of the functional details… are you saying that one particular project, and only that one project, fails on various installations of FFx/Player10, but that all other browsers on those machines display those projects correctly? or was the crux about switching plugin versions somehow?
If so, is there something in the WMODE right in that area on that page? Have you controlled for versioning of the browsers?
(I’m trying to dig into whether there’s a symptom that someone else could create on demand, with new content — trying to pull the core problem from the descriptions.)
tx, jd/adobe
Hi,
pearltrees.com fails on FFx/Player10 Mac, but works when you change browser, Flash player version, or OS.
We’ve played with the WMODE, opaque or window, it doesn’t change anything. Our app uses an IFrame, so we’ve used wmode=opaque and had all the usual problems documented with this mode, but it doesn’t seem to impact us.
What do you mean “controlled for versioning of the browsers?”? We’re all with various flavors of Firefox 3. Does that answer your question? We didn’t try on FF 2…
One more word on the “failing”: the end result is ok, it’s just when you click you get some serious visual artifacts when transitioning from one state to the next which makes the app look dirty and buggy. Once the action is over, it looks like it should.
hope this helps, let me know!
Ariel
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Flash Player 10 does not work on PPC mac’s AT ALL. I am so frustrated. I downgraded to 8 which was supposed to work for PPC mac’s and the sites I go to tell me to upgrade my flash player I don’t know what to do now. Ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
Apple would say get an Intel mac, I guess
good luck,
Ariel
i’ve just upgraded to snow leopard and flash 10 on my macbookpro and flash 10 is not redrawing properly on myspace music players and such interfaces. it’s annoying. the content is there and playable – just nothing displaying. any idea if this is this a snow leopard, firefox 3 or flash 10 issue?
Hi,
sorry I missed your comment. Anyway – from what I’ve seen redrawing is an issue, but I haven’t seen or heard of nothing actually displaying. Does it work with another config?
Ariel