Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

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[ghost]

Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by [ghost] » 2020-05-19, 17:26

Keep in mind that on December 31st a Flash Player update will prevent the player from working.

If you like Flash give Flashpoint a try.

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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by Pentium4User » 2020-05-19, 17:51

techboyg5 wrote:
2020-05-19, 17:26
Keep in mind that on December 31st a Flash Player update will prevent the player from working.

If you like Flash give Flashpoint a try.
Is that real and proved by Adobe or just a prediction?
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[ghost]

Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by [ghost] » 2020-05-19, 17:59

Pentium4User wrote:
2020-05-19, 17:51
techboyg5 wrote:
2020-05-19, 17:26
Keep in mind that on December 31st a Flash Player update will prevent the player from working.

If you like Flash give Flashpoint a try.
Is that real and proved by Adobe or just a prediction?
See number 4.

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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by Isengrim » 2020-05-19, 18:42

Also remember that stuff like minified JavaScript and WASM are basically reimplementations of what Flash used to do - except more bloated. They're black box binary blobs you download, execute on your computer, and pray that - without any open source or public hashes to verify against - that they aren't malicious or hostile.

As for Flash, there's a lot of stuff made with it that I think is worth preserving, for historical purposes.
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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by Moonchild » 2020-05-19, 19:42

Also, WASM in its limited form was already abused the hell out of (browser cryptominers anyone?) and in fact mainstream has decided to put further WASM development on ice because of the dangerous abuse implications of expanding WASM's capabilities and available APIs (specifically threads and shared memory that can e.g. be used to blow the meltdown/spectre mitigations away). Which is by the way something I already predicted BEFORE WASM was implemented in browsers and was still on the drawing board. I do hate being right sometimes.
Usage of WebAssembly in the top 1 million websites found the prevalent use was for malicious crypto mining, and that malware accounted for more than half of the WebAssembly-using websites studied.

So would you rather have an always-on thing like WASM baked into your browser, or something you have control over in plugin form executed separately from surrounding web content?

I do find the following disconcerting though:
Flash-based content will be blocked from running in Adobe Flash Player after the EOL Date.
So they are actually going to sabotage their player to block flash content from being played, in the actual player itself...
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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by Moonraker » 2020-05-19, 19:56

So they are actually going to sabotage their player to block flash content from being played, in the actual player itself...
How are they actually able to do that.?.Would it not be the choice of flash sites whether flash can be played or not.
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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by Moonchild » 2020-05-19, 20:04

Moonraker wrote:
2020-05-19, 19:56
How are they actually able to do that.?
Very simple: just check the system date. if > EOL, abort.
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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by Moonraker » 2020-05-19, 20:17

Ok thanks moon child.
so in effect it is going to be impossible to use(sorry for the dumb question.)..old version or a hack on the system date maybe?.

I am not sure alternative technology is up to scratch yet.
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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by Lurker_01 » 2020-05-19, 20:22

Moonchild wrote:
2020-05-19, 20:04
Very simple: just check the system date. if > EOL, abort.
Off-topic:
Yes, same thing with nodejs and windows 7, if == windows7, abort.
thankfully that decision is getting a discussion and that may get reversed.
At least you can compile it yourself and take that commit off, through, no technical problems or bugs there. (just not supporting EOL)
Moonraker wrote:
2020-05-19, 20:17
[modify] ... system date maybe.
That should work, through you probably would need to also disable internet access, if they are that petty (making a check vs a time server).

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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by Pentium4User » 2020-05-19, 20:25

It should be, if you use really old versions like 11.x when Flash was still alive and used by YouTube.
They also could set a bit after EOL is reached or create their own "counter" or check the time via NTP (or another protocol).
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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by Moonchild » 2020-05-19, 20:30

Depending on when and how it's implemented, there's options. Official releases that don't have the check can be used, a binary hack to change the player to bypass the check, in-memory patching, ... I'm sure one of the many hackers out there can find ways around it and with how popular it is I'm sure it'll be done.
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[ghost]

Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by [ghost] » 2020-05-19, 22:10

Moonchild wrote:
2020-05-19, 20:30
Depending on when and how it's implemented, there's options. Official releases that don't have the check can be used, a binary hack to change the player to bypass the check, in-memory patching, ... I'm sure one of the many hackers out there can find ways around it and with how popular it is I'm sure it'll be done.
But remember: It will still be insecure.

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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by Moonchild » 2020-05-19, 23:58

Just like Pale Moon, eh?
(note; posted this as opposed to repeating myself yet again)
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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by moonbat » 2020-05-20, 03:02

Moonchild wrote:
2020-05-19, 15:54
now the browser itself has become the CPU hog because it needs to do what was previously the task of a plugin and under the user's control.
Modern software development seems to have become a make work program. After a point, software matures enough that security bugs are ironed out, it works great with the environment it was designed for, and should be left alone after that. But since we've got to have a perpetual revenue stream off of it, we go on bloating it with bells and whistles (seen with say, Winzip which added email attachments, then virus scanning and now uploading to cloud services). And now, go one better - destroy perfectly functional software to massage the egos of UI designers and fresh devs who have to reinvent the wheel with the latest shiny API or framework. That's why this everything and the kitchen sink approach towards HTML5 and browsers, the rising popularity of Electron to replace desktop programs altogether with a wrapper around a Chrome browser view, Microsoft trashing desktop functionality since Windows 8, or Mozilla's whole behavior since Australis.
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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by John connor » 2020-05-20, 23:58

Moonchild wrote:
2020-05-19, 15:54
I'm sorry...
Yep. :lol:

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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by SergeantZombo » 2020-07-08, 05:55

This is an old thread so apologies beforehand but Adobe's site does state this in regards to flash:

Starting with the Flash Player June 2020 release, enterprises can enable whitelisting for Flash Player. Doing so has multiple benefits:

•Explicitly whitelist Flash Player content that you trust and block all other Flash content. While many browsers provide the option to block Flash Player on a per site basis, some do not. With this change, it won’t matter which browser is being used because Flash Player itself will keep a list of whitelisted URLs.

•Any whitelisted content will continue to run post EOL, while all other Flash Player content is blocked by default. Please be aware that enabling content to run post EOL is not advised and done at your own risk

•Please note that Flash Player’s ability to run is dependent on browser support so please check with the appropriate browser vendor for more details. Domains that have been explicitly whitelisted will continue to load and play Flash content normally through the end of 2020 and beyond.

So it does sound like as long as a browser plans to actually support flash they are giving you the tools to whitelist sites that use flash and use them as long as you like in a use-at-your-own-risk way.

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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by Moonchild » 2020-07-08, 08:25

Sounds like a real PITA having to whitelist flash content TWICE, once in the browser, and once in the plugin because Adobe thinks users can't be trusted to use browser features properly.
Might want to consider using the last flash plugin version prior to this BS measure (May 2020) forever? Unless of course it has an option to whitelist everything in favor of giving the browser proper control per-site. e.g. it won't work if the plugin has to whitelist a CDN - you'd be whitelisting everything from that CDN regardless of originating site loaded in (since the plugin can't control that, itself; it will just be given the CDN url to load from)
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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by itdoesntreallymatter » 2020-09-24, 18:58

It's honestly still so surreal to me that Flash is just... going to be gone, except for independently created archives like Flashpoint. Like, I grew up on flash games, basically. It's almost like seeing your elementary school get torn down. I know there are good reasons for discontinuing it, but it truly does feel like a monumental shift in internet history/culture.

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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by Moonchild » 2020-09-24, 19:02

itdoesntreallymatter wrote:
2020-09-24, 18:58
I know there are good reasons for discontinuing it
Are there, really? What's so inherently evil about running a plugin in isolated context that it needs to be discontinued in favor of html5 and scripting that has no isolation at all from page content?
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Re: Flash will be dead and buried end of 2020.

Unread post by moonbat » 2020-09-25, 09:21

The worst thing is Adobe can't just leave it alone. No, they plan to d̷i̷s̷a̷b̷l̷e̷ sabotage all existing plugins with the final upgrade so that it won't work at all.
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