Smokescreen may let iPhone and iPad users watch Flash video using JavaScript

Smokescreen may let iPhone and iPad users watch Flash video using JavaScript

Filed under: Utilities, Video, Web services

A Flash player written using native JavaScript and HTML might be the key to playing Flash video on the iPhone and iPad without Steve Jobs and Adobe ever settling their differences. Smokescreen can already play basic Flash animations, but is still too slow to provide a smooth video experience, according to our sister site, Engadget. It's a start, though, and it's definitely an exciting proof of concept.

The reason Smokescreen isn't lightning-fast yet is that it has to do an awful lot of work to get around the need for a Flash plug-in. According to Simon Willison (quoted on Engadget), " It runs entirely in the browser, reads in SWF binaries, unzips them (in native JS), extracts images and embedded audio and turns them in to base64 encoded data URIs, then stitches the vector graphics back together as animated SVG."

Okay, that's seriously impressive. I can't wait until it's practical, too. What do you think, DLS readers? Will it ever happen?

Smokescreen may let iPhone and iPad users watch Flash video using JavaScript originally appeared on Download Squad on Thu, 03 Jun 2010 15:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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