Firefox Will Dump Adobe's Flash in August
July 21 2016 - 3:50PM
Dow Jones News
Adobe Systems Inc.'s Flash technology is on its way out of the
Firefox internet browser.
In August, Mozilla Corp., maker of the browser, will begin
defaulting to HTML 5 instead of Flash for video, online animations,
games and other rich media.
If users run into a website where there is no non-Flash option
available, Firefox will still render that site in Flash. But next
year, Firefox will ask for permission before it renders any sites
in Flash or Microsoft Corp.'s Silverlight, a rich-media technology
similar to Flash.
Web browser plugins, such as Flash and Silverlight, "often
introduce stability, performance, and security issues for
browsers," said Benjamin Smedberg, a manager of Firefox quality
engineering, in a blog post. "This is not a trade-off users should
have to accept." Defaulting to HTML 5 over Flash is expected to
reduce browser crashes and website hangs, Mr. Smedberg said.
"These and future changes will bring Firefox users enhanced
security, improved battery life, faster page load, and better
browser responsiveness," he added.
Mozilla's decision to move away from Flash was long in the
works, he said. But it is also merely the latest nail in Flash's
coffin. In May, Alphabet Inc.'s Google said its Chrome browser
would be defaulting to HTML 5 over Flash, and asking for permission
to render Flash when no HTML 5 alternative was available, before
the end of the year. Google cited similar performance and security
concerns.
About a year ago, Facebook security chief Alex Stamos called on
Adobe to stop trying to fix Flash and end support outright. For its
part, Adobe itself is walking away from Flash. Adobe has told the
Journal that it is encouraging "content creators to build with new
Web standards." It also changed the name of its Flash Professional
software to Animate CC, and refocused it around HTML 5 media.
Fortunately for anyone using a web browser these days, most
major websites that relied on Flash in the past, like YouTube and
Facebook, moved to HTML 5 video long ago. This largely happened
because there is no mobile version of Flash, and as mobile web
browsing and mobile app usage has grown, developers were motivated
to leave Flash behind.
If you want to ditch Flash on your computer, read our guide.
Write to Nathan Olivarez-Giles at
Nathan.Olivarez-giles@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
July 21, 2016 15:35 ET (19:35 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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