When YouTube videos go BLACK: The Adobe Shockwave Player Mess

--
Two recent changes in the Internet world have conspired to create a problem for Mac users attempting to play YouTube videos. The problem: You attempt to play a YouTube video but all you get is a black, inert rectangle. It's dead. Nothing happens.

Rather than pull your hair out, reinstall everything or think your Mac is broken, here is what's going on:

I) Adobe just recently caught up with the real world, nearly 6 (SIX) years LATE, and started providing a 64-bit version of their Shockwave Player. Gee thanks Adobe. About time, don't you think?

The problem is that you must have Safari running in the same mode as the version of Shockwave Player you have installed. Therefore:

A) If you install the 32-bit version of the Shockwave Player plug-in, you must run Safari in 32-bit mode. You can do this in Safari's Get Info box.


-OR-

B) If you install the 64-bit version of the Shockwave Player plug-in, you must run Safari in 64-bit mode. Be sure to check if this is the case in Safari's Get Info box by verifying that you are NOT running Safari in 32-bit mode.

II) The other half of the problem is that Google forgot to tell anyone that they are now offering videos on YouTube in .SWF format. This is the Shockwave format, NOT the Flash format .FLV. Therefore the videos play using the Shockwave Player plug-in, NOT the Flash Player plug-in.

Once you match up your bit versions of Safari and Shockwave Player, you'll find your YouTube functionality is fine. Adobe warn about this incompatibility problem in one direction, but not the other. Google don't warn you at all. (No wonder both companies have legions of anti-fans).

Also keep in mind that Adobe is in the midst of a flood of security flaws being discovered in their software. This problem is particularly critical with the Shockwave Player, Flash Player, Adobe Reader and Adobe Acrobat because the file formats they play are universal on the Internet. This means that it is CRITICAL to keep up with the entirely IRREGULAR releases of security updates from Adobe. Totally ignore Adobe's idiotic quarterly 'In-Band' schedule for releasing updates. Scheduling security updates is for fools. (I'm talking to you too Microsoft!)

Here is where to keep track of Adobe's latest security holes and updates:

Adobe Security Bulletins and Advisories


Adobe Product Security Incident Response Team (PSIRT) Blog

You can pick which version of Shockwave Player you would like to download and install (32 or 64-bit) HERE.

I regularly rake Adobe over the coals at my Mac-Security blog.

You can read about 32-bit mode versus 64-bit mode at Wikipedia.org.

And yes kids, all of the above indicates that we are still in The Stone Age of Computing.
(0_o)

:-Derek

--

Adobe's Festival of Deceit:Apple's Flash ban"has nothing to do with technology"

^
Prologue:

Through my background at Eastman Kodak and Rochester Institute of Technology, I've had friends and acquaintances inform me about the Adobe work culture for well over a decade. I know full well that it can be a contentious place to work, with brilliant and kind people mixed in with ignorant and arrogant people. The ignorance and arrogance has consistently been the bane of their progress within the ever evolving computer environment. Adobe's response to the Apple versus Flash technology debacle is entirely in keeping with the Adobe work culture. The difference is that this time Adobe aren't infighting; They're outfighting in public with Apple, the company that is historically their biggest supporter. As a result, Adobe's very worst characteristics as a company are hanging out for everyone to see, creating what I consider to be quite an embarrassing spectacle. Toss in blatant deceit from Adobe, who are entirely unwilling to correct their technological errors in Flash, and we get to watch Adobe essentially punching itself in the face, giving itself a very swollen black eye. I wish they'd stop and get some perspective. But the now clichéd adage about insanity applies: Adobe keep punching themselves, expecting Apple to change. (o_0)

Adobe's Festival of Deceit

That the spirit of the current age of politics, deceit, is oozing into the computer community is extremely disturbing. We've had endless FUD and troll warz from haters within the community since the genesis of the personal computer. But to have a computer company itself directly lie to the public about its own incompetent technology is something new. Typically the deceit is perpetrated as an undercurrent via 3rd party sources, or it has been veiled in mere suggestion or innuendo. This time around we have the CEO, the guy at the very top of Adobe, directly lying to the public, vainly, insanely, hoping his authority will make the deceit more believable. Seeing as we don't live in Stalinist Soviet Union or Red China, sorry Mr. Narayen but we not only notice you're wearing no clothes, we can say it in public and not get killed.

So what am I on about?

From VentureBeat.com:

Adobe CEO says Apple’s ban of Flash “has nothing to do with technology”

The Wall Street Journal interviewed Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen in order to hear his response to Steve Jobs' critique of Adobe Flash technology and why it will not, in its current state, be permitted on an Apple battery driven device (apart from MacBooks). Quoting from VentureBeat's coverage of the interview:

• If Flash crashes on Apple hardware, that’s “to do with the Apple operating system.” (As a former Unix hacker, I have to ask: Huh?)

• On Jobs’ claim that Flash drains mobile gadget batteries: “Patently false.”

Apple technology pundit John Gruber wrote a smart-aleck response to Narayen’s claims: “Who are we supposed to believe, Shantanu Narayen or our own lying Activity Monitors?”

How could any experienced Mac user not concur with John Gruber's snarky observation? How is it possible for the CEO of Adobe to be so entirely ludicrous? This is NOT politics, where rhetoric can spin mental spells of illusion in ignorant minds. This is technology, a field of endeavor that is ruled by empirical, objective observation.

Objective observation: I just played an Adobe Flash movie on my Mac OS X computer. The Flash movie finished playing. Therefore, it should not be accessing my CPU. And yet there Flash is, in my Activity Monitor application, eating my CPU alive, causing the fan in my MacBook to madly spin to keep the CPU within its temperature tolerance range. I can use two simple solutions to solve the problem. Either (A) close the web page containing the offending Flash video, or (B) quit the web browser containing the window with the offending Flash video. The results in either case are the same: Flash stops eating my CPU alive. The end. Observation concluded.

I can then go back to that exact same Adobe Flash movie and repeat exactly the same problem, over and over. I can then switch web browser applications and repeat the results over and over. I can then go to someone else's Mac OS X computer and repeat the same results over and over.



In science, these are called 'Repeatable Results'. What then follows is the Conclusion.

Conclusion:

Adobe Flash movies, in coordination with the Adobe Flash Plug-in running in any web browser, can create CPU race conditions on occasions when the Flash movie is observed to not be playing. Therefore, the code in either the Flash movie or the Flash Plug-in is poorly written and requires repair.

Whenever this condition is caused on a battery-run computer device, the obvious result is the needless, pointless draining of the device's battery. Therefore, in order to maximize the battery capacity of a computer device, it is important to NOT play poorly coded Flash movies via the Flash Plug-in.

It's that simple, that provable, that obvious.

To say that this battery draining CPU race condition 'has nothing to do with technology' is a blatant lie.

Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen: You are lying to the public, your customers.

Adobe Board of Directors: Why do you tolerate your CEO lying to the public?

Adobe shareholders: Why do you tolerate the CEO of Adobe lying to the public?

Adobe engineers: Why haven't you repaired this race condition in Flash technology?

As far as I am concerned, if Adobe got off their lazy backsides, and off their deceitful soapboxes, this entire matter could be cleared up. Flash code could be repaired to stop the CPU race condition forever; Apple could invite Adobe Flash onto their battery driven devices as a good citizen. Adobe: Make it happen.

Stop the deceit.

Just Make It Happen.
--

Adobe Retaliates Against Disabling Adobe Updater

--In the very recent past, it has been possible to disable Adobe's idiotic and annoying Adobe Updater system, well known to be the single worst installation system in the entire computer community. Disabling this POS has been hailed and suggested across the net for nearly two years, including here at my blog. It has been recommended to instead HAND INSTALL every Adobe update with the individual update packages. The results have been far superior to letting the Adobe Updater system do it for you.

Sadly, Adobe have now retaliated and caused even their individual updater packages to REQUIRE a present and functional Adobe Updater system. Otherwise the installers will freak and act like they don't see anything to install. This is the case with this new Flash updater and has been proven to be true for the new Reader updater.

The solution is to UNLOCK any Adobe Updater folders you may have locked in order to stop its functionality. Search for all 'Updater' folders and make sure they are unlocked. Another option is to toss them all in the Trash and empty the Trash. The updates will now work.

After the update process, in order to stop Adobe Updater from doing its annoying periodic pop-up on your screen and nag-at-you routine, again LOCK all 'Updater' folders until the next time you need to perform an Adobe update.

Is all of this one big PITA? Of course it is. What is the ultimate solution? Don't use Adobe if you can help it.

How the mighty have fallen.

--