Flash Player 10 on Mobile Devices
Here is a video from Adobe Max 2009 with Adobe’s CTO demonstrating Flash Player 10 on numerous mobile devices including Nokia, Palm and Android. Plus, he runs Connect Pro on a mobile phone. I am happy to see more advances with Flash Players on mobile devices. After all, more Flash on mobile devices, more opportunities to use Flash in m-learning.
FYI: Flash Player 10.1 is available as a prerelease for PCs and netbooks at Adobe Labs.
Flash is Coming to Blackberry - Announced at Adobe Max
Today Adobe announced they will be releasing Flash Player 10.1, which will extend the use of Flash on mobile devices. And RIM has added its Blackberry to the list of devices that will run this newest version of Flash Player. Read more about it. No exact date has been set for when it will appear on the Blackberry just yet.
And with Flash 10.1, we probably won’t need, or hear about, Flash Lite any longer.
As stated in earlier posts, I believe that Flash’s availability on Blackberries will be a boon to m-learning. Sad to say, Flash on the iPhone is still not on the horizon.
Adobe Flash in Your Car
Adobe Flash has continually been showing up in more and more places. Phones, TVs, Billboards (really just big monitors in airports and mega stores), now in your car. QNX has created the Connected Automotive Reference (CAR) platform, which provides interactive interfaces for dashboard displays and car entertainment consoles. And games, widgets and videos can be integrated into these systems. WARNING: e-Learning while driving may be dangerous, leave it to the passengers.
FYI: This is not a thing of the future. Cars are offered now with QNX based systems, including BMW, Ford, General Motors, Honda, Jaguar, Mercedes, Porsche and Toyota.
Flash on Blackberry Rumor…We will still have to wait for Flash on Blackberry
Quick update on my recent post regarding Flash players being added to Blackberry browsers next summer. This does NOT appear to be happening, sorry for any false alarms. Thank you Yogesh from Upside Learning for confirming that the reports are rumor. Here is the link he sent me for more info - http://www.embeddedflash.com/?p=547 (John Dowdell of Adobe comments that these are only rumors).
Flash on Blackberry… Next Summer
According to the Boy Genius Report, RIM is planning to add full Flash support for the Blackberry browser by next summer (2010). This is not Flash Lite, but a full Flash player. It will also support Silverlight. This has a lot of potential for m-learning. A significant portion of the m-learning developed is targeted for Blackberry devices, especially in the corporate world.
If Flash does arrive on Blackberries it will mean opportunities to develop more interactive m-learning for these devices and expand users’ access to m-learning currently developed in Flash and Flash Lite. Because of the number of Blackberry users and the amount of m-learning targeted to Blackberry users, having Flash as a development tool will be quite a boon for m-learning designers and users alike. Plus, this may be a motivator for Apple to add Flash to the iPhone.
Adobe FlashTutorials
I have been deep into numerous Flash projects. Some are WBT’s that contain Flash interactions, others are entire courses made in Flash. For some, I am delving beyond my current knowledge of Flash Actionscript. Thus, I have been visiting many Flash tutorials. Here are some of the Flash tutorial sites I found out there. FYI: These sites contain free tutorials.
http://www.entheosweb.com/Flash/default.asp - Entheosweb
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flash/ - Flash Development Center
http://www.w3schools.com/Flash/default.asp - w3schools.com
http://www.flashkit.com/tutorials - Flash Kit
http://www.gotoandlearn.com - gotoAndLearn()
http://www.flashandmath.com - Flash & Math (AS3 tutorials)
http://flash.tutsplus.com - Flash Tuts+
http://www.echoecho.com/flash.htm - EchoEcho
If you have any favorite Flash tutorial sites, please share. I am also adding a Flash Tutorial category on the Free e-Learning page.
Developing With Flash Lite Video Series
Dale Rankine recently launched the first video of his video training series for Flash mobile developers. If you are interested in developing with Flash Lite, say m-learning, you will want to check this out. The videos are developed for delivery on Adobe TV, but he is also making them available on Vimeo. Here the link, http://vimeo.com/adobeflashlite.
I am looking forward to seeing more of these videos and will be adding this to my Free e-Learning page, of course.
Adobe Flash Lite Exchange - Updated With New Content
Adobe’s Flash Lite Exchange has been updated. It has been quite a while since they have added anything new. So this is a welcome sight. Plus, I am proud to say they included my MinuteBio on Julius Caesar.
If you have a Flash Lite enabled device or just want to browse what is available, here is the Flash Lite Exchange link. FYI: They do have an education category.
Adobe Flash on TV
It has been announced that Flash will be available on TVs! This news from Broadcom and Adobe certainly caught my attention. This is not only a great opportunity for Adobe Flash, but opens up many, many opportunities for Flash developers and hopefully e-learning designers.
This will now place rich Internet applications (RIA) on TVs, using Flash Lite Player 3. For now I am going to assume a content developer’s kit (CDK) will be provided by Adobe and the TV remote will act in the same manner as a Flash enabled phone’s key pad, recognizing key presses, etc. If this is the case, it opens the door for very accessible, interactive e-learning….on your TV. And if it talks to an LMS, even better.
Plus, if I am correct, this will expose people to e-learning beyond academia and the corporate world, who are the majority of our e-learning audience.
As this is rolled out we should learn more about its capabilities and at what level it is applicable to e-learning, but until then I will stay very optimistic.
Here is a link to the press release.
Ben Franklin m-Learning Course
