Adobe Flash Lite (formerly Macromedia Flash Lite) was a lightweight version of

Adobe Flash Player Adobe Flash Player (known in Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Google Chrome as Shockwave Flash) is computer software for viewing multimedia contents, executing rich Internet applications, and streaming audio and video content created on ...

, a software application published by

Adobe Systems Adobe Inc. ( ), originally called Adobe Systems Incorporated, is an American multinational computer software company incorporated in Delaware and headquartered in San Jose, California. It has historically specialized in software for the cre ...

for viewing Flash content. Flash Lite operates on devices that Flash Player cannot, such as

mobile phone A mobile phone, cellular phone, cell phone, cellphone, handphone, hand phone or pocket phone, sometimes shortened to simply mobile, cell, or just phone, is a portable telephone that can make and receive calls over a radio frequency link whi ...

s and other portable electronic devices like

Wii The Wii ( ) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was released on November 19, 2006, in North America and in December 2006 for most other regions of the world. It is Nintendo's fifth major home game console, ...

Chumby The Chumby was a consumer electronics product formerly made by Chumby Industries, Inc. It is an embedded computer which provides Internet and LAN access via a Wi-Fi connection. Through this connection, the Chumby runs various software widgets. In ...

and Iriver. Flash Lite allows users of these devices to view multimedia content and applications developed using Adobe's Flash tools, which had previously been available only on

personal computer A personal computer (PC) is a multi-purpose microcomputer whose size, capabilities, and price make it feasible for individual use. Personal computers are intended to be operated directly by an end user, rather than by a computer expert or te ...

s. As of 2014, Flash Lite has been superseded by

Adobe AIR Adobe AIR (also known as Adobe Integrated Runtime and is codenamed Apollo) is a cross-platform runtime system currently developed by Harman International, in collaboration with Adobe Inc., for building desktop applications and mobile applic ...

as the primary development platform for mobile Flash content.

Technical overview

Flash Lite is a development technology implemented at the

client-side Client-side refers to operations that are performed by the client in a client–server relationship in a computer network. General concepts Typically, a client is a computer application, such as a web browser, that runs on a user's local comput ...

, or user interface layer. Recent changes to

ActionScript ActionScript is an object-oriented programming language originally developed by Macromedia Inc. (later acquired by Adobe). It is influenced by HyperTalk, the scripting language for HyperCard. It is now an implementation of ECMAScript (meaning ...

allow Flash Lite to better integrate with and even compete with device-layer technologies like

Java ME Java Platform, Micro Edition or Java ME is a computing platform for development and deployment of portable code for embedded and mobile devices (micro-controllers, sensors, gateways, mobile phones, personal digital assistants, TV set-top ...

and BREW. Flash Lite should not be considered a

mobile operating system A mobile operating system is an operating system for mobile phones, tablet computer, tablets, smartwatches, smartglasses, or other non-laptop personal computing, personal mobile computing devices. While computers such as typical laptops are "mobi ...

Symbian OS Symbian is a discontinued mobile operating system (OS) and computing platform designed for smartphones. It was originally developed as a proprietary software OS for personal digital assistants in 1998 by the Symbian Ltd. consortium. Symbian OS ...

Windows Mobile Windows Mobile is a discontinued family of mobile operating systems developed by Microsoft for smartphones and personal digital assistants. Its origin dated back to Windows CE in 1996, though Windows Mobile itself first appeared in 2000 as Pock ...

, BlackBerry OS, iOS (iPhone OS), Bada (Samsung) or Android: it is a technology for developing applications that run on a mobile operating system. Some features available in Flash are not available in Flash Lite, and Flash Lite has some features specifically for mobile devices. In addition to Flash Lite, which is typically incorporated into a mobile device operating system as provided by the manufacturer, the full Adobe Flash Player may also be available for installation from the mobile device's application store (and currently only if the device has an ARM Cortex-A8 processor).

Version history

Flash Lite 1.1 supports Flash 4 ActionScript. Flash Lite 2.0, based on Flash Player 7, supports Flash 7's newer ActionScript 2.0. Both Flash Lite 1.1 and 2.0 also support the

World Wide Web Consortium The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is the main international standards organization for the World Wide Web. Founded in 1994 and led by Tim Berners-Lee, the consortium is made up of member organizations that maintain full-time staff working ...

's Standard

SVG Tiny Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) is an XML-based vector image format for defining two-dimensional graphics, having support for interactivity and animation. The SVG specification is an open standard developed by the World Wide Web Consortium sinc ...

, a mobile profile of the consortium's

Scalable Vector Graphics Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) is an XML-based vector image format for defining two-dimensional graphics, having support for interactivity and animation. The SVG specification is an open standard developed by the World Wide Web Consortium sinc ...

(SVG) recommendation. Unlike SVG, Flash Lite can add audio and interactive elements without the use of other technologies such as

JavaScript JavaScript (), often abbreviated as JS, is a programming language that is one of the core technologies of the World Wide Web, alongside HTML and CSS. As of 2022, 98% of websites use JavaScript on the client side for webpage behavior, of ...

. As with Flash, Flash Lite is able to read and redraw external

XML Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language and file format for storing, transmitting, and reconstructing arbitrary data. It defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable. T ...

content. Flash Lite 3 is based on Flash 8, which lessens the gap between mobile and desktop content by supporting H.264 video standard, as well as

On2 On2 Technologies, formerly known as The Duck Corporation, was a small publicly traded company (on the American Stock Exchange), founded in New York City in 1992 and headquartered in Clifton Park, New York, that designed video codec technology. It ...

VP6 On2 TrueMotion VP6 is a proprietary lossy video compression format and video codec. It is an incarnation of the TrueMotion video codec, a series of video codecs developed by On2 Technologies. This codec is commonly used by Adobe Flash, Flash Vide ...

and Sorenson video codecs. Flash Lite 3 also introduces support for

FLV Flash Video is a container file format used to deliver digital video content (e.g., TV shows, movies, etc.) over the Internet using Adobe Flash Player version 6 and newer. Flash Video content may also be embedded within SWF files. There are ...

video content (as used by YouTube and Google Video). Flash Lite 4.0 supports ActionScript 3 and is a browser plugin, rather than a standalone player. It further extends the Flash Lite's features with multi-touch support, an advanced text rendering engine and a geolocation interface.

History

In 2005,

completed its acquisition of

Macromedia Macromedia, Inc., was an American graphics, multimedia, and web development software company (1992–2005) headquartered in San Francisco, California, that made products such as Flash and Dreamweaver. It was purchased by its rival Adobe System ...

, the original developers of Flash. At that time, Flash Lite had been available to mobile users in Japan and Europe for some time prior to its availability in the United States. NTT DoCoMo was the first carrier to adopt Flash Lite in May 2003. As a promotion for Flash Lite in February 2005,

conducted its first Mobile Flash Content Contest. From the over 150 applications submitted, nine winners were selected in areas of Best Business and Productivity Application, Most Innovative use of Flash Lite, Best Animation, Best Business Application, Best Educational Content, Best Game, Best Interactive Content, Best Productivity Application, and Best Overall Use of Flash Lite. In May 2006, the iriver U10 (later re-branded as the iriver clix) was released, which supported Flash Lite content in a landscape page orientation. The U10 was the first

digital audio player A portable media player (PMP) (also including the related digital audio player (DAP)) is a portable consumer electronics device capable of storing and playing digital media such as audio, images, and video files. The data is typically stored o ...

to support Flash Lite. In 2005, almost 100% of Flash Lite enabled devices were found in Japan. In February 2007, Adobe claimed that over 70% of Flash Lite devices were shipped outside Japan. In October 2006,

Verizon Wireless Verizon is an American wireless network operator that previously operated as a separate division of Verizon Communications under the name Verizon Wireless. In a 2019 reorganization, Verizon moved the wireless products and services into the div ...

announced support for Flash Lite, making it the first operator in the US to adopt the technology. Flash Lite was initially available on four handset models ( Motorola RAZR V3c and V3m, Samsung SCH-a950 and LG The V (VX9800)) as a BREW extension. This allows users to download Flash Lite applications from Verizon's " Get It Now" service, but it does not allow users to view Flash objects from their

web browser A web browser is application software for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's screen. Browsers are used o ...

. In February 2007, Adobe announced at the

3GSM World Congress MWC Barcelona (formerly but still commonly referred to as Mobile World Congress) is an annual trade show organised by GSMA, dedicated primarily to the mobile communications industry. The event is held in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain at the ...

in Barcelona that the next release of Flash Lite (version 3) would support video, including streaming video. In October 2007, Adobe announced the release of Flash Lite 3. At Adobe's 2007 Financial Analyst Meeting, Al Ramadan, then senior vice-president of Adobe's Mobile and Voice Solutions Business Unit, announced that by December 2006, 220 million Flash Lite devices had been shipped. He also noted Adobe's acquisition of certain vector rendering technology by

Actimagine Nintendo European Research & Development (NERD) is a French subsidiary for Nintendo, located in Paris, which develops software technologies and middleware for Nintendo platforms. This includes retro console emulators, patented video codecs, and ...

, intended to reduce the Flash Lite player's memory footprint in future versions. As of March 2008, neither Adobe nor

have announced the availability o
Adobe Flash Cast
per the February 2007 press release for availability by the end of calendar year 2007. In the same month,

Steve Jobs Steven Paul Jobs (February 24, 1955 – October 5, 2011) was an American entrepreneur, industrial designer, media proprietor, and investor. He was the co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple; the chairman and majority shareholder of Pixar; ...

described Flash Lite as "not capable of being used with the Web." In September 2009,

Opera Software Opera is a Norwegian multinational technology company and subsidiary of Kunlun that specializes in web browser development, fintech, as well as services such as Opera News and YoYo Games. The company's total user base, including users of it ...

integrated Flash Lite 3.1 in the Internet Channel application for the

gaming console. In September 2010,

John Gruber John Gruber (born 1973) is a technology blogger, UI designer, and one of the inventors of the Markdown markup language. History Gruber is from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He received his Bachelor of Science in computer science from Drexel ...

characterized Flash Lite as a "major effort to establish a mobile software platform" that "utterly failed".

Versions

* Macromedia Flash Lite 1.0 ** Based on Flash Player 4 * Macromedia Flash Lite 1.1 * Macromedia Flash Lite 2.0 (December 2005) ** Released in 2005, which brought its capabilities in line with Flash Player 7 * Adobe Flash Lite 2.1 (December 2006) ** Running on the BREW platform * Adobe Flash Lite 3 (Announced in February 2007) ** Support for

transcoding ** Equivalent to desktop Flash Player 8 * Adobe Flash Lite 3.1 (February 2009) * Adobe Flash Lite 4 has been released (2010) and integrated in Symbian^3 ( Nokia N8,

Nokia E7 The Nokia E7-00, also known as Nokia E7, is a business-oriented QWERTY smartphone by Nokia from the Nokia Eseries. It was announced at Nokia World in September 2010 together with the Nokia C6-01 and Nokia C7 and started shipping in February 2011 ...

Nokia 600 The Nokia 600 was an announced but unreleased touchscreen-based smartphone developed by Nokia. It was announced in August 2011 as one of three launch devices for the Symbian Belle operating system. The Nokia 600 was designed as a music-centric pho ...

Nokia 700 The Nokia 700 is an ultra slim smartphone running Nokia Belle (Symbian OS 10.1). It was announced on 24 August 2011 and released in September 2011. Nokia claimed it was their "greenest smartphone to date". A Nokia Belle update (Feature Pack 1) ...

Nokia 701 The Nokia 701 is a smartphone from Nokia released in Q4 2011. It shipped with the "Belle" version of Symbian^3. It has a 3.5" IPS-LCD display with 640 x 360 pixels. The brightness of the display is 1000 nits (which Nokia called the brightest dis ...

) ** Has ActionScript 3.0 support The following table documents historical support for Flash Lite on

Project Capuchin

On April 30, 2008,

Sony Ericsson Sony Mobile Communications Inc. ( ja, ソニーモバイルコミュニケーションズ株式会社) was a multinational telecommunications company founded on October 1, 2001, as a joint venture between Sony Group Corporation and Ericsson. ...

announced Project Capuchin, a bridge that allows Flash Lite to run as a front-end to

and in this way, combine Java's APIs and direct communication with the mobile phone's hardware (

Bluetooth Bluetooth is a short-range wireless technology standard that is used for exchanging data between fixed and mobile devices over short distances and building personal area networks (PANs). In the most widely used mode, transmission power is limi ...

Wi-Fi Wi-Fi () is a family of wireless network protocols, based on the IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are commonly used for local area networking of devices and Internet access, allowing nearby digital devices to exchange data by radio waves ...

and others) with Flash's graphical interface.Macworld , Sony Ericsson combines Java and Flash
/ref>

References

External links

Bill Perry - Flash Lite Evangelist for Asia, Japan and the AmericasMark Doherty - Flash Lite Evangelist for Europe, Middle East and Africa
{{DEFAULTSORT:Adobe Flash Lite Animation software

Flash Lite Adobe Flash Lite (formerly Macromedia Flash Lite) was a lightweight version of Adobe Flash Player, a software application published by Adobe Systems for viewing Flash content. Flash Lite operates on devices that Flash Player cannot, such as mobi ...

BlackBerry software Pocket PC software Symbian software Windows Mobile Standard software