In recent years Flash has been heavily criticized as an insecure technology. Flash-based sites have been hit by numerous attacks, and vulnerabilities have not always been fixed at the same pace they showed up.
Rumors have been buzzing for years and now it seems we’ve finally reached the point of no return. Google is cutting Flash support from its Chrome browser. This is important news if you distribute embedded digital content, such as video or ePaper.
There isn’t one single replacement for Flash technology. The bases are covered from several different technologies. The most widespread being HTML5. This generation of online markup language enables a lot of functionality to parse directly in the browser - bypassing third-party plugins.
Popular sites like YouTube and Facebook continue to use Flash, especially for video management, but with Google's announcement it is probably safe to assume that some of the big players will shift to HTML5 as the primary technology in the near future. Though the HTML5 standard is under continous development it is already well integrated in most browsers like Chrome, Internet Explorer, Safari and FireFox.
Visiolink Desktop Viewer for newspapers and magazines is already launched in an HTML5 version. The ePaper facelift comes with a variety of new features. Page flipping is significantly faster, while content and overview can be presented in several different ways for the reader.
Try HTML5 Desktop Viewer directly in your browser here [Danish content]
HTML5 Desktop Viewer is limited to desktops to ensure optimal execution of user interface functions. On smartphone and tablet platforms, the newspaper's native app holds a great performance advantage over HTML5.
If your paper is on an older Flash-based version of the ePaper, the switch to HTML5 Desktop Viewer can be rapidly deployed. Get in touch with your Visiolink contact, or drop us a line and we will get in touch.
