Embed Flash SWF content without the Plugin | Hacker News Reader

Embed Flash SWF content without the Plugin

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61 pointsvelmu19 comments

If you decide to go a different route and hand install an older Flash player that doesn't have the built-in time bomb, it appears the version you want is 32.0.0.371 or older.

Unfortunately, there's a free-after-use vulnerability. https://helpx.adobe.com/security/products/flash-player/apsb2...

I'm somewhat surprised nobody has packaged up an old version and wrapped it with "only run flash for these urls" and "don't update the ppapi plugin" type functionality. All the pieces seem to be available: https://support.google.com/chrome/a/answer/7084871?hl=en

Hasn't Adobe removed all Flash player binaries from their site?

Yes, though the Internet Archive has 32.0.0.371 and many other older versions: https://web.archive.org/web/20200701045943/https://helpx.ado...

> I'm somewhat surprised nobody has packaged up an old version and wrapped it with "only run flash for these urls" and "don't update the ppapi plugin" type functionality. All the pieces seem to be available: https://support.google.com/chrome/a/answer/7084871?hl=en

This is likely to be of minimal use, since browsers will soon be removing Flash support entirely. Firefox in particular is carrying a significant amount of code to shim gtk2 in a gtk3 program.

>since browsers will soon be removing Flash support entirely

My assumption is that if you manually install an older Flash plugin that it will work.

But it might only work in an older browser.

Ppapi plugins are supposed to be supported through June of 2022 in Chrome.

But you can run Flash files outside of a browser. At least, you used to be able to. It’s been a long time since I last did that.

It's called the Adobe Flash Projector IIRC

If you're looking for "old Flash with a curated set of movies" you can use Flashpoint.

Worth mentioning, the Internet Archive is now archiving Flash animations[0,1] using Ruffle.rs[2]

[0]http://blog.archive.org/2020/11/19/flash-animations-live-for...

[1]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25154128

[2]https://ruffle.rs/

Hi there, lead-dev of CheerpX for Flash and CTO of Leaning Technologies here. If you are curious about our tech, feel free do drop questions here or on Twitter: https://twitter.com/alexpignotti

This one is the best I have seen. It converts the swf very accurately: https://swf2js.com/en/

> there is a lot of content built with Flash that is absolutely worth preserving.

True, dat.

I remember a stick figure animation interactive story, called "Time to Die," that was a riot.

"..decades of content built with Flash and published as SWF (Small Web Format) files.." The SWF extension was originally an acronym for ShockWave Flash file, not Small Web Format (however, this was adopted later as a "backronym").

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWF

Wikipedia says this:

"The term "SWF" has originated as an abbreviation for ShockWave Flash.[5] This usage was changed[by whom?] to the backronym Small Web Format to eliminate confusion with a different technology, Shockwave, from which SWF derived.[6][7] There is no official resolution to the initialism "SWF" by Adobe.[8]"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWF

Looks great. That being said, a lot of the open-source Flash runtimes I've seen have been left to rot. I'm hoping this doesn't go down the same path, because it's a very good idea.

A sandboxed, standalone inspector / player might be welcome for archival use, but there’s little light between Flash vulns and candy-flavored menthol cigarettes, IMHO.

I am surprised that flash wasn't made into a interactive video format. At least for flash 2.0 content. Fk action script 3.

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