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News Flash!!

 





As the end of the year 2020 draws ever closer, we in the tech department felt it necessary to deliver this breaking news.

Adobe Flash player is reaching end-of-life December 31, 2020

Literally, it's news about something that will be breaking. Is this cause for panic? Y2K, delayed by twenty years??

Not at all! However, this may have some impact on the educational space and as such we felt it necessary to expound, educate, and elucidate somewhat on the matter.

What is Flash, and why should I care?

History lesson!  From the first youtube videos, to angry birds, to early online banking, flash has been a part of our lives since time immemorial... if time immemorial was, oh, say twenty years back. Adobe Flash was used as a software platform to create (at the time) innovative and interactive web experiences, from viewing flash animations and videos to playing Virtual Knee Surgeon or Dolphin Olympics 2: Fish Out of Water (You only wish I was making these names up)

Chances are, if there was any kind of interactivity on a website a few years back it was powered by Flash. Chrome data analytics points to over 80% of all users visiting a site with flash-supported content on a daily basis... five years ago. Today, that number is well below 10%. 

Why discontinue?

With internet security an ongoing concern, it certainly didn't help that adobe flash historically was as effective at security as this gate:


Sure, it was polite yet firm, it made an effort, and yet... well as you can see it was certainly not the most insurmountable obstacle. We'll never get past this...unlocked gate in... an...open...field. hmm....

 Recent progress with more secure and effective alternatives such as Unity or HTML5 finally gave Adobe the freedom to announce in July of ...2017 that they would be retiring flash for good at the end of 2020. Which brings us to today!

What do I do??

Again, in 90% of cases this is a non-issue. Websites and developers have known this was coming for literally years, and could see the writing on the wall well before that. For current content maintained by active webpages they should be well on their way to implementing conversion to HTML5 so that the transition is seamless. Absolutely * Nothing** to worry about***!

* almost absolutely
**almost nothing
*** you see where I'm going with this?

There will be a few old sites, old materials, and old curricula that fall prey to this come January. Legacy content that has been the same for years, you will find, may no longer work. Unfortunately we in the technology department are (mostly) powerless against the inexorable and merciless forward march of time. 

Some educational games, typing practice exercises, simulations, or very old videos may stop working. In those cases we will want to seek out alternatives or (if required) reach out to the website/content provider to inquire about the update status.

In chrome, you can see which sites you have historically allowed/blocked flash on by typing: chrome://settings/content/flash?search=flash 
into your search bar... those sites listed may be impacted come 2021. 

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