Adobe Flash
Adobe Flash
Adobe Flash CS4 Professional under Mac OS X.
Developer(s)
Adobe Systems (formerly by
Macromedia)
Latest stable
release
10.0.22.87 / 2009-02-17
Written in
C++
Operating
system
Microsoft Windows, Mac OS
X
Type
Multimedia
License
Proprietary EULA
Website
Adobe Flash Professional
Homepage
Adobe Flash
(previously called Macro-
media Flash) is a multimedia platform ori-
ginally acquired by Macromedia and cur-
rently developed and distributed by Adobe
Systems. Since its introduction in 1996, Flash
has become a popular method for adding an-
imation and interactivity to web pages. Flash
is commonly used to create animation, ad-
vertisements, and various web page compon-
ents, to integrate video into web pages, and
more recently,
to develop rich Internet
applications.
Flash can manipulate vector and raster
graphics and supports bidirectional stream-
ing of audio and video. It contains a scripting
language called ActionScript. Several soft-
ware products, systems, and devices are able
to create or display Flash content, including
Adobe Flash Player, which is available free
for most common web browsers, some mobile
phones and for other electronic devices (us-
ing Flash Lite). The Adobe Flash Professional
multimedia authoring program is used to cre-
ate content for the Adobe Engagement Plat-
form, such as web applications, games and
movies, and content for mobile phones and
other embedded devices.
Files in the SWF format, traditionally
called "ShockWave Flash" movies, "Flash
movies" or "Flash games", usually have a .swf
file extension and may be an object of a web
page, strictly "played" in a standalone Flash
Player, or incorporated into a Projector, a
self-executing Flash movie (with the .exe ex-
tension in Microsoft Windows or .hqx for
Macintosh). Flash Video files[spec 1] have a
.flv file extension and are either used from
within .swf files or played through a flv
aware player, such as (VLC), or QuickTime
and Windows Media Player with external co-
decs added.
History
The program Flash was the brainc