Support for ArmV6 in AIR 3.7?

Report · Mar 15, 2013

One very interesting feature in AIR 3.7 is the ability to force CPU instead of GPU for a given set of devices. The example code in the read me PDF shows how you would make iPhone1 and iPad1 use CPU.

AIR hasn't supported iPhone 1G since AIR 3 was released. Does the fact that the new feature lists lots of ArmV6 devices mean that AIR will support that processor again?

Report · Mar 15, 2013

I wouldn't guess so. On Android, old OS versions like 2.x are still

exceedingly wide spread, and vendors keep making crap devices on ARMv6

architecture, which consumers end up buying. On iOS older versions like

iPod touch 2nd gen and iPhone 3 aren't in wide spread use . Those older

devices are also stuck on iOS v 4.2.x, and will never be upgradable

(Apple doesn't support them anymore).

There doesn't seem to be a lot of reason to go after support for those

devices. (My son uses an one for games, and it's getting increasingly

difficult to find anything that actually works on it, even plain native

apps. My very capable old 3GS is even having trouble keeping up.)

Here are some numbers (all ARMv6 devices are in that 2% of users still

on 4.x):

http://david-smith.org/iosversionstats/

Kevin N.

Report · Mar 15, 2013

I don't think it will support ArmV6 either, but it just seems odd that they gave an ArmV6 device as an example use case.

Report · Mar 17, 2013

If Adobe will support ArmV6, they will enter in alot of devices, and close a large list of request in their features base, the most comented in Samsung GT-S5830 Galaxy Ace, in Latin America and México that device is the most popular. Enter in ArmV6 also will be a very big extra point.

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1596800

Of course enter in other platforms will be porwerfull, we are working to support blackberry 10 with AIR, until now the early tests was ok, we need to change few things and build extra ANEs, then we delivery in that platform too.

Report · Mar 19, 2013

We don't plan to support ARMv6 going forward.

Colin, thanks for pointing out the mention of ARMv6 devices in the release notes of the newly added feature. I will try to get it fixed

Report · Apr 09, 2013

Thanks a lot for your answer, Romil!

Perhaps you can help me: We, since 2007 a very experienced, mostly Flash-AS3-based software company, are planning a new, huge project. Best would be, if we could do this in Adobe AIR / Flash (because AS3 is the only, serious, object-oriented language for multiplatform-development and the GUI-design ist just amazingly fast done with Flash. Beside of it, the performance on iOS and Android is very good, once you know the limitations of the devices and program around it).

Now, my question is: our customer wants to have it run on Windows 8 / Windows 8 RT and ARMv6. I know and I have read in the roadmap, that it is not planned to support them with AIR.

And this, I do not understand - so my questions:

Question 1: Can you give me some technical reasons why Adobe won't support AIR on Windows 8 apps and Windows RT and ARMv6 (if it is only the performance, we do have enough know-how to get round it, if Adobe is interested in, we could extend your performance paper) it?

Question 2: The Unreal engine was ported to JavaScript within four days thanks to Emscripten. See here: http://www.joystiq.com/2013/03/29/mozilla-unveils-browser-based-unreal-engine-3-using-javascript/

Would this be possible for the Flash plugin as well?

I know that AIR compiles to native iOS code using Emscripten. As I know as well, Emscripten has many output formats, so it should be a slight to compile AIR to native Windows 8 / Android code as well - all the hassles about the captive runtime would be gone, we just would have native code!

As Emscripten can compile to JavaScript as well, it should be as well of not too much effort to cross-compile AS3 to JavaScript (and for the graphical and timeline Assets, you have already a solution, else the cross-compile out of Flash Professional to iOS won't work)

Question 3:

Are there any technical reasons not doing native output for the other platforms?

For your information: For us, the multi-platform is unfortunately a killer kriterium, and would result in a complete platform change for developing software (we are currently evaluating the Unity engine as an alternative for not game-based-programming (B2B-applications).

As you see in the many posts in the forum, AIR has still a lot of people using it and all of them want to talk and discuss the future of AIR / Flash with Adobe - and you can be sure, we, the community and buyers of the Adobe-software, will support you or even writing runtime-code for you.

Romil, I am not sure whether you are the right person for me to answer the above questions - If not, could you please just drop me a reply as well and telling me who at Adobe could answer these questions? I am sure that Adobe together with the community could make Flash / AIR the best multi-platform solution available today and this with not too much effort! Most of it is already done and the market would be very, very huge!

Looking forward to your answer, and thanks,

best regards,

Michael

Report · Apr 10, 2013

I agree with franzen, we not want an open source with AIR, but if we can contribute in the way to support more platforms with code, welcome.

Report · May 02, 2013

Hi Romil, here are more Adobe users with comments related with this discussion, they want to see content in their devices: http://osandroid.com/es/phone/acer-iconia-b1/soft/21-adobe-flash-player.html

Report · May 04, 2013

Support for ARMv6 in Android (at least for some decent devices like Samsung Galaxy Y and ACE) its even 500x more important then support Windows Phone or even Windows 8 Modern UI.

Adobe usual use the argument of market share to support runtimes and in this case this ARMv6 have a huge market share.

Report · May 28, 2013

Interesting url: http://www.theverge.com/2012/10/4/3447984/motorola-razr-i-review-intel-smartphone

The mos important says: "

The other issue of contention for Intel-powered devices is app compatibility. We previously found that a handful of big-name games were incompatible with the Orange San Diego, and are happy to report that all of those titles now work perfectly on the RAZR i. In fact, the only app that was simply missing was Adobe AIR, which powers a number of relatively low-profile Android games. All of the big games that weren’t working before, including Shadowgun, Minecraft, and NOVA 3, are waiting for prospective RAZR i buyers. That’s a significant step forward in just four months.

"

So, not are great games with AIR technology? I know alot, maybe with more level than Shadowgun, also some customers ask for this cellphone.

In the future, Adobe will support ARM A15? or also puts outbox processors?

Report · Jun 04, 2013

Hi Adobe, this is a user email, and what we show to you for future Roadmap:

"

Buenos días,

No es posible instalar la aplicación de xxxxx porque dice:

«El archivo del paquete no es valido»

Tengo un celular Motorola razr i, con Android 4.0.4

"

Report · Apr 17, 2013

my friend only 2% of users still using ARMv6. You are wrong and only see a small "very small" piece of all cake. Apple devices are a small world of all mobile devices. Many people use Android devices with ARMv6 like: Galaxy ace, Motorola Defy, etc.

This link you can see the top 10 of the most common devices Android and the 3th is galaxy ace.

http://readwrite.com/2013/02/07/8-of-the-10-top-android-devices-in-use-belong-to-samsung

My Adobe friends. This is true. The big problem that have Adobe Air as framework for develop mobile Aplications is that, if you realy want that Adobe Air be truly one standard for the community, you need cover all devices, no some, otherwise Adobe Air will continue every day more in oblivion.

If we as developer choosing Adobe AIR as platform to build mobile apps even as simple as "Hello World" apps, there are a huge percentage of Android user cant run it. Which means our apps is going to losing millions or billions of potential customer because of chosing Adobe AIR.

Another thing. Unity, Sencha, Titanium, etc, etc, etc have support to ARMv6 why Adobe don't want support these devices? - This causes only one result: the people will have to resign from adobe AIR mobile technology.

I hope that Adobe understand and bring AIR support on all those lower performance device (ARMv6) especially those new ARMv6 device

Report · Apr 18, 2013

Such as history says, today decision will verify in the future, remove the support ARMV6 maybe was good desition in the past but is wrong today, Adobe remove armv6 support since Air 2.6, this version was delivery few months later after Apple delivery iPhone4 where repplace the armv6

"armv6 Support

Because an armv7 processor is required to run versions of iOS later than 4.2.1, setting the "iOS Deployment target" to 4.3 or later means you no longer have to build your app for armv6."

. So maybe that was argument. This are the links (http://helpx.adobe.com/air/kb/archived-air-sdk-version.html, http://helpx.adobe.com/air/release-note/release-notes-air-developers-2.html, http://helpx.adobe.com/air/release-note/release-notes-developer-air-2-1.html, http://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#qa/qa1623/_index.html, )

But after 1year of their desition samsung delivery new and potential medium smarthphones such as Samsung Ace (most popular en Latin America, http://blog.gsmarena.com/galaxy-ace-and-gio-become-the-first-armv6-smartphones-to-get-cm10-ports/).

So Adobe is loss mobile war if continue in the line not support armv6 because each year new phones support armv6 with Android.

Well, appart of the history, alot of clients, users and developers find the way to install air, Adobe can see this link: http://www.chileandroid.com/t6513-adobe-flash-player-11-armv6-solo-instalar-el-apk and this link http://forums.adobe.com/thread/962678 or this link https://groups.google.com/forum/?fromgroups=#!topic/flashcodersny/CDvoxZaefVQ

Finally, some other technologies look long live for armv6 and maybe grown spectrum such as firefox: http://blog.mozilla.org/futurereleases/2013/01/11/firefox-for-android-beta-adds-additional-armv6-sup...

Today, the support Air into BB10 is very excited, we are near to finish do few changes in order to sopport that platform and the espectation of our customer are growing every time.