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Posted by: jimlongo Sep 18 2006, 09:14 PM

Read this important warning
http://www.adobe.com/support/security/bulletins/apsb06-11.html
http://secunia.com/advisories/21865/

If you enable Flash in your browsers make sure you upgrade to v9

Posted by: pandy Sep 18 2006, 09:27 PM

Talking about which, how do you check what version of flash you have in different browsers? I know I can write 'about:plugins' in the address bar in Opera and Moz browsers, but Opera doesn't list the version number. I have no idea how to find out in IE.

Posted by: Christian J Sep 19 2006, 03:47 AM

This page claims it will tell you: http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/knowledgebase/index.cfm?id=tn_15507

Posted by: pandy Sep 19 2006, 12:40 PM

That's handy even if "In some cases the version number reported in the movie above may not match the version of the installed Flash Player". But there ought to be a way to tell directly. They should have a gadget for that, like Java has.

Posted by: jimlongo Sep 19 2006, 01:58 PM

The test seems very reliable on a Mac . . . you could also getinfo on the 2 files

/Library/Internet Plug-Ins/Flash Player Enabler.plugin
/Library/Internet Plug-Ins/Flash Player.plugin

Posted by: Christian J Sep 19 2006, 03:29 PM

Hm, in Windows can't you just right-click on a Flash animation? Then the context menu should say something like "About Adobe Flash player 9".

Posted by: pandy Sep 19 2006, 04:07 PM

Yes, you can. It takes to to a detection script at Adobe that tells you the exact number (that I guess can be wrong judging from the above). What I mean is there should be an easy way so one could just look it up.

Mac nazi!

Posted by: Christian J Sep 19 2006, 05:04 PM

I didn't mean you had to go to Adobe, you could just look at the context menu. Of course you do need to enable Flash in the browser, and find a Flash animation to right-click on.

Posted by: jimlongo Sep 19 2006, 05:10 PM

There must be a good comeback line for that . . . something along the lines of re-install your software, edit the registry, or look in the Start menu . . .



I just can't think of it right now

Posted by: pandy Sep 19 2006, 05:38 PM

It's just my envy talking. I want a Mac. Those things that can run both Mac and Windows OS sounds cool. Do you know if that works well?

Posted by: jimlongo Sep 19 2006, 08:22 PM

Yes BootCamp works very well AFAIK, the downside with that currently is that one must boot into whichever OS one prefers.
There is also http://www.parallels.com/ which runs WIndows in emulation, (and rumours are that BootCamp will do that in 10.5 (january or so).

That will be very cool, OSX, BSD and WinXP at the same time with the ability to drag and drop between them.

Posted by: pandy Sep 19 2006, 09:31 PM

Isn't emulation slow though?

That Bootcamp thing, which Macs have that?

Posted by: jimlongo Sep 19 2006, 10:11 PM

Some http://www.macintouch.com/readerreports/virtualization/topic4195.html claim Parallels is very fast.



Any Intel-based Mac . . . which is every model currently shipping. It is http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=303572. You need to supply WindowsXP installer discs.

Posted by: pandy Sep 19 2006, 10:35 PM

Oh, they are all Intel now? I thought that was a special line. I've only seen a mac through a shop window so you have to excuse my ignorance.

Posted by: jimlongo Sep 19 2006, 10:53 PM

http://store.apple.com/Catalog/US/Images/intlstoreroutingpage.html?cid=AOSA10000022132
Too bad they don't have an Apple Store near you . . . I just visited visited http://www.apple.com/retail/fifthavenue/week/20060917.html last month . . . it was quite an http://www.apple.com/retail/fifthavenue/gallery/.

Posted by: pandy Sep 19 2006, 11:13 PM

Yeah, but I don't want to read all that stuff. I just get confused.

Gosh. What are all thsoe people standing in line waiting for?

Posted by: Brian Chandler Sep 19 2006, 11:47 PM

Yeah, well, about enabling Flash... I never seem to be able to disable it, which is something I want to do more often, because Flash seems to be used more than anything else for Really Annoying distractions.

Can anyone explain - for example - why the Firefox developer's toolbar, which allows you to switch pretty much anything on or off, doesn't even mention Flash. Are there some dirty tricks going on?

Posted by: pandy Sep 20 2006, 12:22 AM

No, I've never understood why it can't be easily disabled either. I have a gadget for IE though.

Posted by: pandy Sep 20 2006, 12:25 AM

But that doesn't give me the full version number. I have to go to Adobe to get that. And what if I can't find a flash file?

Posted by: Brian Chandler Sep 20 2006, 03:24 AM

Never mind about _easily_: I'm using Firefox under Linux, and I can't remember if I explicitly installed a Flash player, but when I right-click on an irritating animation, I get a menu, the bottom item of which reads "About Macromedia Flash Player 7..." - and clicking this menu item has no disernible effect.

Does anyone know if/how I can check for the Flash player in the Firefox menus. Can't find it.

(ISTR that in the old days with IE once Flash was in installed the only way to get rid of it was _extremely_ tedious. Hard to believe this stuff isn't deliberate.)

Posted by: jimlongo Sep 20 2006, 08:48 AM

I suppose it's the same as the other FF platforms -
type about:plugins in the address line

Unfortunately FF doesn't report so well, but you should see something like this

here it is reporting 9.0.r16

N.B. - my FF doesn't report the proper version number for some plugins, noteably QuickTime is reported as 7.0 when it's really 7.1.3

Posted by: jimlongo Sep 20 2006, 09:05 AM

You just need to find the Flash Player.plugin and remove it . . . and while that may have been excruciating in the old days of Windows you should be able to grep that file and move it in Linux pretty easily

Posted by: jimlongo Sep 20 2006, 09:06 AM

You have Flash7, which is the latest version available for Linux.

Posted by: jimlongo Sep 20 2006, 11:48 AM

You want me to tell you what to do? . . . watch for my infommercial, very late on Sunday evenings . . .


You want a laptop of desktop?
PM me and I'll advise you.

Posted by: pandy Sep 20 2006, 03:29 PM

I want it all, baby!

I was primarily thinking laptop (because I've never had one). I can't afford it now anyway. Prices are at least 50% higher here, too.

Posted by: Christian J Sep 20 2006, 04:28 PM

I've thought of getting a Mac with bootcamp, but then you must reboot to get to Windows, and you have no hardware backup.

If you instead buy a separate PC and say a Mac Mini you can use a common monitor/keyboard/mouse (with a switcher), and if one breaks down you'll at least have the other.

I've also heard you can run Mac OS on a PC, but there were some problems with drivers and I don't think it's totally legal.

Posted by: pandy Sep 20 2006, 05:05 PM

I'm keeping my PC. I only have one computer and I want another. The Mac sounds like a cool solution.

Yeah, there's an open source (I think) mac emulator for PC. It's a couple of years since I read about it. Back then they said it could sometimes *beep* your computer up if you didn't know what you were doing. I think it's legal if you own the OS. If you steal it it isn't.

Posted by: pandy Sep 20 2006, 05:08 PM

I came up with a new sig. "I clean up your HTML for a PowerBook".

Posted by: Brian Chandler Sep 20 2006, 10:35 PM

Oh right - thanks.

Next time, when I've forgotten the incantation "about:plugins", how would I find it again? (Seems odd that there is no "Remove plugin" button - if I move the file, obviously it won't work, but how do I know if this messes up Fx?)

The more basic problem is that I want (and I can't be alone) to be able to stop Flashing (what a name!) when it's irritating - I might want to watch something else. Ice pose I should use a different browser for Flash viewing.

Posted by: jimlongo Sep 20 2006, 11:05 PM

Sometimes I use Omniweb, it allows blocking of ads using regular expressions . . . so if I block \.swf$ then they just show up as a blank frame, if i decide I want to see it I can click on the frame and receive the animation.

Pandy mentioned some 3rd party windows tool that allows you to turn off flash.


What about Opera? Can't the content blocker do that?

Posted by: Darin McGrew Sep 20 2006, 11:36 PM

I just leave plugins disabled in Opera (along with JavaScript, Java, animation, iframes, etc.) unless it's a site I trust enough to enable them. You can't enable/disable specific plugins, but you can enable/disable plugins on a site-by-site basis.

Posted by: pandy Sep 20 2006, 11:54 PM

Can anyone I explain why I get a login prompt for imaginatorium.org everytime I visit this thread by clicking a link in an email notification?

As you can see in the task bar I have no other browser windows open.



No, I'm not joking. It isn't a montage.

Posted by: pandy Sep 20 2006, 11:55 PM

Great! I got it when I submitted the post above too. I don't get it when I click the link from the forum page.

<EDIT>
Now I managed to get it when I clicked the forum link too.

Posted by: pandy Sep 21 2006, 12:03 AM

Ha ha! It's his avatar! I thought I had the feared Brian virus.

Posted by: Brian Chandler Sep 21 2006, 04:04 AM

Hmm, I never got that login...

Incidentally, where does this "avatar" word come from? Am I a Hindu deity?

Posted by: jimlongo Sep 21 2006, 10:21 AM

I got that last night as well . . . I figured it was time to go to bed

Posted by: Christian J Sep 23 2006, 12:17 PM

I can't remember seeing that before, but now I noticed it on another forum where an image was hotlinked. Could it be some anti-leech scheme in play (but PW-protecting a image seems a bit drastic of the image owner)? Or has something in IE6 changed suddenly?

Posted by: pandy Sep 23 2006, 04:53 PM

I guess he put his avatar in the wrong directory.

I had scrolled the avatars off the window and I saw nothing in his single post that could cause this so I was really confused. Didn't occur to me that he could use an avatar since I hadn't noticed one before.

Posted by: Peter1968 Sep 23 2006, 08:33 PM

Firefox Flashblock plug-in

https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/433/

Flashblock - replaces all instances of Flash in a page with an "F" icon.

Not sure if Opera has a similar functionality, but somehow I doubt it.

Posted by: Brian Chandler Sep 24 2006, 08:45 AM

Well, the other way round really - the file was already in the wrong directory...



Can't understand the last sentence. It was just that I was using random images to replace the pie chart things that my web server stats analyser thingie is supposed to provide but doesn't for some reason, and therefore this (irrelevant) file just happened to be in a password-protected directory.

Smilies in bulk:

Posted by: Brian Chandler Sep 24 2006, 09:00 AM

Thanks - great! There doesn't seem to be a way of stopping it once started, but I can usually resist the temptation. Quite a lot of Flash though does seem to be deliberately distracting, to the point where I end up adjusting the window to get the jiggling bits outside the frame. It'll be easier now...

Posted by: Peter1968 Sep 25 2006, 10:42 AM

You're welcome!

Seeing Flash utilised on websites doesn't disturb me as much as it obviously does some other posters, but a lot of it is annoying and that plug-in nips it in the bud. Doesn't even load the file.