BBC iPlayer & Flash

Manxman_in_exile

I've been getting a warning on iPlayer that Flash won't be usable after this year.


I'm (still) on Windows 7 and according to the BBC advice I need to update my browser or change it. I generally use IE and as far as I can see it's the latest version (11) and it's flagged to update automatically.


I've got no problem using another browser (I use Firefox for itvPlayer) but I'm curious to know does this mean iPlayer won't work next year with IE?


(I have noticed that since the warning message started appearing, iPlayer doesn't appear so "smooth" and if it's on full-screen I can't get the bar along the bottom to appear - play/pause, volume, subtitles etc - without pressing escape - and even that doesn't always work).

poppellerant

I use Firefox as my main browser and am yet to install Flash - and I have no desire to install Flash unless I need to. iPlayer works in Firefox without Flash installed, so I would try iPlayer on Firefox and see if it works for you too.

thorganby

Yes you simply need to stop using Internet Explorer which has always played catch up with the other browsers available.

Estimates for Internet Explorer's market share are about 2.0% across all platforms worldwide.

I haven't used IE since Windows 95!

BBC video and audio content is delivered to web browsers using one of our two video players: the HTML5 player and the Flash player.

In most cases the HTML5 player is used by default - where it's compatible with browser and content. In some cases, the Flash player will be used instead. There is no appreciable difference in video quality or functionality between them.

If we give you the Flash player by default you can use this page to select the HTML5 player instead. There will be an opt-in to the right if this is an option for your browser.

There are some places where the HTML5 player won't work. These include:

Windows XP
Internet Explorer on Windows 8.1 or below
Safari on MacOS El Capitan or older

source https://www.bbc.co.uk/html5

Farway

iplayer is going to have a revamp anyway so "problem" could be resolved later
https://www.trustedreviews.com/news/bbc-iplayer-is-set-to-undergo-a-dramatic-redesign-3944560

Neil_Jones

Farway wrote: »

iplayer is going to have a revamp anyway so "problem" could be resolved later
https://www.trustedreviews.com/news/bbc-iplayer-is-set-to-undergo-a-dramatic-redesign-3944560

That's just a redesign and a paint job, its not going to fix the fact that in order to get iPlayer working on native browsers earlier than Windows 8.1, Flash is needed. That's just the way that's always going to work as IE under windows 8.1 and earlier does not support the new technologies and to add them is probably more effort than it's worth for the user base, particularly for Windows 8. Windows 7 might have a higher usage market compared to 8 but it drops out of support in two months anyway, followed at the end of the year by Flash.

Easiest solution is just not to use IE for iPlayer. Switch to Firefox (or Chrome or whatever you like) for everything to do on the internet.

Manxman_in_exile

Thanks all.

[Deleted User]

I use safari and have been getting the "won't work in the new year"message for weeks now, I do have chrome so will hopefully be ok.

Manxman_in_exile

OK. I tried iPlayer on Firefox and it seems much better - or at least much better than my recent experiences with IE. And there's no message about Flash.


Thanks again