14 DAY TRIAL // Adobe has just introduced a new beta version of its Flash Player software which now includes several Windows specific options that are supposed to improve the experience on a touch-capable device.
Adobe Flash Player 15.0.0.130 Beta includes improved support for browser zoom levels, an enhancement that’s specifically designed for Windows 8 devices with a touch-capable display.
Adobe says that this particular improvement has been specifically developed to solve issues experienced in the past when trying to change the zoom level of playing Flash content, with browsers on Windows 8 sometimes causing playback speed problems.
“With our new implementation, we can now scale the content and 3D buffers to keep everything aligned. In addition, Flash Player introduces an option to render to an increased Stage3D back buffer, rather than scaling, on browser zoom to keep the resolution of the rendered content high. This option allows to the stage3D buffer to change in size in synch with the change in the browser zoom factor,” Adobe said.
At the same time, the new beta build includes a fullscreen orientation change that clearly comes in handy when playing Flash content on a tablet.
More and more Windows tablets are hitting the shelves these days, and since all support Flash content, it’s mandatory to improve the experience buyers get on these devices as well. Adobe claims that resizing is automatically performed now when running Flash content in full screen and device orientation changes.
“Flash Player will now detect and appropriately scale your content to fit best in a fullscreen display when your device orientation is changed. This change is specific to Windows and is implemented across all browsers. Developers, if your content does not resize, you will need to handle the resize event appropriately. Additional details will be made available in a separate blog post,” Adobe announced.
Last but not least, the new preview build brings a number of improvements for Chrome users on Windows, making hardware video decoding enabled by default in this browser.
Adobe says that this particular option will “drastically” reduce the CPU usage and improve performance on supported video players. The same feature should also be introduced on Mac OS X computers in the coming months, as the company is now working with Google to make it available in more Chrome builds.
In the meantime, Windows users can download Adobe Flash Player 15.0.0.130 Beta right now to see what’s new, but keep in mind that this build is still part of the development channel, so a number of bugs and errors could still be spotted.