I have a lot of friends of mine who are working in e-learning domain as LMS Admins and Flash Developers and everyone out there seems to be a bit worried about Yahoo toolbar getting installed along with the Flash Player. The main reason being, most of the clients who have a need for e-learning have some sorts of restriction wherein they don't allow their employees to use Yahoo or other instant messaging clients within the office. Most of them seem to be surprised by a new Yahoo toolbar install option on the Player download page and they have requested for an alternative for this, something sorts of a page where one has the option only to install Flash Player. Since most of them have opened their firewall only to this page where they can only download the Flash Player and can install a Active X from there, they consider this more like a possible security breach and a threat to their intranet policy.
I asked most of them to refer their client to the Flash Player FAQ page which gives details as to what it is and is not about. But it seems some are still not convinced and are asking for alternatives for the same.
I personally don't like to comment about the decision of Macromedia by itself as I see it from two different perspective. Thinking of it from Macromedia perspective its a revenue model and a way of supporting a profitable and loyal client like Yahoo, I personally feel there isn't really anything wrong in it. On the other side, seeing it from a user perspective though it doesn't affect most of the independent developers and application developers directly, it does have some level of impact on the service oriented industries like the e-learning industry which have strict client's (mostly from the financial sector) who don't want their users to give a means by which they can download something which they are not supposed to be downloading or installing. Though a possible workaround is to store the Active X installer somewhere locally in an intranet website and ask the users to download it from there and install, there is lot of cost and effort involved in it which is about changing the existing re-directions pages to a new page for all the archived courses and the old ones. A considerable amount of effort need to spend in modifying those pages to a new one.
Comments
Unfortunately, it really boils down to organizations (particularly govt agencies) that are very stringent abbout browser plug-in like the Yahoo Toolbar. If organizations perceive there is any chance that these tools can be installed, they will simply restrict access to the Flash and Shockwave download pages using content filtering software (Websense, SurfControl, etc.) as a means to protect their environment. Macromedia needs to reccognize this and adjust accordingly.
Hi -
These are good concerns. To help your friends avoid this problem, here is a link to the Flash detection kit which allows for seamless installs of the Flash Player and avoids the download page where the Yahoo! toolbar is offered as a separate download to users running IE on Windows (this equates to roughly 5% of total downloads).
http://www.macromedia.com/software/flash/download/detection_kit
You can also read more about this on Mike Chambers' blog:
http://www.markme.com/mesh/archives/007219.cfm
Regards,
MD
Hi,
Actually, Yahoo! toolbar doesn't come bundled with Flash Player so it should not upset developers/users.
Let me clarify, Macromedia Flash Player installer doesn't contain Yahoo Toolbar.
Yahoo toolbar offer is only for those user who go to macromedia.com's flash player download page...That too for users with Internet Explorer without Yahoo! toolbar...
Download triggering from any other place(intranet, html wrappers) doesn't involve yahoo toolbar installation...
For example, you have made an application which requires flash 6 plug-in and user has some lower version of plug-in, user is prompted to install latest version and if he clicks "Yes" Flash player would be downloaded on his machine and installed... This covers more than 90% use-case for Flash Player download...So see there is no Yahoo toolbar installation.
So anyone going to Macromedia.com to download Flash Player, clearly sees two option and h/she can opt to download Flash Player only or along with Yahoo toolbar...
FYI! I was very upset with this decision, but when I looked into entire process I found there is no reason to be upset...Yeah an earlier announcement or communication would have stopped lot of developers from being upset or ranting...
I see this(Yahoo-Macromedia) relationship would surely lead more Flash usage on net hence more job opportunities, more flash player penetration etc. Yahoo is trusted company so its toolbar can be trusted and should not be treated as spyware...
my 2 cents...
-abdul