What's up with Flash crashing all the time lately?

[superboyac]

Lately, roughly about the last year or so, flash is crashing all the time.  firefox, chrome, doesn't matter.  At least multiple times a day for me.  All different computers...work, home, laptop, etc.  ESPN...like every day I think.

[TaoPhoenix]

Unclear - that's a wide "symptom" spread!

I've sorta been okay - no worse crashes than usual ... but then you said "a year" so my memory doesn't go back enough for the three-odd Flash updates!

What arena do you want to tackle first? Is it Youtube Videos, a Flash chat room, Other?

[Renegade]

Lately, roughly about the last year or so, flash is crashing all the time.  firefox, chrome, doesn't matter.  At least multiple times a day for me.  All different computers...work, home, laptop, etc.  ESPN...like every day I think.

-superboyac (October 15, 2013, 10:41 PM)

I think you're quite mistaken.

It's not "crashing". It's not a bug. It's a FEATURE. It's there to help you stop goofing off on the Internet all the time. Those thoughtful little software engineers at Adobe! Gotta love 'em~! 

[Vurbal]

Flash was a useful technology for a good long time (in computer years anyway) but in today's world it's a solution in need of a problem. If not for the legacy install base on the server side it would have disappeared already.

As to superboyac's problem, it sounds like there's some kind of system issue involved and not just Flash itself. I haven't noticed it crashing any more than usual over the last few months - sometimes more often when a bad update comes out but nothing I'm not used to seeing from time to time. The fact that it happens on Chrome and Firefox both is suspicious because (unless you manually change it) Chrome uses its own Flash install which I believe is customized somewhat for Chrome.

It's possible there's some kind of video driver issue involved so the first thing I'd do is check for updates and maybe even uninstall/reinstall if you have the most current driver. If it's an ATI card I'd recommend using their Driver Autodetect utility and also the Uninstall program to thoroughly clean out the old driver before installing a new (or the same) one.

I'm less familiar (as in not really at all anymore) with Nvidia's drivers. If nothing else I imagine they at least have some type of autodetect option on their website if not a downloadable client like ATI. Hopefully they have an uninstaller too - or barring that hopefully you're using uninstall software that monitors installer activity and can do the cleaning for you.

[techidave]

nvidia does have a driver detect option on their website that I have used before.  Not sure about an uninstaller other than the one that comes with their software.

[40hz]

Can't speak for all but I've noticed a recent tendency on my machines for flv to lockup or misload in Firefox (under Linux) when watching YouTube vids - sometimes to the point where the only alternative was to download the vid and watch it with VLC. 

But I suspect thats likely more a YT or FF issue.

Other than that, Flash videos seem to work just fine.

[tomos]

have had some quirks with flash in the last year, but few crashes. FF/Win7 64bit.

edit// not using any flash based chat sites as Tao mentions below

[TaoPhoenix]

On another site people have reported that the flash based chat site seems to be crashing in Firefox 24.

And I myself have noticed random crashes on misc sites, just without specifically pinning them to Flash.

[Vurbal]

Well I definitely can't speak for FF 24 since I almost always wait at least a week or 2 before updating to a new version. Too many plugins that could potentially stop working.

[wraith808]

but in today's world it's a solution in need of a problem.

-Vurbal (October 16, 2013, 05:07 AM)

Actually, I think that's backwards.

but in today's world it's a solution problem in need of a problem solution.

-Vurbal (October 16, 2013, 05:07 AM)

There... much better. 

[Vurbal]

but in today's world it's a solution in need of a problem.

-Vurbal (October 16, 2013, 05:07 AM)

Actually, I think that's backwards.

but in today's world it's a solution problem in need of a problem solution.

-Vurbal (October 16, 2013, 05:07 AM)

There... much better. 

-wraith808 (October 16, 2013, 12:40 PM)

That's a fair point. It's certainly evolved into that.

Of course the real point is Flash was developed to fill in gaps in web standards that simply don't exist any more. In fact I imagine part of the reason it seems more kludgy as it continues to mature (ie decay) is trying to cram the current standards into Flash.

There's no need for Flash Video. Flash already has (substandard) H.264 support. If there was a need it would be on YouTube but they're owned by Google who also bought On2, the company that actually created FLV. The predominant use for Flash nowadays is more resistant (and persistent) tracking cookies.

In fact now that I think about it the closest parallel would probably be the Ask Toolbar. It used to be a product with some consumer purpose but now it's a nuisance at best.

[superboyac]

Can't speak for all but I've noticed a recent tendency on my machines for flv to lockup or misload in Firefox (under Linux) when watching YouTube vids - sometimes to the point where the only alternative was to download the vid and watch it with VLC. 

But I suspect thats likely more a YT or FF issue.

Other than that, Flash videos seem to work just fine.

-40hz (October 16, 2013, 07:36 AM)

I think in my case I'm noticing it most of the time with ESPN and youtube.

[Vurbal]

Can't speak for all but I've noticed a recent tendency on my machines for flv to lockup or misload in Firefox (under Linux) when watching YouTube vids - sometimes to the point where the only alternative was to download the vid and watch it with VLC. 

But I suspect thats likely more a YT or FF issue.

Other than that, Flash videos seem to work just fine.

-40hz (October 16, 2013, 07:36 AM)

I think in my case I'm noticing it most of the time with ESPN and youtube.

-superboyac (October 16, 2013, 03:12 PM)

ESPN is definitely one of the worst Flash offenders IME. As much video as they serve it's actually all the other Flash crap (from ooyala and akamai IIRC) that probably causes the problems. The content itself doesn't account for most of the Flash being used as far as I can tell. Go to ESPN.com with a fresh, untrained NoScript install and you can spend all day tweaking settings without ever seeing more than a frame of any given video.

And of course YouTube is Google + video. Nuff said.

[TaoPhoenix]

but in today's world it's a solution in need of a problem.

-Vurbal (October 16, 2013, 05:07 AM)

Actually, I think that's backwards.

but in today's world it's a solution problem in need of a problem solution.

-Vurbal (October 16, 2013, 05:07 AM)

There... much better.  

-wraith808 (October 16, 2013, 12:40 PM)

(Parody!)
"And then the Solution and the Problem became so indistinguishable that you could no longer tell one from the other..."
"The Other Orwell Book"! (Animal Farm)

Gawdammit why was that man so awfully, horribly right on?

[Renegade]

(Parody!)
"And then the Solution and the Problem became so indistinguishable that you could no longer tell one from the other..."
"The Other Orwell Book"! (Animal Farm)

Gawdammit why was that man so awfully, horribly right on?

-TaoPhoenix (October 16, 2013, 11:36 PM)

Problem. Reaction. Solution.

He knew his Hegelian dialectic very well.

There's even a song for it:

OFF-TOPIC - An explanation of the Hegelian dialectic with examples

[TaoPhoenix]

Flash's little brother Javascript is climbing up there as a Thing To Avoid too, but much more complex! The signature case is Chessbase, who last week decided to do live pulls from its game server, making me want to block scripts on the news summary page, and then turn it back on to use the game replayer script!

Since I'm no genius with NoScript, I just toggle that QuickJS addon back and forth all day!

Tumblr is up there with the world's most obnoxious slider! if your mouse strays over the "Facebook Icon", the ENTIRE page slides to the right to show a "Like us" ad! But if you totally turn Javascript off, then the auto-pic-loader stops working! At least Element Hiding Helper for AdBlock helps a little there!

[Renegade]

Flash's little brother Javascript is climbing up there as a Thing To Avoid too, but much more complex! The signature case is Chessbase, who last week decided to do live pulls from its game server, making me want to block scripts on the news summary page, and then turn it back on to use the game replayer script!

Since I'm no genius with NoScript, I just toggle that QuickJS addon back and forth all day!

Tumblr is up there with the world's most obnoxious slider! if your mouse strays over the "Facebook Icon", the ENTIRE page slides to the right to show a "Like us" ad! But if you totally turn Javascript off, then the auto-pic-loader stops working! At least Element Hiding Helper for AdBlock helps a little there!

-TaoPhoenix (October 17, 2013, 06:14 AM)

JavaScript is a different case. It seems to me like you're complaining about people being obnoxious when they code up some JS stuff. JS doesn't crash your browser or system.

Flash on the other hand crashes your browser and can crash your system, especially when combined with the typical BS you get from video card drivers.  poo + poo = poopoo.

I've had problems with Flash & video drivers giving be BSODs or freezing my machine. Crappy consumer hardware + crappy use of Windows by component/application software = unhappiness.

My guess is that your Flash problems are linked to your video drivers, but, other people have already chimed in on that. And it's all still a "feature".

[Stoic Joker]

So how do we sum up everyone's feelings about Flash??

How about this:

[app103]

Can't speak for all but I've noticed a recent tendency on my machines for flv to lockup or misload in Firefox (under Linux) when watching YouTube vids - sometimes to the point where the only alternative was to download the vid and watch it with VLC. 

But I suspect thats likely more a YT or FF issue.

Other than that, Flash videos seem to work just fine.

-40hz (October 16, 2013, 07:36 AM)

This...and it is fairly recent, like the last few weeks. And I believe it's a Youtube issue, as switching browsers when it happens doesn't seem to fix the issue, when I come across a video that stops dead and refuses to play or continue playing.

JS doesn't crash your browser or system.

-Renegade (October 17, 2013, 07:01 AM)

Obviously you haven't tried surfing the modern web with a really old, low spec computer. There was a reason why I once contemplated creating my own browser that would default to the mobile versions of sites, on the desktop. 

And I discovered (by accident) in 2001 how to crash all versions of a certain browser, and cause a BSOD, with a tiny bit of seemingly normal, harmless JS. 

[Vurbal]

So how do we sum up everyone's feelings about Flash??

How about this: (see attachment in previous post)

-Stoic Joker (October 17, 2013, 11:32 AM)

I might go so far as to extend that to Adobe as a whole.

[tomos]

Updated to version 11 yesterday
Keeps crashing Firefox (25.0.1) with Youtube today :-(

[40hz]

I'm rapidly reaching the point where I'm gonna add YouTube to my list of other "don't go" places (i.e. Facebook, Twitter, Woot!, Slashdot, et al)..