All entries for Monday 21 April 2008

Flash 9 webcam support in Linux

This is a bit annoying – we’d planned to use a number of EEE PCs with our Flash-based media streaming applications for a new kiosk-based project, and after some spectacularly unsuccessful tests today with an EEE PC and a range of webcams (including the built-in one) it seems that the problem is with Flash itself – it only supports VideoForLinux (V4L) and not the current V4L Level 2. V4L was removed from the Linux kernel way back in 2006 so I was surprised to find that V4L L2 isn’t there in Flash Player 9.

Apart from the EEE PC, this also discounts an number of other potential devices like the N800/810 and we’ll have to look at Windows UMPCs instead (which is likely to severely impact the budget), or alternatively install Windows on the EEEs (which is a hassle).

I agree with Aral – there’s an explosion of ultra-mobile, Linux-based devices out there now with webcams that could be used to enable video and audio-based communications and blogging, but at the moment we can’t lever them in Flash, and that’s a shame.

Steven Carpenter : 21 Apr 2008 15:23 |  Tags: Flash Linux Rich Media Streaming Webcam |  Comments (3) |  Close comments |  Report a problem