Flash chosen for Motorola?

[bmgoodman]

Could Tivo have chosen to use Flash in the Premiere to make it easier to run on existing (Motorola) cable boxes? See http://www.multichannel.com/article/449644-Comcast_In_Talks_With_TiVo_About_Premiere_.php, where they state, "Comcast originally announced its distribution deal with TiVo in March 2005, and the project was beset with delays as the companies struggled to migrate the TiVo interface to a Java-based platform running on Motorola set-tops."

[ZeoTiVo]

Not just Motorola - Flash opens all kinds of business opportunities

[heySkippy]

I think Flash was chosen because it's a proven platform for inserting advertisements on top of content.

[litkaj]

I think Flash was chosen because it's a proven platform for inserting advertisements on top of content.

If there was a reputation system here I'd up that. I hate Flash (says a guy who has ordered two Premiere XL boxes)...

[bkdtv]

Could Tivo have chosen to use Flash in the Premiere to make it easier to run on existing (Motorola) cable boxes? See http://www.multichannel.com/article/449644-Comcast_In_Talks_With_TiVo_About_Premiere_.php, where they state, "Comcast originally announced its distribution deal with TiVo in March 2005, and the project was beset with delays as the companies struggled to migrate the TiVo interface to a Java-based platform running on Motorola set-tops."TiVo uses Flash + Actionscript for the same reason that web sites use it. It's an established platform that can be used to quickly and efficiently develop and deploy new interface elements.

TiVo's original approach was to code everything in C, as there were few alternatives that could provide the desired performance on older hardware. That made updating and improving the interface difficult. Developers required extensive knowledge of the code and its various dependencies to make any changes. People have complained for years about the lack of improvements and changes to the UI since the TiVo was introduced, the architecture behind the interface was a major reason for that.

Creating, updating, and maintaining a Flash interface with Actionscript is far less difficult. It allows TiVo to bring new user interface features and other improvements to the Premiere in a much more timely manner. Another benefit is the widespread use of Flash by TiVo's existing partners and potential new partners; Flash is used extensively by both advertisers and content providers, outside of Apple.

Adobe has worked to address the hardware requirements with the newest version of Flash. With the 10.1 release, they've implemented hardware acceleration for Flash using 3D manipulation (i.e. GPU functions). From the blog of an Adobe's lead Flash-Linux engineer (http://blogs.adobe.com/penguin.swf/):

The just released Adobe® Flash® Player 10 beta version includes two new window modes (wmode) which control how the Flash Player pushes its graphics to the screen.

Traditionally there have been 3 modes:

normal: In this mode we are using plain bitmap drawing functions to get our rasterized images to the screen. On Windows that means using BitBlt to get the image to the screen on OSX we are using CopyBits or Quartz2D if the browser supports it.

transparent: This mode tries to do alpha blending on top of the HTML page, i.e. whatever is below the SWF will show through. The alpha blending is usually fairly expensive CPU resource wise so it is advised not to use this mode in normal cases. In Internet Explorer this code path does actually not going through BitBlt, it is using a DirectDraw context provided by the browser into which we composite the SWF.

opaque: Somewhat esoteric, but it is essentially like transparent, i.e. it is using DirectDraw in Internet Explorer. But instead of compositing the Flash Player just overwrites whatever is in the background. This mode behaves like normal on OSX and Linux.

Now to the new modes:

direct: This mode tries to use the fastest path to screen, or direct path if you will. In most cases it will ignore whatever the browser would want to do to have things like overlapping HTML menus or such work. A typical use case for this mode is video playback. On Windows this mode is using DirectDraw or Direct3D on Vista, on OSX and Linux we are using OpenGL. Fidelity should not be affected when you use this mode.

gpu: This is fully fledged compositing (+some extras) using some functionality of the graphics card. Think of it being similar to what OSX and Vista do for their desktop managers, the content of windows (in flash language that means movie clips) is still rendered using software, but the result is composited using hardware. When possible we also scale video natively in the card. More and more parts of our software rasterizer might move to the GPU over the next few Flash Player versions, this is just a start. On Windows this mode uses Direct3D, on OSX and Linux we are using OpenGL.
The new Broadcom BCM7413 chip in the TiVo Premiere incorporates a 3D core with OpenGL support, although it is unclear to what extent it is being used to accelerate the current Premiere software. Adobe has found it challenging to implement Flash acceleration under Linux using 3D hardware, although they are working on it (http://blogs.adobe.com/penguin.swf/). Here's a reference to Broadcom:

Flash Player 10.1 has support for Broadcom's video decoding coprocessors (according to the release notes, the BCM70012 "LINK" chip). This is currently supported in Windows. Support for these chips in Mac and Linux would be nice but the drivers aren't ready yet.

[rainwater]

I think Flash was chosen because it's a proven platform for inserting advertisements on top of content.

You couldn't be more wrong. No existing ad technologies that use flash would work on a custom UI that doesn't allow interactivity except using a remote. The S3 already has a versatile advertising platform anyways.

[heySkippy]

You couldn't be more wrong.

Let's revisit this thread in a couple years and see how wrong I am.

[rainwater]

Let's revisit this thread in a couple years and see how wrong I am.

Tell me how using Flash for the UI makes creating a new advertising platform easier? TiVo already had a system for inserting custom advertisements. Using flash doesn't mean TiVo automatically will find another method of using ads that works. TiVo has tried for years to find an advertising model that works and for the most part they haven't. Using flash doesn't automatically fix this. Of course some users like yourself hear flash and think of ads on the web. Unfortunately for TiVo those types of ads do not work on a TiVo because of the way you interact with your DVR. If they did work, TiVo would of used these types of methods long ago.

[CuriousMark]

I am speculating, but could flash be used to download some advertising content over the internet instead of having to record it off of a paid program that is broadcast? If TiVo can switch away from having to use that broadcast, they might be able to save money in the long run. If TiVo could use an internet delivery mechanism it might also add significant flexibility in the amount and type of advertising content available to be shown to viewers. Would flash help them to do such a transition? I don't know, but it might be fun to think about.

[rainwater]

I am speculating, but could flash be used to download some advertising content over the internet instead of having to record it off of a paid program that is broadcast?

TiVo already supports that now. They don't need flash for it.

[MichaelK]

Not just Motorola - Flash opens all kinds of business opportunities



i'll bite- what might those be?

[ZeoTiVo]

i'll bite- what might those be?

do a google search on all the widgets being created for network connected TVs- Flash on TiVo makes it much easier to get those on TiVo. And yes, of course ads also become easier in a flash setup though as others pointed out TiVo already had an interactive ad environment put together. I think TiVo had to devote its own resources for its own HME style though- versus Flash being more prevalent.