Flash 11

Flash 11 has just gone live on the Android Market not even a few hours ago. Promising to be the "holy grail" of flash updates, Flash 11 is a massive step forward according to Adobe. The new version is available for both PC and Android.

Flash 11 uses Stage3D, and purportedly directly utilizes the GPU on your phone for a significant performance increase. The key to this new performance is Stage 3D.

"Stage3D API—a set of low-level GPU-accelerated APIs enabling advanced 2D and 3D capabilities across multiple screens and devices (desktop, mobile, and TV) through the Adobe Flash Platform runtimes. These APIs provide advanced 2D and 3D developers with the flexibility to leverage GPU hardware acceleration for significant performance gains."

Basically this means that games using Stage 3D will use the GPU in your phone and run buttery smooth on your Android phone or tablet.

Game and application developers are already taking advantage of the new Stage 3D engine, which is supposed to allow for smooth up to 60fps gameplay. Other features of flash 11 include

I installed Flash 11 onto my Nexus One as seen in pics on the right, and tested out Youtube in the browser. I wasn't able to change the resolution up to 72oP or 108oP which is what I'd hoped, in order to test out the new Stage 3d Platform. Howeve

Adobe is now completely focused on the Android mobile platform, and has discontinued trying to provide Flash support for the Iphone after too many issues with Apple. This is clearly due in part at least to Flash's security issues. Adobe needs to get on the ball and tighten up security, just as they've taken strong initiative with the promising Flash 11 version, that will get them better developer support and build trust in the product.

Head over to the market here to pick it up while its hot.