In the Debian +popularity-contest numbers, the adobe-flashplugin package the +second most popular used package that is missing in Debian. The sixth +most poular is flashplayer-mozilla. This is a clear indication that +working flash is important for Debian users. Around 10 percent of the +users submitting data to popcon.debian.org have this package +installed.
+ +In the report written by Lars Risan in August 2008 +(«Skolelinux +i bruk â Rapport for Hurum kommune, Universitetet i Agder og +stiftelsen SLX Debian Labs»), one of the most important problems +schools experienced with Debian +Edu/Skolelinux was the lack of working Flash. A lot of educational +web sites require Flash to work, and lacking working Flash support in +the web browser and the problems with installing it was perceived as a +good reason to stay with Windows.
+ +I once saw a funny and sad comment in a web forum, where Linux was +said to be the retarded cousin that did not really understand +everything you told him but could work fairly well. This was a +comment regarding the problems Linux have with proprietary formats and +non-standard web pages, and is sad because it exposes a fairly common +understanding of whose fault it is if web pages that only work in for +example Internet Explorer 6 fail to work on Firefox, and funny because +it explain very well how annoying it is for users when Linux +distributions do not work with the documents they receive or the web +pages they want to visit.
+ +This is part of the reason why I believe it is important for Debian +and Debian Edu to have a well working Flash implementation in the +distribution, to get at least popular sites as Youtube and Google +Video to working out of the box. For Squeeze, Debian have the chance +to include the latest version of Gnash that will make this happen, as +the new release 0.8.8 was published a few weeks ago and is resting in +unstable. The new version work with more sites that version 0.8.7. +The Gnash maintainers have asked for a freeze exception, but the +release team have not had time to reply to it yet. I hope they agree +with me that Flash is important for the Debian desktop users, and thus +accept the new package into Squeeze.
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