微软Windows 8即将在IE10中封杀Flash，除非你的网站在他们的白名单中

简单讲就是微软计划在10月26日发布Windows 8。通过Windows 8，微软决定限制Flash使用，推动无插件版IE10。我们已经知道Windows 8的IE10有两个版本，一个是桌面版，一个是Windows UI版（以前叫Metro风格，因为麦德龙商标争议而弃用）。两个版本都内置了Flash，但如果你的网站不在微软的白名单内，Windows UI版将不会运行Flash。如果网站不在白名单内，你需要写封邮件给微软，提供网站和是否符合Flash内容政策的细节。

值得注意的，微软针对插件Activex也给开发员提供出了解决方案，网站开发员需要在网页头部增加一个IE专属申明，以试图兼容列表模式解析网页，具体代码如下

<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="requiresActiveX=true" />

同时IE会给用户弹出一个提示信息，看来鱼和熊掌不能兼得，如下图

小结：中国网页开发人员发来贺电，感谢并祝贺微软为推动HTML5实业做出了伟大贡献。 也加速了Adobe的Flash的死亡，同时催促Adobe加快开发Flash的过渡产品 Flash2HTML5

以是引用的原文。

Yeah you read that right. I just received an interesting email from Brightcove (the video delivery guys) about issues with their Flash based solution and Windows 8 running the new Internet Explorer 10. To quote:

We wanted to make you aware of a development with Microsoft around Windows 8 that may affect your video content delivered through Brightcove Video Cloud.
Background
Microsoft is expected to release the next version of Windows, Windows 8, on October 26th. With Windows 8, Microsoft has made a decision to limit the use of Flash as a means for delivering content and move toward a concept of a plug-in free experience in Internet Explorer 10. As a result, sites will not be allowed to serve Flash in Internet Explorer 10 unless they have been given prior approval and have been whitelisted by Microsoft.
What this means for you
The default browser experience in the new Windows UI will not allow Flash unless the site has been approved and granted access by Microsoft. Therefore, if a Brightcove Video Cloud customer is looking for a full featured playback experience that is on par with Windows 7 today, they will need to submit a request to Microsoft in order to be whitelisted.

My initial reaction was “surely not???” and a quick search of the web indicates that there is a great deal of confusion as to what the IE10 behavior will actually be. However the Brightcove email provides an link to a handy Microsoft support article which clears things up.

Basically:

1. Windows 8 ships with two (!) versions of Internet Explorer 10. One for the desktop experience and one for the Windows UI experience.
2. Both ship with a built in version of Flash BUT the Windows UI version won’t run Flash unless your site is on a whitelist. The Desktop version will run Flash as normal.
3. You can add a meta tag to your pages which will trigger a prompt to the user to run your site in the desktop IE if they visit it using the Windows UI version of IE (a lovely user experience… not)
4. Lastly they give details on how you get you site added to the whitelist (basically emailing Microsoft with the details of your site and details of how it conforms to Microsoft’s Flash Content Guidelines)

Buried in the support article is the following reasoning for the difference in behavior between the Desktop and Windows UI IE version’s Flash support:

While any site can play Flash content in Internet Explorer 10 for the desktop, only sites that are on the Compatibility View (CV) list for Flash can play Flash content within Internet Explorer 10 in the the new Windows UI. We place sites with Flash content on the CV list if doing so delivers the best user experience in Internet Explorer 10 with those sites. For example, how responsive is the content to touch? Does it work well with the onscreen keyboard, or affect battery life? Do visual prompts comply with the Windows Store app user experience guidelines? Sites that rely on capabilities (for example, rollover events and peer-to-peer (P2P) functionality) that are not supported within Windows UX guidelines for Windows Store apps, and don’t degrade gracefully in their absence, are better off running in Internet Explorer 10 for the desktop with Flash.

Which seems fair enough but kinda underscores the point that having the Windows UI on the desktop version of Windows 8 (and making it the default) doesn’t really make sense when you consider what the user will be doing when they sit down at a PC to work.

It will be interesting to see if Windows 8 lands with a splash or a thud on October 26. I suspect it might be a thud and a whimper. Certainly it looks like Flash and the web are going to be in for a rough ride.