I was browsing through this site and found that some pages told me that it required Adobe Flash Player Plugin to work. And then I realized it is not free software. Now I am in a kind of dilemma. To install or not to install. What should I do?

These days it's almost impossible to surf the net without having flash installed, at least not without suffering a much-reduced "user experience". The majority of streaming media, like YouTube, uses flash players now, for example.

As for it being "non-Free", I don't think that's big of a deal. Not everything you use has to be Free in itself, as long as there are choices that are Free (see below). Adobe flash is "free as in beer", at least, and Adobe has in general not been particularly controlling or manipulative about it's proprietary formats. If they did try pulling any tricks at this point I think the backlash would be so intense that they'd either back off or have their format replaced by something more open. With Silverlight breathing down their backs now, I don't think they'd risk it.

But if you really want to go FREE, then take a look at gnash, the gnu project's attempt at creating an open-source flash player. I think it's good enough to play YouTube videos now, though you'll probably find that a lot of advanced stuff still doesn't work yet.

I believe that OpenOffice.org applications use java runtimes. Isn't the java runtimes too something proprietary to sun microsystems?

I have been suffering a much-reduced 'user experience' WITH flash! What you are describing is a very small portion of the web that is worthwile in having flash installed, the rest is flash-made advertisements, and I detest going to a site made purely of flash, it is rubbish!

Sun Microsystems is slowly releasing Java under the GPL, however there are some proprietary libraries that are not from Sun but from other parties that must be rewritten.

You have pushed one of my "hot buttons", but I'll try to control myself....
So what???? If you are basically just a user who wants to get work done, then it would be quite normal to collect a set of tools that fit your needs. Linux and OpenSource are exciting new products/paradigms for providing tools, but that does not make the traditional proprietary methods suddenly BAD!! The world is full of good SW products produced in the traditional ways---the increasing maturity of OpenSource does not intrinsically render all of them bad.

To be sure, many of us avoid certain products and companies as a matter of principle, but shunning all traditional products is (IMHO) a bit drastic.

I don't think any of us know how the various business models will play out. But the extreme view that all SW should be OpenSource is probably not going to happen. The world of SW changes and evolves rapidly---at any point in time, you have to decide if your objective is standing on principle or getting work done. Noone else can or should try to do that for you.

I agree to that. Flash looked cool when it got out back in the days, but after that it's come more like a pain. I do find that some things are nicely done with it, and don't have much bad to say about how YouTube uses Flash, but those ad forests made with Flash...grr. On the Windows box next room opening a Flash-ad'ed site causes the otherwise silent 2GHz machine take a CPU heap for some mad reason and start the fans at full speed, increasing noice pretty much (I haven't figured out any other reason to that except for sites with Flash animation that make the browser go mad).

Thinking about sites made with Flash only (I have visited some - it appears that some *expensive* clothing webstores do like to have some "glamour" by using only Flash) gives me creeps. The thing is overwhelmingly slow compared to "traditional" sites, doesn't look that much better and mostly just throws you a note that your Flash version is too old and you can't view the site. It's a good spice when used the right way, but really a pain when misused..so it's sort of like fire. Nice when small and controlled, but hardly something you want to cover your house with.

I do install Flash plugin myself. I'm aware of the non-proprietary Flash software projects, but at least for now I haven't much used them..Adobe's Flash works, and as long as they don't start making stupid moves it's ok to me. If the "options" develop good enough I don't have anything against switching to them. I have ad-blocking plugins in my browsers just because I can't stand all the ads covering the screen, yelling at me, most of them holding me stupid ("CLICK HERE TO GET THIS FERRARI FREE YEAH BABE IT'S FREE JUST CLICK HERE HEHEHE"). But some rare sites I visit use Flash where needed, and for those I need the plugin. YouTube is one, but it's not something I would miss if I had to give up.

Long story short: yes, go about installing the plugin, but also install an ad-block plugin, it'll save your nerves.

If you need Flash Player then install it. If you don't then don't.

Whether a piece of software is open source is only relevant to software developers who are interested in incorporating code from that product into their project. It makes no difference to anyone's ability to use the product. Adobe Flash Player is not open source, but it is free to use.

There is almost nothing in OpenOffice.org that requires Java. There are in theory some functions that don't work properly without Java being set up, but I've never come across any of these.

Sun product a Java Runtime environment, but it is not the only one. There are other Java systems available, including some open source ones.

I think Sun Java is open-source now anyway, but since I only use it anyway I haven't been closely following the source code.

The "Export to" functions require Java. I discovered this recently when I wanted to export a document I had to html on a machine that didn't have Java installed. If there's some way to get it to work without a jre, I haven't heard of it.

About Gnash. Sites that require Adobe flash player never say that it is gnash compatible. For e.g. gtalk on the web. I wonder if they have such things on their minds, I mean making it compatible for gnash?

And regarding java runtimes...is there any "free software" equivalent work that aims to be a runtime host almost like java.

Install it. Why does it have to be free software?

I guess the only option for Adobe is sue every repository database that offers their non-free flash plugin and get a list of IP's associated with those who downloaded it. As much as I hate flash websites, it has become a must to install it to navigate the web. While there are some instances where flash helps websites, there are cases where it gets in the way of the actual product.

I use GNU/Linux to stay away from having to pirate programs to get my computer into a workable workstation. With all of the repos and free software available, even from first boot, I don't need to keep buying software updates. I know some of the programs have windows installers, but when even windows is stolen by pretty much everyone I know (how many windows product keys can you find with google?), the point of using free software gets over shadowed.

If adobe thinks they aren't making enough money by people spending $3000 on industry standard software, then they will nickle and dime everyone by putting a little paypal button on everything that says get flash plugin here.

What libraries? (Not that I know java inside out). But I believe if you have to develop the runtimes for a linux system things would seem easier since developing (generally speaking) on linux is easy, because linux is free software. The point I am coming to is: why can't it be free software on linux at least...?

I haven't followed this in detail, but no company has any obligation to provide free or open-source SW for anything. I am in the camp that will take every reasonable opportunity to encourage companies to open up things, but in the short term, we have at least two choices:

1. Stand on principle--use only free SW--and accept the limitations.

2. Do whatever is required to get the system to where it meets our needs. This includes one or more of: Use proprietary but free stuff, Buy SW, Use FF instead of Iceweasel**, etc., etc., etc.

I choose #2---YMMV

**Iceweasel: One of the most absurd things in recent Linux history---Debian taking FF and giving it a new name, for reasons I am not capable of understanding.
Then of course we get a Poll on LQ asking which is better--FF or Iceweasel!!!!!!