Spoofing the flash version

ConnorBehan · 2008-08-17 16:11:53

Flashplugin 10 is proving to be quite a bit faster than 9 but it makes firefox crash unexpectedly on some sites that don't involve flash at all, so I've started disabling the plugin until I need it. I'd like to try something that's less of a pain though.

I found this tip for using Gnash with mozplugger:

application/x-shockwave-flash:swf:Shockwave Flash
     loop: gnash -v "$file"
     : gnash -v "$file"

And it works for a few things, however it's not very useful since Gnash fails to play several files such as Youtube videos.

I then tried to setup the MediaPlayerConnectivity extension to use the standalone flashplayer. That worked for some things as well but when I tried it on youtube, and "empty player" with no FLV file loaded appeared in flash so it appears that youtube only works for player "plugged in" to the browser.

If I could somehow embed flash in firefox using mozplugger rather than the flash plugin, I think it's possible that it would play youtube videos. And presumably it wouldn't crash as I wouldn't be using the flash plugin directly. I tried the above command for mozpluggerrc except changed gnash to flashplayer.

The only problem is, Youtube kindly performs a check of whether or not I have flash and says that I don't. Stupid youtube! I'm looking around for other sites I can test this out on but alot of them are checking for the flash version too.

Is there a way to pass a "yes I have flash" string to those stupid websites but actually use the mozplugger route? If there is a howto on watching youtube videos with mozplugger that would be good but I haven't found one. And I know there are several programs to download and watch youtube videos. Those are good, but I'd rather have an approach that works with every site that takes a similar approach.

Army · 2008-08-17 16:49:16

Your problem with youtube could be solved by the plugin called greasemonkey, which can be found here. Then you go this site and install this script by clicking on "Install this script". You need to have mplayer-plugin or vlc installed (I use the mplayer-plugin and it works perfectly!) and your youtube videos are played by this plugin. You can configure it to always use high-quality videos so you'll have a very nice visual experience on youtube Give it a try!

ConnorBehan · 2008-08-17 23:54:16

That looks like one of the best ways to watch youtube videos but it's youtube specific. It doesn't work for other sites that have "servers passing flv files as arguments to swf files" like megavideo, tudou and dailymotion.

Actually forget what I said before. Embedding any type of standalone flashplayer into mozilla via mozplugger seems to no longer work. I tried:

application/x-shockwave-flash:swf:Shockwave Flash
     loop: app "$file"
     : app "$file"

application/x-shockwave-flash:swf:Shockwave Flash
        loop noisy swallow(app): app -v "$file"

application/x-shockwave-flash:swf:Shockwave Flash
        repeat noisy swallow(app) fill: app "$file"

application/x-shockwave-flash:swf:Shockwave Flash
        HELPER(app "$file")

app = either flashplayer, gnash or swfdec-player and none of them make anything show up on any flash site. Is there a way to make mozplugger embed a desired application? Or does it only do it for specific applications it was written for?

tigrmesh · 2008-08-19 03:51:59

I realize this wouldn't be very convenient, but it is possible to view YouTube videos with youtube-dl and mplayer. For example, to view Linus Torvalds talking about how to pronounce his name (short video), you just need to

youtube-dl http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IfHm6R5le0

When it had finished downloading, youtuve-dl saved the video as 5IfHm6R5le0.flv. Then to view it:

mplayer 5IfHm6R5le0.flv

ConnorBehan · 2008-08-23 21:17:20

I rebuilt mozplugger with make linux BUILD=DEBUG to try and get more information. I also put the full path /usr/bin/flashplayer in mozpluggerrc. That got it to embed flash all the time but it can't accept FLV files that are passed to it. I hate how those work... every site does it a different way and they seem to involve a server checking for http referrers or something. And going back to flashplugin is a problem too. Since I got mozplugger working with Flash turning off mozplugger and turning on flashplugin won't work. I had to uninstall mozplugger to get flashplugin working. Something is messed up with the way Firefox handles plugins.

Actually the ultimate solution would be writing a Greasemonkey script or extension (or plugin, or patching firefox and rebuilding to be really masochistic) that knows how to manipulate plugins. Having flashplugin enabled at all times is buggy but if I could get something to check if the site uses flash whenever I go to a new site and if so turn on flashplugin, and then turn off flashplugin as soon as I navitgate away from that site, it'd be the perfect workaround.

Last edited by ConnorBehan (2008-08-23 21:20:05)

toorima · 2008-08-23 22:26:25

flashblock might be what you want https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/433

ConnorBehan · 2008-08-24 03:27:02

At first that sounds like what I want... having all the Flash objects disappear from a site unless I click on one of them that I want to start playing. But you have to have the flashplugin enabled for that to work. Clicking on an swf area just tells flashblock to unblock it. It doesn't actually change the status of the flashplugin from disabled to enabled. I want flashplugin to be unloaded so firefox knows nothing about it until I go to a site that uses flash. Having it enabled even when it's not in use causes the buginess.

Arch Linux

#1 2008-08-17 16:11:53

Spoofing the flash version

#2 2008-08-17 16:49:16

Re: Spoofing the flash version

#3 2008-08-17 23:54:16

Re: Spoofing the flash version

#4 2008-08-19 03:51:59

Re: Spoofing the flash version

#5 2008-08-23 21:17:20

Re: Spoofing the flash version

#6 2008-08-23 22:26:25

Re: Spoofing the flash version

#7 2008-08-24 03:27:02

Re: Spoofing the flash version

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