Getting Flash to work on Linux Mint

[squirrels000]

I have an older system (ASUS A7N8X-E mobo, AMD Athlon XP 3000, 1.5GB RAM, Nvidia Geforce FX5200 AGP graphics) and I have been running Linux Mint on it just to keep it useful. So far I've only been using it to access the Internet from my "man-cave" and I've run into an issue...actually multiple issues...with Flash.

At a certain point, I'm guessing due to an update somewhere, I started getting messages that my Flash Player was "vulnerable" and needed to be updated. In an attempt to fix it, I tried downloading the (now-outdated) Adobe Flash 11.2 package from here:

http://get2.adobe.com/flashplayer/otherversions/

...and followed the instructions here...

http://www.wikihow.com/Upgrade-Adobe-Flash-Player-on-Linux-Mint

...but it didn't work. When I opened a Flash page the Flash player refused to load.

I went into the package manager and screwed around with the packages...tried uninstalling/reinstalling the Mint flash player and the Adobe flash player, and eventually ended up removing all of the flash packages and removing/re-installing Firefox. I managed to get it working again with the old Mint-included flash player, so I just muddled through, clicking the "run anyway" when I got the vulnerability notice.


Apprently, there was a recent update to Firefox that affected the Flash player, because now Flash is not working again...the plugin will not load. In many cases I get a blank screen.

So I wiped out my installation of Mint 13 with a brand new clean install of Mint 15 (Olivia), hoping that this might be rectified. But after installing Mint 15 clean (filesystems formatted), I tried to start Firefox and Flash was not working at ALL.

I read somewhere that Adobe was no longer supporting Flash and I had to download Google Chrome and use its integrated Flash player, but I installed Google Chrome and it ALSO failed to load Flash.

So is Flash defunct on Linux? I understand everything is moving toward HTML5, per the Jobs Prophecy, but it's not there yet and I visit a lot of websites that make heavy use of, or even depend on, Flash. I would like to use Linux more, but this is a major stumbling block.

Anyone know anything else I could try??

Thanks in advance.Let me know if you need more info.

[daveinuk]

Hello squirrels000,

have you tried firefox add ons mananger under tools and installing or searching for shockwave flash there and also flash aid? I' had an odd episode with flash a while back and since having those two in the add ons it's been ok, might be worth a look . . . .

[squirrels000]

I can't find either the Flash Player or "Flash-Aid" under the Firefox add-ons search.

I tried going to the Package Manager and uninstalling mint-flashplayer and installing adobe-flashplayer, restarted Firefox, went to a Flash-enabled page, and blank-screen.

I also tried the other way around...uninstalled Adobe flash player and installed mint-flashplayer-11...still a blank screen.

I also tried re installing Google Chrome from Google, but it appears that, contrary to wha I read, Chrome doesn't have Flash built into it a,d also requires the adobe flash plugin. Which also fails to load

[squirrels000]

Okay, I tried removing both FLASHes again and installed an old version...Mint Flash player 10.3 and it works!

So it's specific to the new Flash 11.2...any ideas?

[karlchen]

Hello, squirrels000.

As a matter of fact, the same problem has been reported more than once in the recent past. So performing a thorough forum search should have yielded at minimum a few related threads including the solution.

Adobe has stopped adding new functionality to the Linux edition of the Adobe Flash player. Only security vulnerabilities are still being fixed regularly. Therefore the lastest available Flash player on Linux currently is 11,2,202,291.

Current Firefox versions have a builtin check which will reject any older Flash edition, because they are known to hold security vulnerabilities for which malicious exploits are available.

Basically you can get the current Adobe Flash plugin in either of three ways:

1. The Flash plugin package which you will find pre-installed on Mint 13/14 is named mint-flashplugin-11.
   To tell the truth, for an unknown reason the mint-flashplugin-11 software package will always be less up-to-date than the latest Linux version released by Adobe.
   This is why in this forum, too, people are advised to uninstall the software package mint-flashplugin-11 and replace it by either #2 or #3 (see below)
2. The most recommended way of getting the latest available Linux version of Adobe Flash is by installing a software package named flashplugin-installer. As the name suggests, this software package will pick up the current Adobe flash player and install it.
3. The third way of getting the latest available Linux version of Adobe Flash is by installing either adobe-flashplugin plus adobe-flash-properties-gtk or adobe-flashplugin plus adobe-flash-properties-kde

Obviously, the easiest way of keeping Flash up-to-date on Mint is by taking the second approach: install and use flashplugin-installer.
Let me add the software which is suited best for installing, uninstalling and updating software is Synaptic Package Manager. (Menu => System Administration => Synaptic)

In order to check whether your Flash installation is all right, visit this Adobe webpage: [url=http://www.adobe.com/software/flash/about/]Adobe Flash Player[/url]. It will check whether Flash has been activated in your browser and display the installed Flash version. If the Adobe webpage tells you "You have version 11,2,202,291 installed" then your Flash version is all right at the time of writing this and Flash should work perfectly. If it tells you something different, then you should proceed like explained above.
There is one exception to this rule: Google Chrome brings along its own Flash edition. The current Chrome Flash version can be determined on the mentioned Adobe webpage as well.

Let me state clearly:
Everything you need in order to get the functional current Flash release for Linux Mint is available through the Mint/Ubuntu software repositories. The installation can be easily performed via Synaptic package manager.

Kind regards,
Karl

[palo]

As a matter of fact, the same problem has been reported more than once in the recent past. So performing a thorough forum search should have yielded at minimum a few related threads including the solution.

How true. This one may be more relevant to squirrels000;
http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?p=731543#p731543

Nvidia Geforce FX5200 AGP graphics

With that old card the 10.3 version may be the only way to get flash.

Pat

[squirrels000]

As a matter of fact, the same problem has been reported more than once in the recent past. So performing a thorough forum search should have yielded at minimum a few related threads including the solution.

How true. This one may be more relevant to squirrels000;
http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?p=731543#p731543

Nvidia Geforce FX5200 AGP graphics

With that old card the 10.3 version may be the only way to get flash.

Pat

Darn...it's a hardware issue. Oh well...hopefully they'll leave a legacy Flash version available. I guess I'll have to upgrade when I get a chance...right now just trying to get maximum mileage out of this relic.

Thanks for the find. Will keep an eye out for 11.1 if they make it available.

[palo]

Darn...it's a hardware issue. Oh well...hopefully they'll leave a legacy Flash version available. I guess I'll have to upgrade when I get a chance...right now just trying to get maximum mileage out of this relic.

It has also been suggested by forum member caf4926 [url=http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?p=734250#p734250]here[/url] that it may be related to the CPU flags and not the graphics. It could be good for the community knowledge if it can be verified. Can you please post the output of

Code: Select all

inxi -F

- just the line that refers to CPU?

Pat

Edit: A little Google-Fu suggests that more CPUs that lacked SSE2 with Linux (Windows kept on truckin') were affected by the changes made to flash around v.11.2 and Flash bundled with Chrome after about V.20 stopped working too. Of course no clear definitive statement from Adobe. But it does suggest that it could be more CPU related than GPU.

[soldier1st]

Hello, squirrels000.

As a matter of fact, the same problem has been reported more than once in the recent past. So performing a thorough forum search should have yielded at minimum a few related threads including the solution.

Adobe has stopped adding new functionality to the Linux edition of the Adobe Flash player. Only security vulnerabilities are still being fixed regularly. Therefore the lastest available Flash player on Linux currently is 11,2,202,291.

Current Firefox versions have a builtin check which will reject any older Flash edition, because they are known to hold security vulnerabilities for which malicious exploits are available.

Basically you can get the current Adobe Flash plugin in either of three ways:

1. The Flash plugin package which you will find pre-installed on Mint 13/14 is named mint-flashplugin-11.
   To tell the truth, for an unknown reason the mint-flashplugin-11 software package will always be less up-to-date than the latest Linux version released by Adobe.
   This is why in this forum, too, people are advised to uninstall the software package mint-flashplugin-11 and replace it by either #2 or #3 (see below)
2. The most recommended way of getting the latest available Linux version of Adobe Flash is by installing a software package named flashplugin-installer. As the name suggests, this software package will pick up the current Adobe flash player and install it.
3. The third way of getting the latest available Linux version of Adobe Flash is by installing either adobe-flashplugin plus adobe-flash-properties-gtk or adobe-flashplugin plus adobe-flash-properties-kde

Obviously, the easiest way of keeping Flash up-to-date on Mint is by taking the second approach: install and use flashplugin-installer.
Let me add the software which is suited best for installing, uninstalling and updating software is Synaptic Package Manager. (Menu => System Administration => Synaptic)

In order to check whether your Flash installation is all right, visit this Adobe webpage: [url=http://www.adobe.com/software/flash/about/]Adobe Flash Player[/url]. It will check whether Flash has been activated in your browser and display the installed Flash version. If the Adobe webpage tells you "You have version 11,2,202,291 installed" then your Flash version is all right at the time of writing this and Flash should work perfectly. If it tells you something different, then you should proceed like explained above.
There is one exception to this rule: Google Chrome brings along its own Flash edition. The current Chrome Flash version can be determined on the mentioned Adobe webpage as well.

Let me state clearly:
Everything you need in order to get the functional current Flash release for Linux Mint is available through the Mint/Ubuntu software repositories. The installation can be easily performed via Synaptic package manager.

Kind regards,
Karl

When installing option #2, the plugin check reports that it is vulnerable, yet when i stick to the default flash(it was finally updated) it doesn't show as being vulnerable, so i assume it would be wise to stick to the default one, for security reasons right?

[karlchen]

Hi, soldier1st.

Your report puzzles me a bit. On 6 different Ubuntu 12.04.2-, Mint 13- and Mint 14-systems, using options #2 and #3, always gives me Flash 11.2.202.291, and my Firefox 22 does not complain on any of my systems that it were known to be vulnerable.
(Let us face it, this only means that at some point during the next few weeks Adobe is going to tell us why Flash 11.2.202.291+x finally protects us from N security holes which 11.2.202.291 still had. )
Checking the current version of mint-flashplugin in Synaptic still gives 11.0.1.152 which is months behind the Adobe edition.
Therefore I am amazed that Firefox 22 should accept Flash 11.0.1.152, but reject 11.2.202.291.

Kind regards,
Karl
--
Checking the Flash version used by your browser: [url=http://www.adobe.com/software/flash/about/]Adobe Flash[/url]
--

Code: Select all

uname -a; lsb_release -rd
Linux paulchen 3.2.0-48-generic #74-Ubuntu SMP Thu Jun 6 19:45:16 UTC 2013 i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux
Description:	Linux Mint 13 Maya
Release:	13

[soldier1st]

Hi, soldier1st.

Your report puzzles me a bit. On 6 different Ubuntu 12.04.2-, Mint 13- and Mint 14-systems, using options #2 and #3, always gives me Flash 11.2.202.291, and my Firefox 22 does not complain on any of my systems that it were known to be vulnerable.
(Let us face it, this only means that at some point during the next few weeks Adobe is going to tell us why Flash 11.2.202.291+x finally protects us from N security holes which 11.2.202.291 still had. )
Checking the current version of mint-flashplugin in Synaptic still gives 11.0.1.152 which is months behind the Adobe edition.
Therefore I am amazed that Firefox 22 should accept Flash 11.0.1.152, but reject 11.2.202.291.

Kind regards,
Karl
--
Checking the Flash version used by your browser: [url=http://www.adobe.com/software/flash/about/]Adobe Flash[/url]
--

Code: Select all

uname -a; lsb_release -rd
Linux paulchen 3.2.0-48-generic #74-Ubuntu SMP Thu Jun 6 19:45:16 UTC 2013 i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux
Description:	Linux Mint 13 Maya
Release:	13

sorry i should have clarified. option #2 shows the 11.2.202.291 version and according to the firefox plugin checker, it shows that version is out of date, yet the mint-flashplugin-11 shows as 11.2.202.280 and it doesn't show as vulnerable.
http://imageshack.us/a/img96/8862/38mr.png

[karlchen]

Hi, soldier1st.

I admit I have got no good explanation why your Firefox should reject Flash 11.2.202.291 as outdated, but accept Flash 11.2.202.280.
Also I wonder a bit when Synaptic will display mint-flashplugin 11.2.202.280 on Mint 13, because tonight it still only offers 11.0.1.152 here. And "apt-get update" has been performed successfully.

Cheers,
Karl

[marcoose777]

Squirrels000: You're not alone my friend. For the last 5 days I've tried to fix these flash issues. They started immediately after applying firefox 22 update, and as far as I can tell youtube videos, vimeo video, and webgl content from shadertoys has stopped working (flash player actually crashes on youtube and vimeo).

anyone interested (i.e. the you need sse2 brigade / clutching at straws brigade)

Code: Select all

output from inxi -F : 

CPU: Single core AMD Athlon 64 3700+ (-UP-) cache: 1024 KB flags: (lm nx sse sse2 sse3) clocked at 1000.00 MHz

Code: Select all

release -rd

Description: Linux Mint 13 Maya
Release: 13

Currently I cannot afford to buy a new machine (50% pay cut since made redundant 3 yrs ago etc.etc.) so this one will have to do for a while longer. Thinking philosophically though, perhaps not being distracted by the likes of youtube (from doing something productive) is doing me a favour? Tried mint support on IRC first, only to have some smug git telling me he had no problems with flash and firefox 22, and no real helpful suggestions beyond the install flash from the mint repo using the software manager - which I thought should be assumed par-se.

Good luck squirrels......

[soldier1st]

Hi, soldier1st.

I admit I have got no good explanation why your Firefox should reject Flash 11.2.202.291 as outdated, but accept Flash 11.2.202.280.
Also I wonder a bit when Synaptic will display mint-flashplugin 11.2.202.280 on Mint 13, because tonight it still only offers 11.0.1.152 here. And "apt-get update" has been performed successfully.

Cheers,
Karl

Firefox isn't rejecting flash, it just shows one as vulnerable when that particular version is installed. also, which mirror are you using? perhaps the mirror your using hasn't updated yet. also, when removing the default one, you need to remove the mint-flashplugin-11, when installing flashplugin-installer or you may end up with 2 flash versions.

[palo]

Squirrels000: You're not alone my friend. For the last 5 days I've tried to fix these flash issues. They started immediately after applying firefox 22 update, and as far as I can tell youtube videos, vimeo video, and webgl content from shadertoys has stopped working (flash player actually crashes on youtube and vimeo).

anyone interested (i.e. the you need sse2 brigade / clutching at straws brigade)

Code: Select all

output from inxi -F : 

CPU: Single core AMD Athlon 64 3700+ (-UP-) cache: 1024 KB flags: (lm nx sse sse2 sse3) clocked at 1000.00 MHz

There are no brigades but there are people in the community trying to make sense of some things which they (Linux) have very little control over. It is possible that you have a different problem as you report failures with webgl content as well.

Hi, soldier1st.

I admit I have got no good explanation why your Firefox should reject Flash 11.2.202.291 as outdated, but accept Flash 11.2.202.280.
Also I wonder a bit when Synaptic will display mint-flashplugin 11.2.202.280 on Mint 13, because tonight it still only offers 11.0.1.152 here. And "apt-get update" has been performed successfully.

Cheers,
Karl

Firefox isn't rejecting flash, it just shows one as vulnerable when that particular version is installed. also, which mirror are you using? perhaps the mirror your using hasn't updated yet. also, when removing the default one, you need to remove the mint-flashplugin-11, when installing flashplugin-installer or you may end up with 2 flash versions.

soldier1st> I can confirm that I see the same thing as you with FF22. http://www.adobe.com/software/flash/about/ shows that I have the most current version available (11,2,202,291 installed) yet using the Plugin Check from the Add-ons Manager shows it is out of date when it is in fact the latest available at this time.

Karl> Mint 13 here and Synaptic is showing mint-flashplugin 11.2.202.280 also so maybe you are using a stale mirror.
(deb http://mirror.umd.edu/linuxmint/packages/ maya main import upstream)


Pat

[marcoose777]

:palo, apologies if my previous post may have been misinterpreted (stress getting the better of my otherwise amiable demeanour), but if it's any help to anyone else I have the latest version of flash plugin available 11.2.202.291 - installed from apt repo. This has been confirmed by visiting the adobe flash version checker (http://www.adobe.com/software/flash/about/). All other system and application updates have been promptly applied. As there is a distinct lack of reporting/hysteria on this subject deduction leads me to believe the affected are a minority, perhaps it is hardware, or a combination thereof, related. As mentioned this machine is a tad old (Asus A8Nsli mobo, AMD64 3700+ sandiago cpu, Geforce 6600 gpu). You were quite right to mention issues with flash player being difficult to troubleshoot owing to the propriety/closed source nature. Having said that, prior to firefox update(21->22) all was fine, and for that reason I can't help but think something fundamental has changed within the firefox-flashplayer interface. Further to the comment about webgl, that issue is in all probability related to flash content embedded within the webpage I had issue with (shadertoys.com). Apologies again

[karlchen]

<offtopic with respect to "Getting Flash to work on Linux Mint">

Hello, palo.

About me using a stale Mint repository mirror:

Damn. You seem to be right.

Last November or December, if I remember right, when packages.linuxmint.com kept on being terribly slow and unreliable for weeks, I switched to [url=http://mirror.devnu11.net/linuxmint/]http://mirror.devnu11.net/linuxmint/[/url].
Just checked the site. And to me it looks as if they stopped updating it 3 months ago or so.

OK, will have to find out whether any of the other German mirrors is more up-to-date and reliably so. Else I will have to travel around to the Netherlands, Denmark or France or some other neighbouring country.
--
P.S.:
Seems as if out of 4 available German mirrors I had chosen the only one that stopped mirroring at the end of April 2013. This is what I would call "bad luck".
--
Thanks for waking me up, palo.

Kind regards,
Karl
</offtopic with respect to "Getting Flash to work on Linux Mint">

[marcoose777]

Hi again, my problem is now resolved (self help). Anyone else reading this and suffers a similar problem to me and has apparmor installed too, try checking your sys logs for apparmor denial. Look for apparmor restricting firefox from 'r' access to /etc/asound.conf, to confirm run firefox from terminal in safe-mode and duplicate flash plugin crash, if this is the case you should see an error to the effect of access denial. Why this should suddenly start happening is not clear.

[palo]

marcoose777> Glad to hear you got it resolved - thanks for sharing.

<offtopic with respect to "Getting Flash to work on Linux Mint">

Hello, palo.

About me using a stale Mint repository mirror:

Damn. You seem to be right.

Last November or December, if I remember right, when packages.linuxmint.com kept on being terribly slow and unreliable for weeks, I switched to [url=http://mirror.devnu11.net/linuxmint/]http://mirror.devnu11.net/linuxmint/[/url].
Just checked the site. And to me it looks as if they stopped updating it 3 months ago or so.

OK, will have to find out whether any of the other German mirrors is more up-to-date and reliably so. Else I will have to travel around to the Netherlands, Denmark or France or some other neighbouring country.
--
P.S.:
Seems as if out of 4 available German mirrors I had chosen the only one that stopped mirroring at the end of April 2013. This is what I would call "bad luck".
--
Thanks for waking me up, palo.

Kind regards,
Karl
</offtopic with respect to "Getting Flash to work on Linux Mint">

You are welcome. The fact that the mirror you were using had stopped syncing could actually be useful to some people - just thinking about those that found the mid-June update that brought mint-flashplugin 11.0.1.152 to the 11.2 series and flash no longer worked with their oldish hardware. This made it necessary to install 10.3.
http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?p=731543#p731543

Maybe it would be possible in that situation to;
* remove mint-flashplugin
*install the 11.0.1.152 mint-flashplugin from the stale mirror
*lock the version

Maybe just another option for a very small minority with oldish hardware to avoid installing the very old 10.3 version. Still have to deal with that version sniffer in Firefox though.

How were your travels? - I hear Europe is beautiful this time of year and has some nice mirrors.

Pat

[karlchen]

<offtopic>
Hi, Pat,
this year summer has been taken a lot of days off in the past few months in large parts of Europe.
But summer is going to pay a visit to Germany today. No idea whether it is going to stay.
About the (virtual) trip through Europe:
It was pretty short because Synaptic took me right to France when asked for the best mirror server.

Code: Select all

 deb http://mint-mirror.gwendallebihan.net/packages/ maya main upstream import backport

Have a nice weekend,
Karl
</offtopic>