theregoesdave

For years Windows Mobile users have had their web surfing experience hampered by poor support for rich Internet applications on the handset platform. Today Adobe makes a giant leap forward in mobile web experience by bringing a full version of Flash 10 to Windows mobile handsets.

It’s not quite clear yet whether this is a browser plugin designed specifically for Internet Explorer mobile 6 or whether it will also run on other mobile browsers or previous versions of Internet Explorer mobile. The company will be showing off a demo version at it’s Adobe Max developers’ conference in San Francisco.

The mobile browser wars on Windows Mobile are really starting to heat up. Microsoft is playing catch-up by just getting zoom features into Internet Explorer 6. In my opinion, Opera Mobile is leading the pack in terms of user experience, but Flash could give Microsoft an advantage. Latecomer Mozilla is prepping what looks to be a killer Alpha release of Firefox Mobile, code-named Fennec.

Flash arrival on Windows Mobile signals a further gap widening between mobile web browsing capabilities as compared to the iPhone. Windows Mobile will support full Flash, but still doesn’t have a browser that supports the extended javascript support necessary for AJAX. Apple’s iPhone, on the other hand, provides decent javascript support, but doesn’t seem interested in supporting Flash animations.

Flash 10 for Windows Mobile isn’t expected to ship until next year, when Internet Explorer mobile 6 ships with new devices. Hopefully we can get a preview of both and potentially the CAB files to be able to install the applications on our current hardware, but I haven’t been able to hunt one down yet.

Via MobileCrunch

• Call for Mobile Web Standards
• Windows Mobile 6.1: “Full Desktop Browsing?”
• Will Video Be The Mobile Web Trend Of The Year?
• Android set to surpass iPhone for interactive applications with Flash 10
• Will Steve Jobs shoot himself in the foot by disallowing Flash on the iPhone?