Gnash – GNU Flash movie player

Last Updated on July 11, 2021

Gnash is a player for animated “movies” in the Macromedia Shockwave Flash (.swf) format. It can be run as a graphical application, as a Web browser plugin, or as a library used by other programs.

Gnash is originally based on the code of GameSWF, by Thatcher Ulrich. GameSWF was the most advanced among free flash movie players; it implemented a fairly broad set of Flash Format v7 features, using 3D hardware APIs for rendering.

Gnash is capable of reading up to SWF v9 files and opcodes, but primarily supports SWF v7, with better SWF v8 and v9 support under heavy development. Gnash has implemented about 80% of ActionScript v2.0, and has begun implementing ActionScript v3.0.

The goal of the Gnash developers is to be as compatible as possible with the proprietary player (including behaviour on bad ActionScript code). However, Gnash offers some special features not available in the Adobe player, such as the possibility to extend the ActionScript classes via shared libraries: sample extensions include MySQL support, file system access and more.

The web browser plugin installs itself into Mozilla, Firefox, or Konqueror. It can play some Flash files in cooperation with the browser. It should work with any browser that supports the of Mozilla’s NSPR API and plugin SDK.

Features include:

• Runs standalone to play flash movies.
• Browser plugin (Firefox, Konqueror, Mozilla).
• SWF v7+ compliant.
• Streaming video from video sharing sites like Lulu.tv or YouTube.com.
• XML Message server.
• High Quality ouput using OpenGL for rendering the graphics, and AntiGrain for embedded framebuffer only devices.
• Security, allowing the user to control access to network connections.
• Extensible.

Website: www.gnu.org/software/gnash
Support: Mailing List
Developer: Sandro Santilli, Bastiaan Jacques, Tomas Groth, Udo Giacomozzi, Markus Gothe, Hannes Mayr, John Gilmore, Zou Lunkai, Benjamin Wolsey
License: GNU GPL v3

Gnash is written in C++. Learn C++ with our recommended free books and free tutorials.

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