Get rid of Adobe Flash Player from the website

Please rewite the Dashboard and Log on the web site using non-Flash technology, preferably HTML5.

Flash is too much of a resource hog on desktops and doesn't run on iOS devices.

Thanks.

 

Moderator Edit: Clarified subject

260 Comments
SunsetRunner
Not applicable

@YojanaFitbit thanks for adding another comment of this 7 pages to "under consideration". This has been under consideration for 5 years. Personally, I will not give any more suggestions to Fitbit since Fitbit constantly ignores their user base. After 5 years it should have been possible to remove all flash, given that flash is marked "end of life" by 2020. My next device will certainly not be a Fitbit  anymore.

anotherbozo
First Steps

Just to add my vote - please get rid of Flash. I will not consider installing it on my PC and it is reckless of Fitbit to encourage anybody to install it just so they can view graphs on the Dashboard.

 

HTML 5 is the way to go.

 

I am on my second Fitbit device so hopefully a valued customer who is listened to?

dmitri8
Recovery Runner

@anotherbozo you're way too optimistic...  Basically it's just gonna happen whenever it's gonna happen, on their schedule.  If ever.  As should be painfully obvious from the 5-year-long history here, they don't give a crap about people posting here, or their suggestions.

SunsetRunner
Not applicable
I gave up long ago. Because it uses Flash I never subscribed to premium service. And when the 2 working Fitbit devices out of the 3 that I purchased die I won’t replace them with Fitbit products.
Rich_Laue
Community Legend

@SunsetRunner as you have noticed, 2 years ago every chart was flash based and since then the flash paged have been slowly being changed over. 

My thought is that they are moving a page at a time then monitoring to make sure nothing has broken. 

Yes Fitbit has been slowly converting pages and I do agree it is happening to slow. 

 

As for as the response I think it is simply the canned response that some hire up the chain has set up. 

SunsetRunner
Not applicable
My team built a medical research website that is much more complex than the Fitbit site using HTML 5 and with a “responsive” design that works on any device, with over 30 complex reports. It took only a few months, creating it from scratch. There is ZERO excuse for Fitbit to take this long.
Rich_Laue
Community Legend

Well fine, that is your team. I am simply another Fitbit user that has watched many unwanted bugs pop up in Fitbit software, firmware, and the web. 

I simply was adding my speculation, and since I have no control over Fitbit.... 

Rich_Laue
Community Legend

Well fine, that is your team. I am simply another Fitbit user that has watched many unwanted bugs pop up in Fitbit software, firmware, and the web. 

I simply was adding my speculation, and since I have no control over Fitbit.... 

 

My point is for the first 4+ years after this suggestion nothing was done. I'm the last year and a half there has been a lot of progress. 

And to me progress, no matter how little is a step in the right direction, especially since Flash really only runs natively on windows and soon this won't even be so. 

SunsetRunner
Not applicable

@Rich_Laue with all respect Rich, but there is no excuse for still running Flash today. This is a severe security risk to users. They could even just delete the Flash crap without replacement. It would not take longer than say 2 days to do so. Given the speed they roll out bugs into production I would say it would take only 2 hours to delete that crap. 5 years is definitely unacceptable. In 5 years you can relaunch the whole website. And writing canned response to such an issue which is open for such a long time just sucks. I understand you are not involved to Fitbit. Please stop defending them in this issue. They did lose my trust and "slow progress", "but they already started" etc arguments won't count for me anymore.

Rich_Laue
Community Legend

As I stated, I am not related to Fitbit in any way and can only speculate. But have noticed Flash disappearing steadily, maybe not quickly but steadily 

Currently 

IOS does not support flash

MAC does not support Flash

Android does not support Flash

Linux will support a 10 year old Flash player

Windows will soon not support Flash. However windows is so messed up that it is simply aggravating to use. When it works it is their way, not the users way. 

SunsetRunner
Not applicable

As mentioned, I am aware you are not related to Fitbit.

 

I am also aware that Flash does not work on the devices you mentioned. It just does not solve the main issue.

 

Fitbit is was and still is acting irresponsible to towards their user base. They have been ignoring warnings and beggings of their users.

 

They should have stopped this behaviour years ago. I don't care if Flash is slowly phased out or whatever. Fitbit, as a company, has failed. Immediate removal of all Flash security risks and an official apology is the only thing which I would accept.

 

Here is one of many links of why Flash needs to go today:

https://www.pcrisk.com/internet-threat-news/10500-flash-security-risk

 

Since I gave up hope on Fitbit in this regard, this is the last message I write in this regard and in general. I decided to no longer support Fitbit.

Rich_Laue
Community Legend

It really doesn't take much hope since we see the evidence. We all know Flash has never been a safe option. 

Rich_Laue
Community Legend

Not sure why, but I'm ha ring a problem finding a page on Fitbit.com that still has flash on it. 

As for premium, I had it a couple of years ago and had no issues seeing the graphs on Android or Linux, both of which do not support flash. 

 

In fact I'm having problems finding any page on fitbit.com that has flash contents. 

Would someone be able to point a link to such a page? 

SunsetRunner
Not applicable
https://www.fitbit.com/foods/log


Food Stats
Calorie intake over the past 30 days

You are seeing this because you don't have Adobe Flash plugin installed. Get Adobe Flash to view this graph.
anotherbozo
First Steps

The Free Trial Reports also contain flash.

 

https://www.fitbit.com/premium/reports/food/2019-08-19

https://www.fitbit.com/premium/reports/activity/2019-08-19

 

I might have considered buying a Premium Report but I see no point in spending $49.99 for a report where most of the graphs are inaccessible to me.

 

Rich_Laue
Community Legend

2 years ago when I had premium, I had no problems seeing the premium reports on my non flash android phone. 

SunsetRunner
Not applicable

Status still marked as "under consideration". Flash is not only deprecated but is scheduled for end of life this year. Please remove the dependency asap.

SunsetRunner
Not applicable
I gave up on Fitbit years ago over this issue. When my current Fitbit products die the replacements will not be from Fitbit. And now that Google is acquiring Fitbit I will have nothing to do with them.
Av8rix
Stepping Up

Wow!  Seriously?  Google?  I didn't know that!  Google is the most intrusive platform on the planet.  My replacement will not be Fitbit either.

SunsetRunner
Not applicable

I didn't know that either!  I only bought my Fitbit last month. If I'd known I'd have chosen something else.

Rich_Laue
Community Legend

@SunsetRunner you gave up on Fitbit years ago, because they have flash on their website, yet you will not be replacing your current Fitbit. Even though giving up on Fitbit, you still post here and use a Fitbit tracker? 

SunsetRunner
Not applicable
Because I originally posted I get email updates to the thread and I respond via email. I have not been back to the discussion online since I concluded that Fitbit was ignoring safe practices by continuing to use Flash. I’m not going to throw away my One or my scale until they die, but I have switched to Withings for health-related hardware and software, and my iPhone & Apple Watch are my primary activity tracking tools.
SunsetRunner
Not applicable

Hello,

 

like @SunsetRunner I got replies from this thread by mail.

 

Fitbit sucks. It does not care about its users, as seen in this thread. The Charge 2 device broke very quickly. Bugs were constantly introduced into the mobile app (almost daily at some point). And my data does not belong to Google without my consent. I am done with Fitbit and also put my other device to trash. I consider Fitbit a waste of money for little in return.

 

This is my last message here since I bought an Apple Watch before a few weeks which works very well and as expected.

 

Good bye

RBearSAT
First Steps

End of Life for Flash was December 31, 2020. However, some pages on the Fitbit site still have Flash components. They need to be converted now. One is the Food Stats on the Track My Food page.

Rich_Laue
Community Legend

Your food page no longer has flash. 

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