How to Get FlashPlayer to Work on Flock Web Browser



Something that comes up sometimes after a fresh installation of a distro is the issue of Flashplayer. We use it to see embedded flash objects in websites. Often times, in a Linux distro, Mozilla Firefox is the default web browser; of course, it's a great browser and that is fine but sometimes you might want to install a different browser, such as Flock. Why Flash is not automatically linked between Flock and Firefox is a mystery, considering one is a "derivative" of the other is unclear. Opera on the other hand, comes pre-configured to link to the flashplayer file in Firefox. At any rate, if you can't see Flashplayer elements, here is what you do. First, check to see if your flashplayer is detected by and working in Flock. One of the easiest ways I like to check is to go to Pandora. If the box gets a loading indicator, then your Flash is working fine. If you get a grey or white box, Flash is not working.

If Flashplayer is not working:
  1. Open your file manager (Nautilus, Thunar etc.)
  2. Navigate to /usr/lib/flashplugin-installer/
  3. Copy this file: libflashplayer.so
  4. Navigate to /home/homefolder'sname/flock/plugins
  5. There should already be a file called: libnullplugin.so
  6. Paste the file: libflashplayer.so right next to the file: libnullplugin.so
  7. Done!

There are of course, times when you follow the directions but things still don't work (grrr, right?). If this should happen to you with the above example, try again with the following variations:
  1. Open the file manager as root (right click on file manager in the menu and see if there is an option to open as root) or open your file manager from the terminal as root.
    2. Here's an example for Mandriva:
    [pariah@HappyFunMachine ~]$ su -c "nautilus" -
    Password: xxxxxx
    [root@HappyFunMachine pariah ~]#

    Here's an example for Linux Mint:
    [pariah@HappyFunMachine ~]$ sudo nautilus
    Password: xxxxxx
    [pariah@HappyFunMachine ~]#

  2. Other examples of root user commands are gksu and sksudo. Now that you are the root or superuser, repeat the steps from above
  3. Another issue is that you may have downloaded Flock somewhere else than I did. Generally, downloading a tar.gz package will place it in your home folder but you will have to look to see where you (or your installer) put it. This may require that you do a search in your file manager. Remember the exact name of the file is libflashplayer.so and search the computer or file system.