Navigating to a website, I got that familiar screen telling me to view it with FlashPlayer. It’s almost a little like pouring salt in a wound, as if I could, I obviously would. Nevertheless, it’s what needs to be done. But instead of installing FlashPlayer, which simply cannot be done in iOS, I launch the Photon browser.
I navigate to the same website, then push the lightning bolt icon in the toolbar. It gives me a message stating that it’s connecting to a streaming session. Photon works by streaming the site from the cloud.
Once Photon finishes streaming the site, I can now use it along with all of its FlashPlayer abilities. Using the keyboard takes pressing the keyboard icon in the menu. There also other menu options to help with more precise finger movements like dragging and clicking, especially useful when playing games.
The settings menu includes many more options. The makers of the app suggest you play with the bandwidth option to get the desired outcome. The bandwidth is automatically set very low, but it can be raised to match how fast your network is. Other settings include many of the options included with any other browser, as well as alternate port, enable popup, and switching to a game keyboard.
Photon isn’t just just for browsing sites with FlashPlayer though. It can also do split screen browsing. You can have two screens going in a split, do a picture-in-picture, or even a trio of screens. It comes in handy for a variety of reasons, whether watching a music video on one screen and doing work on another, looking at separate sites or the same site at different times, or even watching two YouTube videos. This is accessed on the left-hand side of the URL window. While Safari is good for many things, it’s just not a good browser for everything. Photon isn’t good for everything either. That means it takes a collection of browsers to get things accomplished in iOS, whether on an iPhone, an iPad, or an iPod Touch. If you have a need for watching multiple screens in a browser, or if you have to use sites with FlashPlayer, this is a browser you’ll want to have in your arsenal.
