Google delays Java support phasing out

In the end of 2014, Google updated their plans to phase out NPAPI (and, therefore, Java) support. In short, we have one more quarter to prepare. Let's elaborate.

As I already wrote earlier, Google is going to discontinue support of NPAPI plugins, which basically means that Java uploader won't work in Chrome anymore. They planned to do it in the beginning of 2015, however I have just encountered a blog post on Chromium site, saying that they have updated their plans. 

Now the phase out plan consists of the following steps:

Step 1. Present time

Most NPAPI plugins are disabled by default except of whitelisted ones (which obviously includes Java plugin).

Step 2. January 2015 (did not happen yet)

Whitelist will be removed, but the user will be able to enable Java plugin for a particular site by clicking some visual element on a browser, something like this: 

oh no

Step 3. April 2015

They will remove the yellow box from a navigation bar and therefore the user won't be able to enable a Java plugin though GUI. However it will be possible to do it by modifying a registry on Windows or a config file on Mac. In other words, it will be a solution for advanced or enterprise users, but it is definitely a no go for regular people.  

Step 4. September 2015

NPAPI plugin support will be removed completely and it won't be possible to turn it on even by tweaking registry/configs. 

More information about NPAPI deprecation plan

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The bottom line is that Google was kind enough to give us additional 3 months before end users experience serious problems. Enterprise users have more several months (although I would not recommend to wait that long).

By that time Aurigma should implement all the features preventing you from switching from Java to HTML5. We have already made a first step and already released a new version which supports folder uploads in Chrome (see the next post). 

We will keep you posted about the new features in the HTML5 uploader. Stay tuned and don't hesitate to email us at info@aurigma.com if you feel that it still lacks of some important features available in Java uploader.