It's been a long journey to get full Adobe Flash player functionality on Linux machines, but now it looks like that journey is drawing to a close. I've just been playing with a release candidate of Flash Player 10 on my Asus EEE PC and am very happy with the results. It looks like the built in camera will now work under Flash Player, thanks to the addition of support for the Video4Linux Version 2 camera API, which is great news if you use applications that make use of this functionality. The other very noticable change is that full screen video now appears to be working at the correct frame rate making it possible to enjoy full screen videos from such YouTube or BBC iPlayer without the choppiness caused by a slow frame rate. This turns the EEE into a great portable net media player (although be very careful using iPlayer and video sites with a mobile internet dongle or you may end up with a hefty bill!).

The EEE isn't just for having fun, one of those Es stands for Easy to work. I decided that it was time to go on a road test so I popped the EEE into the glove box of my car and went to meet my good friend Amanda D'Silva. I asked her to have a go on it as she is someone who is very familiar with MS Office(tm) and in her role as a communications manager she often has to put together reports and presentations both in the office and sometimes on the move.