RipCode (http://www.ripcode.com/) says its newest product, the TransAct Transcoder V6 can intercept Adobe Flash-based file or live video requests and convert them to a container, video codec, and audio codec accepted by the Apple devices -- all transparently to the end user device and without the need for any pre-transcoding or device-based client.

RipCode CEO Brendon Mills says the iPad is poised to further accelerate and expand the mobile video device market just as the iPhone has over the last several years. However, one of its noted shortcomings has been Apple’s lack of support for Flash video playback, given the dominant position of Flash in professionally generated entertainment, sports and news content. HTML5 has been purported to address this dilemma by introducing Apple device applications that are simply "thin clients" communicating back to a web site hosting and subsequently delivering Flash files without a device-based player, but HTML5 isn't yet widely adopted, Mills says.

RipCode’s Transactional Transcoding platform enables an alternate and immediate solution to this issue, opening up video content to users without requiring the content hoster to move to HTML5 or pre-transcode entire video libraries from Flash to an iPad-accepted container format, he adds. By transcoding the content "in the cloud," it's essentially analogous to a network-based Flash to MP4 or MPEG-TS video adaption layer.

"Transcoding is an integral part of any volume-based video preparation and delivery infrastructure," Mills says. "With new codecs, devices, resolutions, delivery protocols, rights management controls, and monetization needs constantly evolving the video delivery landscape, this space will continue to churn for many years. The ‘Flash on iPad’ dilemma is really just the latest in a long line of speed bumps on the road towards ‘any-content, any-time, any-place, any-device’ that we all desire. Fortunately, our technology removes this barrier in a way that is attractive to content hosters, a key device manufacturer, a key video player provider, and the end user alike."

RipCode’s V6 transcoding appliance is equipped with transcoding flexibility (file-to-file, file-to-stream, stream-to-stream, stream-to-file, and RipCode’s On-Demand Transcoding), codec and container flexibility, concurrency, video processing functions, and resolutions ranging from QVGA to 1080i/p. What's more, it supports a suite of integrated video delivery options including QuickTime, MP4 Progressive Download, Apple’s MPEG-TS Adaptive Progressive Download for file-based and live content, Microsoft Smooth Streaming, and RTSP.

Mills says it's easily integrated -- as hardware or software -- into any content hosting/delivery operation given its Linux/Intel processing core. Working in conjunction with RipCode’s Commander and Detector, content requests from an iPad is automatically detected, which launches an intelligent content transcoding workflow that re-encodes a Flash file to one of the aforementioned iPad-accepted formats, and then delivers either via MP4 Progressive Download or Apple’s MPEG-TS Adaptive Progressive Download.