Adobe is kicking off its Adobe MAX developer conference by announcing that version 10.1 of its Flash Player will run on mobile and embedded devices just as it does on the desktop. The culmination of its Open Screen Project launched last year, the update to the rather ubiquitous browser plugin will finally synchronize the Flash experience on all platforms with the exception of arguably one of the most successful smartphones: Apple's iPhone.

Previously, Adobe offered Flash Lite for some mobile operating systems, which was essentially an older version of Flash optimized for the lower-power processors in cell phones and other mobile devices. Adobe announced the Open Screen Project last year in an attempt to bring a single, ubiquitous platform for developers to deliver rich media applications to desktops and mobile devices without requiring separate development. Flash Player 10.1 attempts to provide a single runtime that should run identically on a Palm Pre, for instance, as it does on a Dell Mini or a Mac Pro. It will be optimized for netbooks and so-called "smartbooks" in addition to smartphone platforms, and will utilize GPU acceleration whenever possible. Flash Lite will still be available for lower-end devices.

The Open Screen Project has been hard at work coming up with a single version of the Flash Player, porting Flash and the AIR runtime to the ARM architecture, commonly used in most high-end smartphones. Adobe has also partnered with a number of partners in the Open Screen Project. The company announced today that RIM is joining the project and will collaborate with Adobe to bring Flash Player 10.1 to its BlackBerry operating system. Adobe said that betas of Flash Player 10.1 will available for Windows Mobile and Palm's webOS later this year, and expects betas for Google Android and SymbianOS to be ready in early 2010.

Though it's not surprising, absent from the flurry of announcements for smartphone platforms is any mention of Apple's iPhone. Apple has resisted Adobe's efforts to provide a version of Flash that runs on the iPhone OS, and has made numerous efforts to develop or adopt technologies that offer open alternatives to Flash, such as HTML5 audio and video support, advanced CSS3 transformations and animations, and HTTP Live Streaming.

Though Google has openly supported many of the open alternatives to Flash as well, it has also joined the some 50 companies participating in the Open Screen Project. With Apple appearing to be the sole remaining holdout in the mobile space, it seems that it may be more and more difficult for Apple to ignore Flash, especially if it becomes popular on other mobile platforms. Should the Open Screen Project succeed as Adobe plans, however, it may also mean that open alternatives to Flash are relegated to also-ran status.