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Gapminder World is not working

What happened?

Gapminder World uses a technology called Adobe Flash Player to show all that data you love. Flash Player got updated from version 20 to version 21 on Thursday the 10th of March. That update broke Gapminder World. Because Flash Player automatically updates if there is a new version, probably without asking you, it seems Gapminder World all of a sudden stopped working. Actually it’s the new Flash Player version that broke it.

We reported the issue to Adobe and are waiting for them to fix it. In the meantime, we are investigating all options to make Gapminder World work with Flash Player 21.

How can I still use Gapminder World?

First check if Gapminder World is working for you on //www.gapminder.org/world/?use_gapminder_world. It might just work. In that case, no need to do anything.

If it doesn’t work, there are two options:

  • Install Flash Player 20 on your computer.
    This is not the easiest, but not very difficult either. Below we will tell you how to do this.

  • Use Gapminder Tools: //www.gapminder.org/tools/
    Since Flash Player is being used less and less, we are introducing a replacement for Gapminder World using the latest technology: Gapminder Tools.
    Gapminder Tools is still under development and may still have some bugs. However, we are working hard on polishing it at this very moment.

Using Gapminder World with Flash Player 20

Adobe offers installers to install a previous version of Flash Player. Below, we explain how you can use these to make Gapminder World work again on your computer.

You can run Gapminder World in a browser or use its offline version. The offline version requires you to download and install Gapminder World on your computer. If you’d rather use a browser, skip the Offline version instructions and move on to the browser part.

Help us help you!
If you find another way to run Gapminder World, have tested any of the untested scenarios and got Gapminder World to run, or have trouble with these guides, let us know on [email protected].

 

Gapminder World Offline version

Follow these instructions:

  1. Uninstall the current version of Flash Player on your system.
  2. Download the zip file with Flash Player installers from:
    https://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/flashplayer/installers/archive/fp_20.0.0.306_archive.zip
  3. In the zip, go to the folder 20_0_r0_306.
  4. Open one of the following files:

    Windows: flashplayer20_0r0_306_win.exe
    (tested)
    Apple OSX: flashplayer20_0r0_306_mac.dmg
     (not tested)

    This will install Flash Player 20 on your computer.
  5. At the end of the installation process, be sure to select the option ‘Never check for update (not recommended)’ or at least ‘Notify me to install updates’.
    Remember: if you update Flash Player, Gapminder World will stop working again.
  6. Go to: //www.gapminder.org/world-offline/
  7. Click the big green button under Download to download Gapminder World Offline
  8. Run the installation file that was downloaded.
  9. Start the just installed program Gapminder World

If this worked for you, no need to read on. You can explore the data like before.

 

Gapminder World Online in a browser: Firefox

We recommend using Firefox since it can use Flash Player 20 relatively easily. If you would like to use Gapminder World in a different browser than Firefox, skip to the next section. Warning: Running Gapminder World in browsers other than Firefox (or Opera) will be significantly more troublesome.

Follow these instructions:

  1. If you don’t have Firefox, download and install it from: http://getfirefox.com
  2. Uninstall the current version of Flash Player on your system if there is any.
  3. Download the zip file with Flash Player installers from:
    https://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/flashplayer/installers/archive/fp_20.0.0.306_archive.zip
  4. In the zip, go to the folder 20_0_r0_306.
  5. Open one of the following files:

    Windows: flashplayer20_0r0_306_win.exe
    (tested, works)
    Apple OSX: flashplayer20_0r0_306_mac.dmg
     (not tested)

    This will install Flash Player 20 on your computer.
  6. At the end of the installation process, be sure to select the option ‘Never check for update (not recommended)’ or at least ‘Notify me to install updates’.
    Remember: if you update Flash Player, Gapminder World will stop working again.
  7. If your browser is still open, restart it.
  8. Go to http://gapminder.org/world/

If this worked for you, no need to read on. You can explore the data like before.

If it didn’t work, go to this webpage: https://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player.html

  • Check in step 1 if Flash is installed and if it’s version 20. If not, try again.
  • Check in step 4 if Flash is enabled in your browser. If not, follow the guide to enable it.

Do not follow steps 2 and 3. Step 2 and 3 tell you how to install the latest version of Flash Player. Gapminder World doesn’t work with this version. You want to install an older version.

If none of the above works, you can install Gapminder World Offline (as described above).

 

Gapminder World Online in Other browsers

Warning: Running Gapminder World in browsers other than Firefox or Opera is not recommended and might not even work.

If you want to try anyway, follow these instructions:

  1. Uninstall the current version of Flash Player on your system if there is any.
  2. Download the zip file with Flash Player installers from:
    https://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/flashplayer/installers/archive/fp_20.0.0.306_archive.zip
  3. In the zip, go to the folder 20_0_r0_306.

  4. The online version of Gapminder World runs in your browser. For example Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer or Microsoft Edge. Which flash installer you need is dependent on which browser you use.

    This does NOT work with Microsoft Edge or a recent version of Internet Explorer or Chrome. If you are using older versions of Internet Explorer or Chrome, it might work. We did not test this and recommend using Firefox or Opera and the installer for Firefox or Opera indicated below.Open one of the files below to install Flash Player 20 on your computer.

    • Windows and Opera: flashplayer20_0r0_306_winpep.exe
      (tested, works!)
    • Windows and Chrome: flashplayer20_0r0_306_winpep.exe
      (does not work on latest Chrome. Maybe on old versions of Chrome, not tested)
    • Windows and Internet Explorer: flashplayer20_0r0_306_winax.exe
      (Does not work on Windows 8.1 and 10. Maybe Windows 7 and before, not tested)
    • Apple OSX and Firefox: flashplayer20_0r0_306_mac.dmg
      (not tested)
    • Apple OSX and Opera: flashplayer20_0r0_306_macpep.dmg
      (not tested)
    • Apple OSX and Safari: flashplayer20_0r0_306_mac.dmg
      (not tested)
    • Linux: not tested

  5. At the end of the installation process, be sure to select the option ‘Never check for update (not recommended)’ or at least ‘Notify me to install updates’.
    Remember: if you update Flash Player, Gapminder World will stop working again.
  6. If your browser is still open, restart it
  7. Go to http://gapminder.org/world/

Gapminder World should work again.

If it doesn’t, go to this webpage: https://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player.html

  • Check in step 1 if Flash is installed and if it’s version 20.
  • Check in step 4 if Flash is enabled in your browser.

Do not follow steps 2 and 3. Step 2 and 3 tell you how to install the latest version of Flash Player. Gapminder World doesn’t work with this version. You want to install an older version.

If none of the above works, try to install Firefox or Opera and the corresponding Flash version. Alternatively, you can install Gapminder World Offline (as described above).