How to embed a FLASH file
INSERT A FLASH FILE
How many times have you been greeted at a web site by a rotating banner or images that change on a click?
More than likely, you are viewing a FLASH movie or SWF (pronounced 'swiff' ) file. The Macromedia (now
Adobe) file format ShockWave-Flash (SWF) was designed to deliver vector graphics and animation over the
Internet. A SWF file is in a binary format and not a file that you could read and edit like HTML. The file
format is simple and is read by a FLASH player. Recent statistics show that more than 99 percent of Internet
users, so virtually everyone, have the Flash 4 plug-in installed. The player depends upon only a very limited
set of operating system functionality. The format is primarily intended for on-screen display and so it
supports anti-aliasing, fast rendering to a bitmap of any color format, animation and interactive buttons.
Needless to say, you must create the FLASH file in an application separate from MOSS. Then upload and
link to the SWF file in MOSS. Here’s how:
UPLOAD SWF FILE
1. Upload the SWF file to the images folder
2. Publish image
CREATE A NEW PAGE
You can access a FLASH file a couple ways in MOSS.
Create a new page using a page layouts with a Flash content container (DIV)
Use any page layout that has the ability to add a web part
The following instructions will work for either method above.
ADD WEB PART
1. Choose Flash web part (you can also use the content editor web part)
2. From the Edit menu bar in the web part, choose “Modify shared web part”
FROM EDIT SOURCE OR THE HTML EDITOR
One step that any Flash file needs is the embed code. You’ll place this code in the Source Editor of the Flash
web part.
1. Use the Embed code:
2. Click on the file name from the Manage Content and Structure menu to get the source URL.
3. Copy and paste to the embed command above
4. Save
5. Check in
6. Publish
Embed FLASH file Page 1
FLASH TIP: EMBEDDING YOUR SWF IN A WEB PAGE
By Adrien-Luc Sanders, About.com
If you're publishing for the web, you'll need to be able to insert your SWF file into your website, right? While
Flash has the option to publish in HTML format, all that gives you is a blank white web page with your SWF
file playing in it. That doesn't do you much good if you're using your own layout and you want to insert your
Flash movie inside that layout, does it?
If you're familiar with WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) editors like Macromedia Dreamweaver
or Microsoft FrontPage, then it's easy to just use the Insert menu to insert a Flash object, and then select your
SWF file from its location on your hard drive; the HTML editor will write the code for you, and all you need
to do is edit the path of the file to reflect the location on your web server.
If, however, you're working in a text editor and writing your HTML code from scratch, it can be a tiny bit
more difficult. Here's a quick and easy shortcut, though:
Edit your Publish settings for Flash SWFs and HTML to reflect how you want your Flash SWF to appear in
your web page.
Export your Flash movie as HTML.
Locate your HTML file on your computer, right-click, and select "Open With".
Choose either NotePad or another text editor.
Copy the source code from the HTML file.
Paste it into your web page's source code in the appropriate location where you want your SWF file
to display.
Edit the file path to reflect the location of the SWF file on your web server, and upload both your
HTML and SWF file to the appropriate directories on your server. (Note: this also applies if you're
using PHP, JSP, ASP, CGI, or other web page extensions.)
Your code should look something like this:
Page 2 Branding Control Settings
Most of this you don't need to touch, so don't worry about making sense of that. The italicized section sets
the codebase for the version of Flash used, to check against to see if your user has that version. The rest has
taglines to download the Flash player (if the user doesn't have it) and the parameters that you would need to
edit--mainly, the line labeled EMBED src="Yourfilename.swf".
By default only the file name would be there, because Flash publishes the SWF and the HTML file in the
same folder together with your FLA file. However, you may want to put your SWF files in a separate
subfolder on your server, perhaps a folder labeled "flash"--in which instance you would edit the code to read
EMBED src="flash/Yourfilename.swf".
Trust me, it's much simpler than it sounds. Give it a try and find out for yourself.
OTHER CONSIDERATIONS:
Components of a Flash file:
FLA--The FLA file format is the “master” document format for Flash projects. When you create a
new Flash file in the Adobe Flash authoring program, you create an FLA file. This contains all the
elements which make up the finished product, including graphics, animation instructions,
ActionScript code, comments, etc. FLA files can only be opened in Flash (not the Flash Player). The
FLA file does not play or execute. Instead, you export an SWF (or EXE) file which is what end-users
see. You can preview the resulting SWF file at any time from the FLA file.
FLV—Flash video files
SWF—the file containing the video component (what end-users see)
Skin SWF files--are prebuilt collections of controls that the Flash Video Playback component can use to
control the video during playback.
Progressive download or embedded video
Using external progressive video files has the following advantages over using embedded video:
During authoring, you need to publish only the SWF interface for previewing or testing part or all of
your Flash content. This results in faster preview times and quicker turnaround on iterative
experimentation.
While using an ActionScript 2.0 file, the video begins playing as soon as the first segment has been
downloaded and cached to the local disk.
While using an ActionScript 3.0 file, the video begins playing only when enough of it has
downloaded so that it can play the FLV file from start to finish. This behavior can be altered using
ActionScript.
At runtime, video files are loaded from the local disk into the SWF file, with no limitation on file size
or duration. There are no audio synchronization issues or memory restrictions.
The frame rate of the video file can be different from the frame rate of the SWF file, allowing for
greater flexibility in setting up a project.
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