Second Life Forums Archive - more flash interactivity?

paulie Femto

Into the dark

Join date: 13 Sep 2003

Posts: 1,098

03-13-2005 11:46

So, we can "push" a button in a flash movie by using the restart trick. In a movie that shows multiple buttons onscreen at a time, however, we can only push the first button.

Can we fine tune our interaction and push just the button we want by combining the restart trick with parameter passing using the html query string?

For example, can we restart the movie and pass a parameter on restart, like this: http://domainxyz.com/movie.swf?button3value=pushed.

(dont click the link. it is just an example)

Has anyone experimented with it?

_____________________

REUTERS on SL: "Thirty-five thousand people wearing their psyches on the outside and all the attendant unfettered freakishness that brings."

Almitra Blair

Resident Seeress, Builder

Join date: 10 Feb 2004

Posts: 38

hmm

03-13-2005 14:02

It looks like you can pass parameters to a flash movie IF the movie is designed to accept them. Otherwise, no.

http://www.flash-here.com/tutorials/flash_pass_param.html

Does anyone have experience with this?

_____________________

I'm just me,
Almitra

Cameo Island

House Iaomai - Passion Sim

Almitra's Antique's - Hikuelo & Cameo Island

Triad Alliance
Sim Development, Building, Landscaping

I am more than the sum total of what I "DO" in this life or any other.

Tcoz Bach

Tyrell Victim

Join date: 10 Dec 2002

Posts: 973

03-21-2005 05:16

I haven't experimented with this, but I work a GREAT deal with Flash. If you can view the movie, that means you're using the Flash player, so there shouldn't be any reason properly created buttons don't work. If you have to restart a Flash movie every time you click a button, well, that's no good.

What exactly is happening, does anybody know? Wish I had a chance to look at this, I'm very interested in using Flash in SL.

_____________________

** ...you want to do WHAT with that cube? **

Harris Hare

Second Life Resident

Join date: 5 Nov 2004

Posts: 301

03-21-2005 14:04

I do.

First up, Flash movies viewed in SL are actually being presetented by the Quicktime library, not by Macromedia's own player/plugin. Thus the reason why only Flash version 5 or less movies will play (that's what the current version of Quicktime 6.5 supports).

As for the 'reset trick', that's not really an accurate name for it. By resubmitting the LSL play media command, you are telling the embedding Quicktime player to press its play button again. In Quicktime, this has the same effect of moving to the next frame in the Flash animation's timeline. Since a lot of Flash movies are written so that they 'stop' before the animation, clicking their "Start" or "Begin" button simply moves to the next frame which has the same effect.

I have no idea how hard it would be for Linden Labs to make it so that the "hot zones" in a Flash or Quicktime movie can be available to in world avatars but theoretically, it should be possible. Where it gets weird is that to other players, the AV would be clicking on a button only seen on their own machine. o.O

Icon Serpentine

punk in drublic

Join date: 13 Nov 2003

Posts: 858

03-23-2005 15:05

From: Harris Hare

I do.

First up, Flash movies viewed in SL are actually being presetented by the Quicktime library, not by Macromedia's own player/plugin. Thus the reason why only Flash version 5 or less movies will play (that's what the current version of Quicktime 6.5 supports).

As for the 'reset trick', that's not really an accurate name for it. By resubmitting the LSL play media command, you are telling the embedding Quicktime player to press its play button again. In Quicktime, this has the same effect of moving to the next frame in the Flash animation's timeline. Since a lot of Flash movies are written so that they 'stop' before the animation, clicking their "Start" or "Begin" button simply moves to the next frame which has the same effect.

I have no idea how hard it would be for Linden Labs to make it so that the "hot zones" in a Flash or Quicktime movie can be available to in world avatars but theoretically, it should be possible. Where it gets weird is that to other players, the AV would be clicking on a button only seen on their own machine. o.O

This is quite correct. The QT engine also recognizes a lot of the timeline functions in ActionScript. So it is essentially possible to interact with flash using a scripting layer such as PHP and using the URL commands we have in LSL to send data. It might even be possible to parse XML-RPC data in a scripting layer such as PHP to present data to a flash file that can update itself using the supplied information.

Par example, I'm building a flash blog. I could update this blog from in-world using email and see the updated blog page in-world. This same system could also be used to make pretty guestbooks, scoreboards, help-systems, etc in-world.

_____________________

If you are awesome!

more flash interactivity?
paulie Femto Into the dark Join date: 13 Sep 2003 Posts: 1,098	03-13-2005 11:46 So, we can "push" a button in a flash movie by using the restart trick. In a movie that shows multiple buttons onscreen at a time, however, we can only push the first button. Can we fine tune our interaction and push just the button we want by combining the restart trick with parameter passing using the html query string? For example, can we restart the movie and pass a parameter on restart, like this: http://domainxyz.com/movie.swf?button3value=pushed. (dont click the link. it is just an example) Has anyone experimented with it? _____________________ REUTERS on SL: "Thirty-five thousand people wearing their psyches on the outside and all the attendant unfettered freakishness that brings."
Almitra Blair Resident Seeress, Builder Join date: 10 Feb 2004 Posts: 38	hmm 03-13-2005 14:02 It looks like you can pass parameters to a flash movie IF the movie is designed to accept them. Otherwise, no. http://www.flash-here.com/tutorials/flash_pass_param.html Does anyone have experience with this? _____________________ I'm just me, Almitra Cameo Island House Iaomai - Passion Sim Almitra's Antique's - Hikuelo & Cameo Island Triad Alliance Sim Development, Building, Landscaping I am more than the sum total of what I "DO" in this life or any other.
Tcoz Bach Tyrell Victim Join date: 10 Dec 2002 Posts: 973	03-21-2005 05:16 I haven't experimented with this, but I work a GREAT deal with Flash. If you can view the movie, that means you're using the Flash player, so there shouldn't be any reason properly created buttons don't work. If you have to restart a Flash movie every time you click a button, well, that's no good. What exactly is happening, does anybody know? Wish I had a chance to look at this, I'm very interested in using Flash in SL. _____________________ ...you want to do WHAT with that cube?
Harris Hare Second Life Resident Join date: 5 Nov 2004 Posts: 301	03-21-2005 14:04 I do. First up, Flash movies viewed in SL are actually being presetented by the Quicktime library, not by Macromedia's own player/plugin. Thus the reason why only Flash version 5 or less movies will play (that's what the current version of Quicktime 6.5 supports). As for the 'reset trick', that's not really an accurate name for it. By resubmitting the LSL play media command, you are telling the embedding Quicktime player to press its play button again. In Quicktime, this has the same effect of moving to the next frame in the Flash animation's timeline. Since a lot of Flash movies are written so that they 'stop' before the animation, clicking their "Start" or "Begin" button simply moves to the next frame which has the same effect. I have no idea how hard it would be for Linden Labs to make it so that the "hot zones" in a Flash or Quicktime movie can be available to in world avatars but theoretically, it should be possible. Where it gets weird is that to other players, the AV would be clicking on a button only seen on their own machine. o.O
Icon Serpentine punk in drublic Join date: 13 Nov 2003 Posts: 858	03-23-2005 15:05 From: Harris Hare I do. First up, Flash movies viewed in SL are actually being presetented by the Quicktime library, not by Macromedia's own player/plugin. Thus the reason why only Flash version 5 or less movies will play (that's what the current version of Quicktime 6.5 supports). As for the 'reset trick', that's not really an accurate name for it. By resubmitting the LSL play media command, you are telling the embedding Quicktime player to press its play button again. In Quicktime, this has the same effect of moving to the next frame in the Flash animation's timeline. Since a lot of Flash movies are written so that they 'stop' before the animation, clicking their "Start" or "Begin" button simply moves to the next frame which has the same effect. I have no idea how hard it would be for Linden Labs to make it so that the "hot zones" in a Flash or Quicktime movie can be available to in world avatars but theoretically, it should be possible. Where it gets weird is that to other players, the AV would be clicking on a button only seen on their own machine. o.O This is quite correct. The QT engine also recognizes a lot of the timeline functions in ActionScript. So it is essentially possible to interact with flash using a scripting layer such as PHP and using the URL commands we have in LSL to send data. It might even be possible to parse XML-RPC data in a scripting layer such as PHP to present data to a flash file that can update itself using the supplied information. Par example, I'm building a flash blog. I could update this blog from in-world using email and see the updated blog page in-world. This same system could also be used to make pretty guestbooks, scoreboards, help-systems, etc in-world. _____________________ If you are awesome!

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more flash interactivity?