tags, you can create animations and interactive effects with Web-authoring tools ranging from Notepad or SimpleText to Macromedia Dreamweaver. You can actually combine Flash content with DHTML to create Flash layers on top of other HTML content. One problem with DHTML is that Netscape and Internet Explorer do not use it in the same way. Usually, you need to make sure you have a specialized set of code (or minor modifications) for each browser type.
XML with XSL XML stands for eXtensible Markup Language. XML looks like HTML, but it’s really a language that can manage structured or related data such as pricing information, contact information, or anything else that you would store in a database. XSL stands for eXtensible Stylesheet Language. XSL documents apply formatting rules to XML documents. Together, XML and XSL documents can create interactive data-driven Web sites. However, older browsers cannot read and display XML and XSL documents. Nearly every graphical Web browser available, regard less of the browser’s version, supports some version of the Flash Player. This means that you can install the Flash Player and play Flash movies on Netscape 4.0 or IE 4.0. As you see later in this chapter, XML can also be used to supply data to Flash.
SVG Backed by several software companies, including Microsoft and Adobe, SVG is the Scalable Vector Graphics format. The World Wide Web Consortium (or W3C) has proposed SVG as the vector graphics standard for the Web. However, SVG is more than a graphics format — it is also a Web development language based on XML. Adobe remains the industry’s strongest supporter of SVG by enabling its vector applications (mainly Adobe Illustrator and GoLive) to create files in this format. Adobe has also taken it upon itself to make the plug-in for this file format. The W3C tries to establish standards for the Web, and hopes that browsers will one day natively support SVG without the necessity of a plug-in. Currently, however, SVG has had a very slow adoption rate by both Web developers and surfers. As such, it’s not likely to be a feasible development solution for most of your business clients.
Chapter 2 ✦ Working with Web Technologies and Interactive Models
Web Resource
To keep up with SVG developments, see Adobe’s SVG Web site at www.adobe.com/svg or the W3C’s SVG coverage at www.w3c.org/Graphics/SVG.
Macromedia Shockwave Director Originally Macromedia’s flagship product, Director remains the powerhouse authoring solution for offline interactive rich-media projects. Since its inception in the 1980s, Director has had the benefit of many years to establish its mature interface and development environment. Director can integrate and control many media types, including video, audio, and entire Flash movies. Director also has an Xtras plug-in architecture, which allows third-party developers to expand or enhance Director’s capabilities. More recently, Director 8.5 added true 3D modeling support. Now you can create Shockwave games with textured models and lighting effects! However, there are two major drawbacks to Shockwave Director: It requires a large download for the full player installation, and the player is available only for Windows and Macintosh platforms. Director is the primary authoring tool for CD-ROM and DVD-ROM development.
SMIL, Real Systems RealPlayer, and Apple QuickTime SMIL is the Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language, and it also looks a lot like HTML markup tags. SMIL allows you to layer several media components in SMIL-compatible players such as RealPlayer and QuickTime. You probably have seen SMIL at work when you load RealPlayer and see the snazzy graphics that make up the channel’s interface. With SMIL, you can layer interactive buttons and dynamic text on top of streaming video or audio content. You may not even think of SMIL as a competing technology, but rather a complementary one — Flash can be one of the multimedia tracks employed by SMIL! You can even use Flash as a track type in QuickTime alone, without the use of SMIL. With Flash 4, Macromedia and Apple announced QuickTime Flash movies, which allow you to create Flash interfaces that lay on top of audio-video content. RealPlayer will also play “tuned” Flash files directly, without the use of SMIL. A tuned Flash file is weighted evenly from frame to frame to ensure synchronized playback. Note, however, that tuned files usually need to be strict linear animations without any interactive functionality.
Macromedia Authorware Like Flash, Authorware was a technology developed by another company and purchased by Macromedia. Since this acquisition, Macromedia has significantly developed the features and capabilities of Authorware. It is an authoring application and a companion plug-in technology, with similar audio-video integration capabilities as Macromedia Director. However, Authorware was developed with e-learning in mind. You can structure training solutions and monitor stu dent learning with Authorware. We mention Authorware as a potential competitor to Flash because many Flash developers use Flash to create training modules that interact with serverside databases.
Microsoft PowerPoint As you frequently see in business meetings, conferences, or even classrooms, many interac tive presentations are still developed using PowerPoint. Many people turn to PowerPoint for its ease of use, especially when making slide-show presentations for conferences and meet ings. You can even download and set up a PowerPoint Viewer for your browser so these files can be made accessible online. However, your presentations can contain much more complex animation by using Flash, and Flash presentations can be presented from laptops, or even on Pocket PCs, using the Flash Player instead.
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Part I ✦ Conceptualizing Flash
An Overview of Companion Technologies Now that you have a clear understanding of how Flash fits into the current World Wide Web, you can consider the technologies that contribute to Flash’s well-being. In today’s world, the developer not only needs to know how to script Flash movies, but also how to introduce Flash into existing environments, such as a Web browser or your business client’s Web-ready (or not-so-Web-ready) databases.
The Web Saga: HTML Lives! Just like a “good” horror movie, HTML keeps coming back in your face. Get used to it — you’ll be living with HTML for the foreseeable future, so if you haven’t embraced it for what it is, now’s the time. Even Web sites that are 100 percent Flash content require some rather intri cate HTML in order to work. Consider the following uses of HTML for Flash: ✦ To format and display Flash movies on a Web page: As simple as it sounds, it can be a little tricky to hand-code the HTML for both the Active X Control for Internet Explorer and the plug-in for Netscape. ✦ To scale Flash movies within the browser window: One of Flash’s exciting features is to stretch to the size of the browser window, allowing Web surfers with large monitors to view Flash movies at a larger size. ✦ To provide an alternative HTML version to the Flash content on the site, for users who don’t have (or can’t use) the Flash Player plug-in: Despite the addition of support for screen-readers to Flash Player 6 or higher, not all screen-readers are currently com patible with the built-in support. An HTML version of your content is sure to broaden your potential audience. ✦ To access content that can’t be displayed in a Flash movie: For example, if you want to link to QuickTime movies from a Flash movie, you need to write the proper HTML to embed and play back QuickTime movies. PDF documents are another example of a file format you might need to access from Flash links. ✦ HTML is also used within Flash itself: For instance, when you’re using Dynamic text fields to display text, you have the option of formatting it using HTML. An understand ing of the language, or at least the tags used to format text, will give you better control over this feature for use in your Flash productions. New Feature
Flash Player 7 can also load external CSS (cascading style sheet) files. CSS is used by many
HTML 4.0 (or DHTML) sites to determine how pages should be rendered in the browser.
Although most people find HTML a little painful to use — partly because of its inconsistencies from browser to browser — it’s well worth the time to brush up on your HTML. If you have a particularly strong aversion to HTML, we recommend that you start using a WYSIWYG HTML editor such as Macromedia Dreamweaver to make life a little simpler.
Scripting on the Client Side: JavaScript If you’re new to ActionScript, and you haven’t learned JavaScript, you’re in luck. Much of what you learn from this book can be applied to JavaScript in HTML documents. If you’re new to ActionScript, but know some JavaScript, you’re also in luck — it’ll be easier for you to grasp some of ActionScript’s programming principles. Simply put, JavaScript is the interactive lan guage of the HTML world, just as ActionScript is the interactive language of the Flash world. But why do you need to know JavaScript in order to develop Flash projects?
Chapter 2 ✦ Working with Web Technologies and Interactive Models
✦ JavaScript allows you to pass data into a Flash movie when the Web page containing the Flash movie loads. For example, maybe you want to pass a search term (from a search engine’s text field in a
