Internet Explorer 7 really don’t like Swf

Mar 282006
 

Update:(July 26 2007)To avoid this behavior you need to load your Flash via Javascript. For this you can use the SWFObject, I made an extension for Dreamweaver to ease the use of it.

In IE7 there is one more thing that they add that I find completely useless and unusable.
There is now a little info box telling you:

Click to activate and use this control

When you rollOver() a flash animation. It do load and play your animation but every first time you want to click on your Flash (on a button for exemple), the first click is to active the control and then you got to make a second click to interact with the Flash…
So I went to the Microsoft site where they use a very nice (lol) flash animation.

You can check their ie7Flash.js file that they use.

And so everything work without the info box !

Internet Explorer 7 don’t like Swf

Mar 282006
 

Update:(July 26 2007)To avoid this behavior you need to load your Flash via Javascript. For this you can use the SWFObject, I made an extension for Dreamweaver to ease the use of it.

I just wanted to make a quick test of my website with IE7 beta 2, thinking that all would work normally but I had a bad surprised.
My Flash site is launch in a pop up, it’s a swf file and IE7 give an error: Access is denied.
This error appears every time I try to access a swf that is not embedded in an Html. If the swf is embedded it works perfectly.
So what to do if IE7 doesn’t play your swf ?

  • Just reload [ press F5 ] and then it play your file.

    • Anyway it’s seems that we have to take the habit of using Html embedding in a pop-up.
    Maybe M$ will solve this problem, if it’s an option to change I prefer to consider it may not be used by all the user, so to forget. Or am I the only one with this error?

    Getting Things Done

    Mar 272006
     

    I’ve read (in Make vol 05) about the GTDTiddlyWiki (Getting things done wiki), I have used it a bit and I must say that it’s a really nice and useful application.
    It’s a sort of notebook very usable. It’s not serverside but all take place in your browser (so you can use it offline). It’s under a BSD open source license (so it’s free).
    For info, Getting Things Done is the title of a book written by D. Allen.
    You really need to take a look at GTDTiddlyWiki if you don’t already know it.

    Quaero by the end of 2006 ?

    Mar 262006
     

    The European multimedia search engine Quaero (the european google in short) is predicted to be launch by the end of 2006. More and more it become a “high-tech reality”. It will introduce the ability to search by a “query image” and by a query sound”.
    From www.upi.com :

    Although current search engines can be used to hunt for text, sound-files, videos and images, these searches are limited in that they can only be conducted using keywords rather than by the actual nature of the files. A search for a picture of an elephant will only retrieve images that are currently tagged with “elephant” keywords. Quaero aims to change that. By introducing the ability to search by a “query image” and “query sound clips” instead of just basic keywords, users will be able to search by images and sounds as well as text. Through a process of “image mining,” software that recognizes colors and shapes will be able to identify pictures and videos containing images similar to the query image. “Keyword propagation” will also be used: When Quaero finds a descriptionless image containing some or all elements of a properly labeled image it will append the description from the labeled image to the unlabeled one, creating faster searches. By introducing image and audio components to online searches, Quaero is looking to not just rival Google but to take a major leap forward in the entire field of search-engine technologies and capabilities.

    It may also reveal to be a good solution for Flash referencing :)
    The full article from UPI.

    Flex 2.0 beta Videos Tutorials

    Mar 232006
     

    On the macromedia labs I just discover some Flex videos,

  • Flex Data Services
  • Flex Framework
  • Flex Builder
    • New coding features and shortcuts.
    • New productivity features in Flex Builder 2.0 Code and Design views
    • Create and compile an application with Flex Builder
    • Create a constraint based layout with Flex Builder
    • Building a Flex application in 15 minutes

    Nearly make me wonder about putting myself to Flex …

    Spring 2006, an early alpha build of Blaze (Flash 9) shall come

    Mar 232006
     

    As Mike Downey blog it a few month ago, the new Flash 9 alpha shall be available soon. Now that we had a look at AS3, we are ready to Flash with it! ! I can’t wait to use all the new features and I hope that all sample made with Flex will be exportable to Flash 9.

    [...] We’re planning to release a very early alpha build of BLAZE publicly to all Flash Professional 8 or Studio 8 customers that will allow Flash developers to use ActionScript 3.0 and compile to Flash Player 8.5. We plan to release this public preview alpha release of BLAZE in the Spring of 2006 when Flash Player 8.5 is released. We’re doing so in order to give developers who use the Flash authoring tool a chance to start learning ActionScript 3.0, migrate existing projects, and slowly transition to the new language.[…]

    Now that Fp 8.5 is an official public beta like Flex 2.0 beta, it’s smell like it will soon come.

    First online video in the “Great Minds in Development” series

    Mar 212006
     

    Microsoft (DevSource), had put online a nice vidéos series “Great Minds in Development”. The First is with Jakob Nielsen, he talks about :

  • Recognise that developer are not average people.
    Developer thinks what they do is simple to use, but it’s simple for them.
  • Importance of prototyping, or you’ll loose time.
  • User testing can be cheap. Just sit with the user and write note (why don’t they click here?), observe the user.
  • Be more conservative with technologies (most of people don’t care about computer, they you want their job to be done).
  • Exemple of good or bad website.
  • Make information optimized for the medium.
  • Search on we site generally don’t work well but people depend a lot on search.

    • View the video
    It’s not a course about usability but it’s good thinking.

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