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Preparing Flash Video, Audio and other .SWF Files for CD Rom Projects
NOTE: This tutorial provides information about creating CD-ROM projects using Flash SWF files. If you want to add Flash video to a CD-ROM, you should strongly consider using FLV output as opposed to SWF output, especially for video files larger than 10MB. FLV output provides superior performance when played from a CD-ROM. For instance, unlike SWF files, FLV files do not preload 100% when played from a CD. In addition FLV files do not have the 16,000 frame limit or RAM consumption issues of SWF files.
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Introduction
We receive many questions regarding the use of Flash videofor use with CD-roms, typically for deployment in a self-executing projector file. (A Flash projector is a standalone executable file that will play a Flash file. When you use a projector it is not necessary to ensure that the end user has the Flash player installed because the projector contains both the file to be played and the player itself.)

While you can use Flash video converter to create video for CD Rom applications there are certain issues that you should consider when making those files. Because of the way Flash works, when you have a SWF on CD, the Flash player loads the entire file into memory before it starts to play. So, depending on your computer's speed, ram, CD player speed, etc. your performance may vary. Consequently, we suggest not creating files larger than 10-25MB for use on a CD Rom. You can get around this limit by chaining a series of SWFs together and loading them sequentially (though you will have a lag each time you load a new swf).

Also, for Macs, you need to allocate enough RAM to your projector. All Mac OSs prior to OSX will not automatically allocate enough RAM. When preparing a CD-ROM, the projector file needs to be allocated it's own size plus the biggest Flash video file plus a couple of extra MB to be on the safe side. When the HFS volume is burnt onto CD it will inherit the memory settings you've specified.

Wildform products will automatically output projectors for both Win and Mac. However, be aware that the Mac projectors created on a Windows version of our software are compressed and need to be expanded on a Mac prior to running. The Mac projectors created on a Mac version are already expanded.

We ran across the following information on the web and the author, Radina Matic, offered to let us post it here for our user's benefit. This tutorial/faq should answer most of your questions regarding the use of Flash video for CDs, including creating projectors and authoring CDs.

This tutorial/faq is designed to answer the most common questions associated with the creation of Flash projectors and the methods of burning those projectors to CD-roms.
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Why use a Standalone Projector?
The main reason to use a Flash projector is for when you want to distribute your Flash creations offline and you do not want to worry if the user has the Flash Player installed.
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Mac Projector vs. Windows Projector
The standalone Projector for PC comes with the normal .exe extension, while the Mac Projector published on PC comes with .hqx extension. HQX is not an executable file, it is a compressed file format (kind of like Mac's Zip file) which packs together the two file forks Mac files have: the Data fork and the Resource fork. The .hqx file will not open on a PC if you doubleclick on it (because it has to be decoded), and it will not work if you burn it like that on CD with PC (for CD burning issues see below).

Note: Mac projectors created on a PC must be expanded prior to opening on a Mac. Mac projectors made on a Mac do not have to be expanded - they are already expanded. The Windows projectors made on a Mac should work fine on a PC.

Note regarding Loading SWFs: If you want to load other .swf files into your main movie, you ONLY need to publish the main movie as an .exe/hqx, not all of them.
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FSCommand for Standalone Projector
FSCommands are used to communicate between the Flash player and the operating system.
  1. PC/Windows issues:

    Flash 5 supports 6 FSCommands: "quit", "fullscreen", "allowscale", "trapallkeys" (locks all keys, but user can still access the Status bar by pressing the Windows key - if the projector is set to display at full screen - and exit your projector by pressing Alt + F4), "showmenu" ('false' argument will disable all right click menu options except "About Macromedia...") and "exec". There is also an undocumented "Save" FSCommand which allows you to write variables to a user's HD.

    The "Exec" command revealed itself to be the most interesting because it gives you the opportunity to make your movie communicate with other programs, open files in their default applications and lot more (see Resources). On the other hand, if you would like to enhance your projector, for instance change its shape, make its background transparent, change title and icon, and so on, you will have to use one of 3rd party tools (see below for a partial list).

    The "Exec" command in Flash MX is severely crippled since it does not allow passing arguments anymore and all programs you want to start from your projector must be in the fscommand folder in the same root as projector file. "Save" FSCommand has also been suppressed. Some 3rd party tools may offer workaround to this.
  2. Mac issues:

    Normally all code should work on the Macintosh platform without any problems (Flash was made to be cross-platform). One thing you will not be able to do with a Mac projector is to write variables on a user's HD. Also, when opening files with FSCommand you should remember to use colons (:) (and not slashes (/) as in PC) to separate folders in a pathname: FSCommand ("exec", ":folder:filename");. On the other hand, OSX uses standard Unix path notation (/) and not colons.

    Another way to open specific files with a Mac projector is by using applescript, which you should compile as an application in the AppleScript Editor and then run with FSCommand. Your applescript and the file you want to open with the applescript should be in the same folder. Here are 2 examples:

    Example 1:
    --set the name of the file to open
    property fileName : "thedocument.pdf"
    --get the path to the containing folder
    set myPath to (path to me as string)
    set AppleScript's text item delimiters to ":"
    set the parentFolder to
    ((text items 1 thru -2 of myPath) & "") as string
    set AppleScript's text item delimiters to ""
    -- find the flash file
    try
    set targetFile to alias (the parentFolder & fileName)
    on error
    --i.e. if there's no file here by this name, it will quit.
    return quit
    end try

    Example 2:
    tell application "Finder"
    open file targetFile
    end tell
    tell application "Finder"
    activate
    select file "Your File" of disk "Your Disk"
    open selection
    end tell

    There seems to be a problem/bug with Flash MX projectors for Mac. Basically if you have to load .swf's in your main movie it will not stay full screen even if you use the FSCommand for it correctly. The workaround for this problem is to create an empty "container" movie with only the FSCommand for full screen, and then load your content into level1 or higher. That seems to be the only way a Mac projector will stay full screen (see Resources below for more details).

    Unfortunately, there are no 3rd party tools for the Mac that can help you enhance your projectors as there are for PC.
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Burning CDs with projectors
Once you have your projector you will probably want to burn it to a CD for distribution. I assume that most of us know how to burn CDs for our own platform, so I will only cover burning hybrid (crossplatform) CDs here.

Since Flash projectors on CD have to be loaded completely into a computer's memory (ram) before they start to play, you need to be careful about their size. Even though there is no definite answer (though loading a series of .swf's into your main movie may help), it is recommended that they should not be bigger then 25 Mb (Macromedia's original advice is: no bigger then 4MB! - see resources for the technote). If you have to do a bigger project, you may consider switching to Director.
Burning on Mac
Since Mac recognizes the ISO 9660 file system and Windows file formats, and Windows does not understand Mac's Hierarchical File System (HFS) file format, hybrid CDs used to have to be burned on Macintosh. But PC users should not despair because there are workarounds to this (see below).

Toast
Toast is one of the burning programs which allows the creation of Hybrid CDs on Mac. You will need to make temporary disk partition on your Desktop and copy your Mac projector and eventually the shared .swf files (those that will be seen on both Mac and PC) on it. In another folder on your desktop (but not in the temporary partition) put all PC files (projector, autorun.inf and icon). Then in Toast choose Custom Hybrid, select Mac volume, press Data button and then simply select your temporary partition (or drag it onto the Toast window). Now choose ISO volume, hit ISO button and select your PC files from the folder you made (just the files, not the whole folder), and also select all the shared .swf files from the temporary Mac partition. This way the shared files will be burned only once, but will be seen on both Mac and PC. You will have to specify "Joliet" naming settings for PC files so the names can be longer then 8.3 characters.

Autostart
The Autostart feature on the Mac is handled by QuickTime and you can choose the file you want to autostart (your projector) from the settings in the Mac volume of the Toast window. If you want your PC projector to autorun when the CD is inserted, you'll have to make an autorun.inf file. You can use free program BBEdit to create this file for the PC on your Mac. Choose New document and write this:

[autorun]
open=yourprojector.exe
icon=youricon.ico

Save the file as autorun.inf. It should be on the root of the CD to work correctly. If you want your CD to show a custom icon in Windows Explorer, it should be in the Windows icon format - any simple graphic image will not work. There is a program called Iconographer that can make Windows icons on a Mac.

It may be wise to allocate enough RAM memory (which should be equal to the size of your projector, the size of the .swf files to load into the main move, and a couple of extra MB just to be sure) to your Mac partition before burning, because the CD inherits its memory settings. When you have all this ready, burn your CD and enjoy...
Burning on PC
The only way to create cross-platform (hybrid) CDs on a PC is to use a specific program that makes an "image" file (this has nothing to do with graphic images) containing your Mac and PC projector and the shared files. The image file is then burned to the CD with your favorite burning software. The result should work on both platforms and autorun works on PC as autostart does on Mac. Here is the procedure to use with a program called MacImage:

When you open the program it will be in the default Project Mode and Hybrid view. Give the name to your Project, launch Explorer and drag your files in their places: PC projector, autorun file and icon into the ISO view of the MacImage window, Mac projector into the HSF view (do not worry about expanding .hqx files, because the program takes care of it), and shared files into ISO/HSF view. This way PC users will see only PC files, Mac users will see only Mac files and both will see shared files. Once you have finished all this, you will have to compile the image file: choose Compile option from the Projects menu (or click the fourth button on the toolbar), give the name to your image file and the program will do the rest. All you have to do now is burn the compiled image to CD with burning software. But before that, you should take another step to implement Autostart feature for Mac. Reopen the compiled image in the Partition Mode (switch mode in the first item of Options menu), select the file you want to autostart (your Mac projector), and choose the Autolaunch feature from the right click menu. Resave the image and it will be ready for burning.

Almost all burning packages are capable of burning image files. In Nero you should choose Burn Image option from the File menu, open your image file (switch to "all files" type to see it), accept the default values from the pop up window and it will burn the image to CD. And that's it.

PC users can make autorun.inf file in a text editor (Notepad) and it should look the same as above. The autorun file should be on the root of your CD, but your projector and icon do not have to be. Just remember to change the autorun.inf file if you plan for any reason to put your projector into a specific folder (the same is true for making autorun.inf for burning hybrid CDs on a Mac):

[autorun]
open=somefolder/yourprojector.exe
icon=somefolder/youricon.ico
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This tutorial was written by Radina Matic - DiDi.
 
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