Summary

In this hour, you've seen how to embed video and sound into a web page. You saw how to use a simple link to a multimedia clip, which is the most broadly supported but least flexible option for playing media content. You then learned how to use the <object> tag to embed a media player directly in a web page. Not only that, but you found out that for maximum browser compatibility it helps to assist the <object> tag with the <embed /> tag. The <object> and <embed /> tags can be used to include a vast array of media types, including WAV, MP3, RealAudio, and MIDI files, not top mention AVI, WMV, and QuickTime videos, to name just a few. Table 19.1 summarizes the tags discussed in this hour.

Table 19.1. HTML Tags and Attributes Covered in Hour 19

Tag/Attribute	Function
<embed />	Embeds a multimedia file to be read or displayed by a plug-in application; this tag is technically deprecated but still useful due to browsers not fully supporting the <object> tag yet.

Attributes
width="width"	The width of the embedded object in pixels.
height="height"	The height of the embedded object in pixels.
type="mimetype"	The MIME type of the multimedia content.
src="mediaurl"	The URL of the file to embed.
controls="controls"	The configuration of the user input controls for the media player; use All to enable all controls.
loop="loop"	Whether to play the media clip once or loop it repeatedly; set to true or false.
autostart="autostart"	Whether to start playing the media clip upon opening the page; set to TRue or false.
pluginspage="pluginurl"	The URL of the plug-in required to play the media clip.
<object>…</object>	Inserts images, videos, Java applets, ActiveX controls, or other objects into a document. (See Hour 18 for attributes of the <object> tag.)
<param>…</param>	Runtime settings for an object, such as the width and height of the area it occupies on a page.

Attributes
name="name"	A named parameter property.
value="value"	The value associated with a named parameter property.