TIP 241: Detecting SWF Plug-in Compatibility

Name: Advanced SWF Authoring

Developer: GoLive Product Team

Source: http://share.studio.adobe.com/axAssetDetailSubmit.asp?aID=8802

Cost: Free

The GoLive product team put together a nifty extension that sniffs out whether or not a visitor to your page has the proper SWF plug-in needed to see Flash animations. This is a very cool extension because it offers a lot of flexibility as to how the detection happens, and it creates the necessary code in your page.

After installing the extension, you'll notice a new section in the Inspector palette when a SWF is placed onto a page. The section, called Detect, offers three detection methods: You can create a page that will direct the user to the Flash page if the plug-in is detected or to an alternate page if the plug-in is not installed (Figure 241); you can specify a GIF or JPG which will replace the SWF if the plug-in is not detected; or you can specify HTML to replace the SWF if the plug-in is not detected.

Figure 241. This extension adds a new Detect section to the SWF Inspector.

In all three cases, you simply choose a detection method from the Type pull-down in Inspector palette and then click the Create Page button, which creates a new detection page, or click the Insert Detect button to insert the code into the current page.

In our tests we got an alert when using the image-replacement method. The alert is to let you know that you need to enter the pixel dimensions of the GIF or JPG into the inspector because the extension doesn't automatically do so itself, but its wording is a little unclear and even a bit scary. Don't let it throw you, though. Just click the OK button and enter the width and height of the image into the Inspector palette. It works like a charm!