flash loadmovie not operating in PHP

livewire

This is odd. I have no idea how to fix it. I have a PHP file (Apache/Linux Server) that calls a Flash movie that resides in a subfolder. That works. It pulls up the Flash movie and all is good so far.

The problem:

Inside the Flash movie there are 4-5 buttons that make a load movie call to other Flash movies that are in the same subfolder as the original movie. When this happens, the Flash file fails to load the movie. The original Flash file's call is a direct link to the file with NO slashs or periods (although I tried that too). The link in Flash is also not a expression. In the actionscript is the filename ONLY.

Offline, if I just pull up the Flash file, it works great. If I make this same call from an HTML file to the Flash sub-folder (either locally or on the server) it runs great.

When it is run online with PHP, the Flash file will only play the original file and will not load the sub-movie in. The only fix I have found is to put the PHP file directly into the Flash folder. Once this is done, I can play the Flash file from the PHP file and the Flash file will successfully load the sub-movies. OR another fix was to put the absolute URL in the Flash loadMovie command (which is usually just the relative filename since all of the Flash files for one project go into the same folder).

Yay he fixed it....NO. I need the PHP on the OUTSIDE of the subfolder that has the Flash files. Why? I have MANY subfolders to create for many projects. I can't have all the files in the same folder. It would be a big unorganized mess and some of the Flash files are different but have the same name. I could duplicate my PHP file for every folder, but then the task of updating the PHP would become a pain since I would have to then reupload a file into numerous folders.

I could also include an absolute URL in the Flash loadMovie command for all of my Flash files. This cannot be done either because there are hundreds of files and most were done years ago. So going back to reconfigure all of them would not be feesible, expecially since the person who will end up doing our input work will be using a simple interface, not Flash.

Has anyone ever seen this problem? If so, how does one fix it? It seems like it is somehow in the PHP, but I am not sure.

Here is the PHP outside of the Flash folder:
http://www.exade.com/test/test_flash.php

Here is the same exact PHP inside of the Flash folder (only difference in the code is that this file doesn't include a folder when calling the Flash file):
http://www.exade.com/test/images/test_flash2.php
Just click on any of the four main, gray, links to view what I am talking about.

If anyone wants to check out the PHP code:
http://www.exade.com/test/wth.zip

livewire

Bump

autocolismo

try using something like this (this is just from the file test_flash.php) try using the same way in the other files

echo "<OBJECT classid='clsid: D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000' codebase='http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,0,0'
WIDTH=" . $wide . " HEIGHT=" . $high . " id=" . $filename . ">
<PARAM NAME=movie VALUE=" . $folder . $bling . $filename . "> <PARAM NAME=quality VALUE=high><EMBED src=" . $folder . $bling . $filename . " quality=high bgcolor=#000000 WIDTH=" . $wide . " HEIGHT=" . $high . " NAME=" . $filename . "
TYPE='application/x-shockwave-flash' PLUGINSPAGE='http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer'></EMBED>
</OBJECT>";

i hope you understand what i'm "saying"

livewire

Thank you for your reply. Unfortunatly, that didn't work either.

🙁

I have a co-worker that theorized that since the flash file is being called into the PHP that is in another directory, the flash file then thinks it is actually in that directory. So when it calls for the flash sub movies, it can't find them. I tested this theory by putting the sub movies into the PHP directory. The PHP then called the main flash which was in the sub folder. When the flash called up the sub movies, it worked. Now I have three fixes for this problem, but not the one I need most. LOL! I need the directory structure to be more organized than it would be by just throwing all the files together.

This is a dumb problem. (bangs head on wall)

autocolismo

example:

place to codes :
www.something.com/code

place to flash movies:
www.something.com/flash

so when you call the php from flash it must return:
"../flash/somemovie.swf"

If that doesn't work you should look for something else, you are maybe calling for the wrong filename, etc.

action script:

on (release) {
loadMovie(myMovie, mytarget);
}

the php should return:
"&myMovie=../flash/movie.swf&mytarget=target"

Note: use:
echo "some text" . $var . "more text";
instead of
echo "sometext"$var"more text";

livewire

Would this require changing the actionscript? I don't quite understand. If so, I cannot change the actionscript as there are hundreds of files.

autocolismo

One thing more.

If you pass variables to PHP:
use
$HTTP_GET_VARS['varname'];
or
$HTTP_POST_VARS['varname'];

to get the variables from other pages. I think this is your problem.
try that, if it still doesn't work post here your php AND one fla font so i can see who you made that.

zatoichi

It sounds like the issue is affecting your movie is a problem Flash has with relative pathname tracing. On some browsers the path is traced from the directory of the html page that loaded the original movie, and on others from the directory of the movie itself (i can't remember which browsers do which).

Workarounds include:
using only absolute urls
keeping everything in one directory:
passing a base url variable to the movie at runtime and

using the base attribute

The base attribute is the method recommended by Macromedia, but it is also the only one I have never tried. Here is some more info about it:
http://www.macromedia.com/support/flash/ts/documents/tn4157.html
Good luck.

livewire

The BASE attribute works perfectly. It saved the day. The Flash files can now all be in their own directories. AWESOME! Thanks for the insight.

😃 😃 😃 😃 😃 😃

zatoichi

🙂