Introduction:
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FlashPlayer is a player for Adobe's "flash" interactive animation format,
also known as SWF. The flash format was originally invented as a very
bandwidth-efficient means for delivering animation across the Internet.
It has since grown into an interactive presentation format, complete with
its own scripting language.
Like all flash animation players for the Amiga, FlashPlayer is based on the
open-source SWF library by Olivier Debon. FlashPlayer has made many
improvements to the original SWF library, and has wrapped around it a
full-featured GUI. However, despite the improvements, FlashPlayer still
suffers many of the limitations of the SWF library, including limited or
missing support for many of the newer additions to the flash format.
This is the standalone version of FlashPlayer. The standalone version is
capable of playing flash animations without the use of any other program.
FlashPlayer is also available separately as an IBrowse plugin, which allows
flash animations to be viewed as part of a web page. The plugin of course
requires IBrowse.
The source code for both FlashPlayer and the modified SWF library are
available in a separate archive, FlashPlayerSrc.lha.
Features:
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- Fairly complete support for Flash 1 through Flash 3 formats
Most of these older animations will play pretty much as intended.
- Limited support for Flash 4 and up
Does not support scripting, so while it will not malfunction when
presented with a newer animation, it may not play it as intended. Newer
animations may play just fine, however, if they don't use any of the
unsupported features (I've seen Flash 8 and Flash 9 animations that work
fine with FlashPlayer).
- Uses render.library and guigfx.library (included) for best image quality
Can play flash animations on any screen, from two color low-res OCS to
24-bit graphics cards. Supports OCS, ECS, AGA, CyberGraphics, and Picasso
96. Uses dithering for improved display quality on color-mapped screens.
- Public and custom screen support
Can open on the Workbench or on a web browser's screen, or can open its
own screen, in any resolution or format.
- Uses AHI for flexible audio output
Plays sound on any hardware for which AHI has a driver. Supports 16-bit
audio.
- Uses openurl.library for browser support
Allows any supported browser to visit web pages linked to by a flash
animation. (The plugin offers even better support for IBrowse users.)
- Built-in decoding of MP3 sounds
Contains an integrated version of the open-source MAD MP3 decoder; does
not require mpega.library or other external decoder.
- Support for alternate hardware platforms
Because it does not depend on native Amiga hardware for graphics or
sound, FlashPlayer works with Amiga emulators and with the latest Amiga
hardware (it has been ported to MorphOS with minimal effort, and runs
under emulation on UAE and the AmigaOne).
- Runs from Workbench or shell
Can be run in any of the normal ways, including via the WB 3.5+ default
icon system (default icon included), and as a MIME-driven player for a
web browser (instructions included). If run on the Workbench screen,
files can be played by dropping them on the FlashPlayer window.
- Mouse, menu, and keyboard control of the flash animation
Control the animation with the mouse, or use the keyboard and menus to
stop, start, frame advance, and rewind the animation. Zoom in on the
animation, and scroll around within the zoomed-in frame.
- Configurable, for maximum flexibility
Uses tooltypes or command-line arguments to set the screen type, the
playback quality, the size and scale (enlarged or reduced) of the
animation, enable or disable sound, streaming sound, looping, and url
support, adjust the sound buffer size, and set the diagnostic output
level.
New for version 1.6:
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- Added partial support for edit text fields. Without scripting FlashPlayer
can't actually edit text, but these fields are also used many times to
display static text, and this text is now visible.
- Added partial support for device fonts (text that displays using plat-
form-native fonts, rather than fonts that are included as part of the
animation), which are often used by edit text fields. FlashPlayer doesn't
actually use Amiga fonts, but instead uses a built-in simulated device
font.
- FlashPlayer now recognizes the difference between menu buttons and push
buttons; push buttons "capture" the mouse, so the button will remain
active if the mouse is moved off of the button while held down. Any
actions triggered by this activity will occur, rather than being ignored.
- If a button release sound is present it will be played; previously it was
ignored.
- The new JPEG image type added to Flash 10 files will be displayed, though
without the deblocking filter associated with the image.
- Many bugs involved with operating an animation's buttons using the key-
board instead of the mouse have been fixed, so this feature is actually
usable now.
- The display now refreshes properly when using the keyboard to zoom into
and scroll around in an animation, making this feature usable at last.
Limitations:
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- Does not support many of the newer additions to the flash format
Chief among these is the scripting language first added to Flash 4, and
extended in newer flash versions. Some animations depend on scripting and
will not run without it, while others use it only as an enhancement, and
can still be viewed to some extent even without scripting support.
- Resource-intensive
While the flash files themselves can be small, decoding and presenting
them requires lots of memory and lots of processor cycles. A fairly high-
end system is required to play any but the smallest and simplest anim-
ations, and even a 68060 is unable to play most animations at their
intended speed (or to play streaming sound without dropouts).
- Limited browser integration
The flash format was really intended to be played from within a browser,
using an integrated plugin. Lacking this ability, FlashPlayer can only
act as an assistant to a browser, rather than as an integrated part of
it. This makes viewing flash animations on the web much harder than it
ought to be. The plugin version of FlashPlayer solves this problem, if
you use IBrowse.
Requirements:
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FlashPlayer runs under AmigaOS 3.0 and above. It requires guigfx.library
and render.library, both included. It makes use of, but does not require,
AHI and openurl.library.
FlashPlayer requires a 68020 or better processor, with an FPU. FlashPlayer
is not available for the PowerPC, as I don't have a PPC system to develop
it on; however it runs under emulation on AmigaOS 4 and UAE, and has been
ported to MorphOS.
Author:
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Mike Steed
72207.463@compuserve.com
SWF library written by Olivier Debon; modified by Mike Steed
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