Pre load or background load .flv's??

In an extended .swf, 5-10 minutes long I need to have
multiple short .flvs interact in a timely manner with content
inside the swf. Is there a way to pre load all of them or load them
in the background while the intro plays so they will launch on cue
without pause where I need them to on the timeline?
Any help is greatly appreciated!

You might also want to post your question at the Flex forum http://forums.adobe.com/community/flex/
-Sanika

Similar Messages

Pre-load .flv file

Hello again,
Seperate question:
I have created an SWF file that streams an FLV file.
What I would like to do is have the SWF load the FLV all at once at the beginning (the way a flash app might pre-load the interface). Is this possible?
This way, when the SWF starts playing, the FLV will be loaded already, and will not have to buffer during playtime.
The FLV is only 300KB, and is an element in the interface itself, so I can't have it stuttering.
Thanks in advance!

attached to the first frame where your component exists and its contentPath is defined, disable autoStart and, if flv is your component instance name, use:
flv.play();
flv.pause();
this.onEnterFrame=function()[
if(flv.bytesLoaded>=flv.bytesTotal){
delete this.onEnterFrame;
flv.play();

Pre-loading Oracle text in memory with Oracle 12c

There is a white paper from Roger Ford that explains how to load the Oracle index in memory : http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/database/enterprise-edition/mem-load-082296.html
In our application, Oracle 12c, we are indexing a big XML field (which is stored as XMLType with storage secure file) with the PATH_SECTION_GROUP. If I don't load the I table (DR$..$I) into memory using the technique explained in the white paper then I cannot have decent performance (and especially not predictable performance, it looks like if the blocks from the TOKEN_INFO columns are not memory then performance can fall sharply)
But after migrating to oracle 12c, I got a different problem, which I can reproduce: when I create the index it is relatively small (as seen with ctx_report.index_size) and by applying the technique from the whitepaper, I can pin the DR$ I table into memory. But as soon as I do a ctx_ddl.optimize_index('Index','REBUILD') the size becomes much bigger and I can't pin the index in memory. Not sure if it is bug or not.
What I found as work-around is to build the index with the following storage options:
ctx_ddl.create_preference('TEST_STO','BASIC_STORAGE');
ctx_ddl.set_attribute ('TEST_STO', 'BIG_IO', 'YES' );
ctx_ddl.set_attribute ('TEST_STO', 'SEPARATE_OFFSETS', 'NO' );
so that the token_info column will be stored in a secure file. Then I can change the storage of that column to put it in the keep buffer cache, and write a procedure to read the LOB so that it will be loaded in the keep cache. The size of the LOB column is more or less the same as when creating the index without the BIG_IO option but it remains constant even after a ctx_dll.optimize_index. The procedure to read the LOB and to load it into the cache is very similar to the loaddollarR procedure from the white paper.
Because of the SDATA section, there is a new DR table (S table) and an IOT on top of it. This is not documented in the white paper (the white paper was written for Oracle 10g). In my case this DR$ S table is much used, and the IOT also, but putting it in the keep cache is not as important as the token_info column of the DR I table. A final note: doing SEPARATE_OFFSETS = 'YES' was very bad in my case, the combined size of the two columns is much bigger than having only the TOKEN_INFO column and both columns are read.
Here is an example on how to reproduce the problem with the size increasing when doing ctx_optimize
1. create the table
drop table test;
CREATE TABLE test
(ID NUMBER(9,0) NOT NULL ENABLE,
XML_DATA XMLTYPE
XMLTYPE COLUMN XML_DATA STORE AS SECUREFILE BINARY XML (tablespace users disable storage in row);
2. insert a few records
insert into test values(1,'<Book><TITLE>Tale of Two Cities</TITLE>It was the best of times.<Author NAME="Charles Dickens"> Born in England in the town, Stratford_Upon_Avon </Author></Book>');
insert into test values(2,'<BOOK><TITLE>The House of Mirth</TITLE>Written in 1905<Author NAME="Edith Wharton"> Wharton was born to George Frederic Jones and Lucretia Stevens Rhinelander in New York City.</Author></BOOK>');
insert into test values(3,'<BOOK><TITLE>Age of innocence</TITLE>She got a prize for it.<Author NAME="Edith Wharton"> Wharton was born to George Frederic Jones and Lucretia Stevens Rhinelander in New York City.</Author></BOOK>');
3. create the text index
drop index i_test;
exec ctx_ddl.create_section_group('TEST_SGP','PATH_SECTION_GROUP');
begin
CTX_DDL.ADD_SDATA_SECTION(group_name => 'TEST_SGP',
                            section_name => 'SData_02',
                            tag => 'SData_02',
                            datatype => 'varchar2');
end;
exec ctx_ddl.create_preference('TEST_STO','BASIC_STORAGE');
exec ctx_ddl.set_attribute('TEST_STO','I_TABLE_CLAUSE','tablespace USERS storage (initial 64K)');
exec ctx_ddl.set_attribute('TEST_STO','I_INDEX_CLAUSE','tablespace USERS storage (initial 64K) compress 2');
exec ctx_ddl.set_attribute ('TEST_STO', 'BIG_IO', 'NO' );
exec ctx_ddl.set_attribute ('TEST_STO', 'SEPARATE_OFFSETS', 'NO' );
create index I_TEST
on TEST (XML_DATA)
indextype is ctxsys.context
parameters('
    section group   "TEST_SGP"
    storage         "TEST_STO"
') parallel 2;
4. check the index size
select ctx_report.index_size('I_TEST') from dual;
it says :
TOTALS FOR INDEX TEST.I_TEST
TOTAL BLOCKS ALLOCATED:                                                104
TOTAL BLOCKS USED:                                                      72
TOTAL BYTES ALLOCATED:                                 851,968 (832.00 KB)
TOTAL BYTES USED:                                      589,824 (576.00 KB)
4. optimize the index
exec ctx_ddl.optimize_index('I_TEST','REBUILD');
and now recompute the size, it says
TOTALS FOR INDEX TEST.I_TEST
TOTAL BLOCKS ALLOCATED:                                               1112
TOTAL BLOCKS USED:                                                    1080
TOTAL BYTES ALLOCATED:                                 9,109,504 (8.69 MB)
TOTAL BYTES USED:                                      8,847,360 (8.44 MB)
which shows that it went from 576KB to 8.44MB. With a big index the difference is not so big, but still from 14G to 19G.
5. Workaround: use the BIG_IO option, so that the token_info column of the DR$ I table will be stored in a secure file and the size will stay relatively small. Then you can load this column in the cache using a procedure similar to
alter table DR$I_TEST$I storage (buffer_pool keep);
alter table dr$i_test$i modify lob(token_info) (cache storage (buffer_pool keep));
rem: now we must read the lob so that it will be loaded in the keep buffer pool, use the prccedure below
create or replace procedure loadTokenInfo is
type c_type is ref cursor;
c2 c_type;
s varchar2(2000);
b blob;
buff varchar2(100);
siz number;
off number;
cntr number;
begin
    s := 'select token_info from DR$i_test$I';
    open c2 for s;
    loop
       fetch c2 into b;
       exit when c2%notfound;
       siz := 10;
       off := 1;
       cntr := 0;
       if dbms_lob.getlength(b) > 0 then
         begin
           loop
             dbms_lob.read(b, siz, off, buff);
             cntr := cntr + 1;
             off := off + 4096;
           end loop;
         exception when no_data_found then
           if cntr > 0 then
             dbms_output.put_line('4K chunks fetched: '||cntr);
           end if;
         end;
       end if;
    end loop;
end;
Rgds, Pierre

I have been working a lot on that issue recently, I can give some more info.
First I totally agree with you, I don't like to use the keep_pool and I would love to avoid it. On the other hand, we have a specific use case : 90% of the activity in the DB is done by queuing and dbms_scheduler jobs where response time does not matter. All those processes are probably filling the buffer cache. We have a customer facing application that uses the text index to search the database : performance is critical for them.
What kind of performance do you have with your application ?
In my case, I have learned the hard way that having the index in memory (the DR$I table in fact) is the key : if it is not, then performance is poor. I find it reasonable to pin the DR$I table in memory and if you look at competitors this is what they do. With MongoDB they explicitly says that the index must be in memory. With elasticsearch, they use JVM's that are also in memory. And effectively, if you look at the awr report, you will see that Oracle is continuously accessing the DR$I table, there is a SQL similar to
SELECT /*+ DYNAMIC_SAMPLING(0) INDEX(i) */
TOKEN_FIRST, TOKEN_LAST, TOKEN_COUNT, ROWID
FROM DR$idxname$I
WHERE TOKEN_TEXT = :word AND TOKEN_TYPE = :wtype
ORDER BY TOKEN_TEXT, TOKEN_TYPE, TOKEN_FIRST
which is continuously done.
I think that the algorithm used by Oracle to keep blocks in cache is too complex. A just realized that in 12.1.0.2 (was released last week) there is finally a "killer" functionality, the in-memory parameters, with which you can pin tables or columns in memory with compression, etc. this looks ideal for the text index, I hope that R. Ford will finally update his white paper :-)
But my other problem was that the optimize_index in REBUILD mode caused the DR$I table to double in size : it seems crazy that this was closed as not a bug but it was and I can't do anything about it. It is a bug in my opinion, because the create index command and "alter index rebuild" command both result in a much smaller index, so why would the guys that developped the optimize function (is it another team, using another algorithm ?) make the index two times bigger ?
And for that the track I have been following is to put the index in a 16K tablespace : in this case the space used by the index remains more or less flat (increases but much more reasonably). The difficulty here is to pin the index in memory because the trick of R. Ford was not working anymore.
What worked:
first set the keep_pool to zero and set the db_16k_cache_size to instead. Then change the storage preference to make sure that everything you want to cache (mostly the DR$I) table come in the tablespace with the non-standard block size of 16k.
Then comes the tricky part : the pre-loading of the data in the buffer cache. The problem is that with Oracle 12c, Oracle will use direct_path_read for FTS which basically means that it bypasses the cache and read directory from file to the PGA !!! There is an event to avoid that, I was lucky to find it on a blog (I can't remember which, sorry for the credit).
I ended-up doing that. the events to 10949 is to avoid the direct path reads issue.
alter session set events '10949 trace name context forever, level 1';
alter table DR#idxname0001$I cache;
alter table DR#idxname0002$I cache;
alter table DR#idxname0003$I cache;
SELECT /*+ FULL(ITAB) CACHE(ITAB) */ SUM(TOKEN_COUNT), SUM(LENGTH(TOKEN_INFO)) FROM DR#idxname0001$I;
SELECT /*+ FULL(ITAB) CACHE(ITAB) */ SUM(TOKEN_COUNT), SUM(LENGTH(TOKEN_INFO)) FROM DR#idxname0002$I;
SELECT /*+ FULL(ITAB) CACHE(ITAB) */ SUM(TOKEN_COUNT), SUM(LENGTH(TOKEN_INFO)) FROM DR#idxname0003$I;
SELECT /*+ INDEX(ITAB) CACHE(ITAB) */ SUM(LENGTH(TOKEN_TEXT)) FROM DR#idxname0001$I ITAB;
SELECT /*+ INDEX(ITAB) CACHE(ITAB) */ SUM(LENGTH(TOKEN_TEXT)) FROM DR#idxname0002$I ITAB;
SELECT /*+ INDEX(ITAB) CACHE(ITAB) */ SUM(LENGTH(TOKEN_TEXT)) FROM DR#idxname0003$I ITAB;
It worked. With a big relief I expected to take some time out, but there was a last surprise. The command
exec ctx_ddl.optimize_index(idx_name=>'idxname',part_name=>'partname',optlevel=>'REBUILD');
gqve the following
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-20000: Oracle Text error:
DRG-50857: oracle error in drftoptrebxch
ORA-14097: column type or size mismatch in ALTER TABLE EXCHANGE PARTITION
ORA-06512: at "CTXSYS.DRUE", line 160
ORA-06512: at "CTXSYS.CTX_DDL", line 1141
ORA-06512: at line 1
Which is very much exactly described in a metalink note 1645634.1 but in the case of a non-partitioned index. The work-around given seemed very logical but it did not work in the case of a partitioned index. After experimenting, I found out that the bug occurs when the partitioned index is created with dbms_pclxutil.build_part_index procedure (this enables enables intra-partition parallelism in the index creation process). This is a very annoying and stupid bug, maybe there is a work-around, but did not find it on metalink
Other points of attention with the text index creation (stuff that surprised me at first !) ;
- if you use the dbms_pclxutil package, then the ctx_output logging does not work, because the index is created immediately and then populated in the background via dbms_jobs.
- this in combination with the fact that if you are on a RAC, you won't see any activity on the box can be very frightening : this is because oracle can choose to start the workers on the other node.
I understand much better how the text indexing works, I think it is a great technology which can scale via partitioning. But like always the design of the application is crucial, most of our problems come from the fact that we did not choose the right sectioning (we choosed PATH_SECTION_GROUP while XML_SECTION_GROUP is so much better IMO). Maybe later I can convince the dev to change the sectionining, especially because SDATA and MDATA section are not supported with PATCH_SECTION_GROUP (although it seems to work, even though we had one occurence of a bad result linked to the existence of SDATA in the index definition). Also the whole problematic of mixed structured/unstructured searches is completly tackled if one use XML_SECTION_GROUP with MDATA/SDATA (but of course the app was written for Oracle 10...)
Regards, Pierre

CP5 pre-loader questions re: video

Forgive the long post..
I published a Cap 5 project in which the first 4 slides contain short videos. The pre-loader is set to 70%. When playing the course from a server or LMS the initial load ranges from 1 minute to 5 minutes depending on location and computer. After the initial load reaches 70% the first video shows its own loading screen for a few additional seconds and begins to play. Subsequent videos will also show a brief loader before they play. The video and project sizes are as follows:
- Course SWF is 12.5mb
Slide one video is 827kb
Slide two video is 1.2mb
Slide three video is 1.9mb
Slide four video is 950kb
- All videos are encoded F4V
- Project is published from CP5 on a Mac
- Latest Flash player is being used for all user machines
The Problems:
- On high performance machines with fast internet connections, the content loads and plays as expected, however on slightly older machines, or slow connections the playback is jerky and unpredictable
- Playback performance from a web server is generally better than from the SumTotal LMS regardless of the machine capabilities
- On several occasions the audio for the next slide plays simultaneous with the video from the current slide. Also bullets that are synched with the slide and video will fall out of synch. After reloading or using the nav bar to back up, the slide generally plays as expected.
My questions for the community:
1 - Will the pre-loader load F4V videos before playback? Can someone explain what the pre-loader will load what it will not?
2 - If the preloader does not load video, is there a downside to setting the preloader to a minimum number (say 10%) to at least reduce the initial load cycle?
3 - How do I ensure that audio from the next slide will not play on the current slide or video synchronized with timeline elements do not fall out of synch?
Thanks
Jeff

Hi there,
Please find the answers for your questions.
1 - Will the pre-loader load F4V videos before playback? Can someone explain what the pre-loader will load what it will not?
<ashwin> No, preloader only loads the main Movie. Once the slide with video is encountered the Video load is initiated and this loads the video. FLV video and Animations (if they are externalised) are not loaded while preloading the movie.
</ashwin>
2 - If the preloader does not load video, is there a downside to setting the preloader to a minimum number (say 10%) to at least reduce the initial load cycle?
<ashwin> Yes you can do this but i am not sure if this reduces the project loading time. I will try to explain you the way preloader works. A 10% preloader percentage indicates to load 10% of the SWF size, For instance if the SWF size is 12 MB then the project starts to play once 1.2 MB of the project is loaded. So if the project has rich content in the first few slides then loading may take time as it has it has to load the first slide fully to show the first slide. So it all depends on how the project is created and how the content is distributed in the project.
</ashwin>
3 - How do I ensure that audio from the next slide will not play on the current slide or video synchronized with timeline elements do not fall out of synch?
<ashwin>Do you have the audio from first slide to n slides continuously, if thats the case then in the published output a single audio file will be created with the published SWF and is stored in the SWF (In this case we say audio is sitched). So if a preloader is set to 10%, even though only 10% of the movie will be preloaded the entire audio should be loaded which might create sync issues as the movie will have started to play while the audio is being loaded.
To overcome this you may choose to increase the slide time of the slides containing audio by around 0.1 second. This activity will split the audio in the published output and hence will have small audio fragments to load while the movie is loading.If around 20 slides have audio continuously then you can increase the slide time for around 6-7 slides and not all.
</ashwin>
Try them and let me know if this information helped.
Thanks
Ashwin Bharghav B
Adobe Captivate team

Slow startup - can we pre-load AcroRd32.exe?

Hi all, my users click on a PDF link and Acrobat 6.0 begins to launch within the IE browser. However, the launch slows down and sometimes fails when loading all the Acrobat plug-ins (api files).
Now, when the user closes the browser, the AcroRd32.exe process still runs in the background. The next time they click on a PDF document link, the document loads lightning fast.
Question- is there a way to pre-load Acrobat when the user boots up or launches IE?
Thanks in advance

Yes, you might be able to execute a script that launced Reader when IE initializes but why would you want to do that? You run the risk of multiple hidden instances of Reader running in the background and eating up your system resources. Your users will still get the EULA to OK when you launch Reader silently too. Oh well... here is the switch to do it anyway. You are responsible for scripting it.
AcroRd32.exe /h
~T

Pre-loading conditional content(pictures etc.) before it needed.

Hi, i have some linkedlist or tree-structure contents(images,sounds etc.) I want to pre-load next items(content) to cache while user interacting with current content. Thus, when user want to see next content, it'll show immideately and start loading next content in the background.
For an example,
Assume in image gallery in the tree structure. While user looking at the picture, i want to load next nodes of tree silently to improve speed.
Is it possible to do that? Or Any of you have suggestions?

Well of course i don't know exactly what the user will pick for next. But i know there are just couple of content he/she can choose from the tree structure.
Assuming next node consist 5 pictures. I want to start loading all simultaniously, so no matter what user choose, so whatever user choose, that content has %x percentence loaded. I'm also quite sure about there'll max 5 content in the next nodes.
For the future i'll collect data from user behaviour then i'll have possibility table to lookup and assign priorities for load.

Partial Pre-Load in Flash?

I have several .flvs that load into one of 7 .swfs. I have a
pre-loader for all 7 of my .swf files up front, however, NONE of my
.swfs will load until ALL the .flvs are fully loaded and ready to
play, which takes a very long time AND the user may not necessarily
need to download all or any of the .flvs. Does anyone have a way to
load all the rest, and partially load the one containing the .flvs?
or load the .flvs on demand?
Please see:
Hyde Park Test
for what I mean. The loader "hangs" on 7.swf until all the .flvs
(in 5.swf) are ready to play. I'd like the entire thing to load
when the .flvs are only partially loaded - they can continue to
load while the user surfs the page...

calendar.swf is compiled to run in the local-with-networking sandbox, while get-calendar.swf runs in local-with-filesystem. Loading one into the other causes a security error. Simplest solution is to change get-calendar.fla to local-with-networking:
Publish Settings (Flash tab). Select Access network only in Local playback security.

Pre-load dashboard

I was wondering if it was possible o have Leopard pre-load the dashboard at login to save the second or two delay that occurs when I try to open the dashboard the first time.

I set dashboard up to load at startup. But it actually pops up and comes to the fore. I set dashboard up in Login Items checked as both Hidden and non-Hidden.
I want Dashboard to load in the background, not in the fore. Is this possible?

Pre-loading a scene while playing a movie

How would I go about pre-loading "Scene 2" of my web site,
which is the main content area, while my intro movie "Scene 1" is
playing? The movie playing on "Scene 1" is an flv being streamed
from the server.
Is there a way of doing this so when my flv is over, "Scene
2" appears without the user having to wait for it to load?
Thanks in advance,
G

all scenes load as your swf loads. you can monitor the load
progress of various scenes by using actionscript.

Leopard OS 10.5 - pre-loaded vs. Erase and Install

Just received a new iMac I ordered from from Apple Online yesterday. I was told it would come pre-loaded with the new Leopard OS but it didn't. The installed OS was 10.4.01. Apple has now agreed to either send me the Leopard OS or to take back the iMac and later on send me another one with Leopard pre-loaded. I'm wondering if this is really necessary as the Leopard OS Erase and Install option and/or a Secure Erase would appear to give me essentially the same result. Keep in mind my background is with Windows OS where I would always do a low level format of the hard drive and then do a clean install of a newer version of Windows OS. I would appreciate any suggestions about what I should do.

Malcom:
No, not initially. I saw the SCSI warning, but I must have missed that- I did the firware revision yesterday, after the fact- but I pulled the Jive drive box first and haven't had time to reassemble. I'll reinstall it tomorrow. Then I'll work on the SCSI card Adaptec 39160- (My Medea external Raid is a no show period.)
Thanks for being there!
Jim

Pre-loader issues in captivate 5.5

HI guys
i have a 1026x768 captivate file with around 150 slides when compiled to medium compression it is around 7mb
it dosnt have any questions pools and no audio, it does have some progessive flvs and a few advanced actions
the problem (and its getting to be a bit of a pain) is that when a user downloads the pre-loader kicks in perfectly
if you are in firefox or safari but in IE no preloader just a white screen and 10/20 seconds later the file appears
can anyone offer any resaon as to why IE9 wont show the preloader. My client is getting jumpy
i have tried writing my own preloader, varying the DL ammount, lowering the file size to low....... and nada.... IE9on captiave 5.5
no preloader
cheers
KBN

Hi,
Any progress on this matter? I have a swf with an XML-generated menu. Clicking on the menu is supposed to load an swf, clicking on another menu item is supposed to unload the first swf and then reload another in its place. It does just that, but the amount of memory consumption increases with each click. Looking at the Output during debug reveals that the unloadAndStop is not functioning. It does nothing at all! I've stripped down the code to the essentials to test it, and it looks like this:
import flash.events.MouseEvent;
import flash.display.Loader;
import flash.net.URLRequest;
var FlashLoader:Loader = new Loader();
var flashUrl:URLRequest = new URLRequest("complex.swf");
FlashLoader.load(flashUrl);
FlashLoader.x = 120;
addChild(FlashLoader);
stage.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, UNLOAD);
function UNLOAD(event:MouseEvent) {
          flashUrl = null;
          FlashLoader.unloadAndStop();
          FlashLoader.unloadAndStop();
          removeChild(FlashLoader);
          stage.removeEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, UNLOAD);
          stage.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, RELOAD);
function RELOAD(event:MouseEvent) {
          flashUrl = new URLRequest("complex.swf");
          FlashLoader.load(flashUrl);
          FlashLoader.x = 120;
          addChild(FlashLoader);
          stage.removeEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, RELOAD);
          stage.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, UNLOAD);
It's really driving me nuts... note that I've tested this with non-captivate-generated swfs and it works PERFECTLY. Couldn't the Flash Professional team and the Captivate team at least communicate before implementing things?

Why is drum machine designer pre-loading tons of busses.... ?

Why is drum machine designer pre-loading tons of busses.... ? Is there a way to turn off the pre mapping ? I loaded up a few presets and the routing is insane. Not simple to follow the chain and I have a huge monitor haha. Instant bog down of my computer.

The DMD is really a preset combo of Samples and FX.....
If you notice... the DMD 'plugin' isn't actually a 'normal' plugin even though it goes into the instrument slot...
It doesn't have a Power button for example and you cannot drag the DMD instrument by itself to another track's instrument slot...
It's actually Ultrabeat running in the background... playing samples plus FX plugins on various Auxes plus a fancy front end..... to manipulate the sounds all via a very clever bit of work in the environment
To see whats going on under the hood.. go to the Environment window.... and you will see this...
Note: This is just one track using the DMD.....

Lag after pre-loader hits 60% and before movie starts playing.

Hi all,
I’m hoping somebody can shed some light on an issue
that I’m experiencing with a Captivate project I’m
working on. I’ll try to explain this in detail so you
understand the background and scope of this project. These are
being exported as HTML/SWF and being viewed within IE6.
I’ve been tasked with taking a new employee training
course that is currently handled by a live person standing in front
of a room of people and showing them an 18 minute VHS tape and also
covering information that is presented on a PowerPoint file, and
making it into a Captivate movie.
I was able to get the original digital video cut into 4
chunks and converted to SWF by media group that produced the tape.
The four SWF files are 320x240 and range from 13 to 22 megs.
Because of the size of the files and the amount of content, I
created 8 ‘modules’ that make up the larger project.
The last slide of the first module launches the 2nd module, etc.
until the user has seen all of the modules which on their side
(other than a brief pre-loader popping up at times) is mostly
transparent and they think they are just watching a 30 minute
training course.
Basically, what I’ve done is laid out the modules so
that the whole course alternates back and forth between text slides
with voice-overs and the movie clips. The movie clip SWF’s
have been embedded into every other module, so:
Module 1: Intro to the course (text & voice-overs)
Module 2: Video clip 1
Module 3: Discussion about stuff (text & voice-overs)
Module 4: Video clip 2
Module 5: Discussion about stuff (text & voice-overs)
Module 6: Video clip 3
Module 7: Discussion about stuff (text & voice-overs)
Module 8: Video clip 4 and wrap-up
Now here is the problem:
We have 20+ offices and I am located at the main office where
the web servers are located. If I run through this, everything
works great. I tested this in one of our off-site locations today
where they have a semi-fast connection, but still going across a
WAN.
Module 1 loads fine. Hits 60%, plays, user can click Next,
Next, Next to proceed through the training. At the end of Module 1,
we prompt them with some text to let them know there may be a brief
delay before they see the upcoming video clip. Click Next, loads
Module2.swf which has the videoclip1.swf embedded in it (21 megs).
Takes a little while to load which is expected. Hits 60%.
Preloader goes away and then just white screen for at least 10
seconds (sometimes 20-30 seconds, depending on the size of the
embedded movie clip) before the movie actually starts playing.
This is not acceptable as the user will think that something is
broken. If the movie is not completely loaded, then it
shouldn’t have hit 60% and the preloader graphic disappear,
right?
I think that the problem revolves around the movie clip not
being able to play until it is fully loaded, although the Module
has loaded the 60% that it needs to begin playing. The only way
around this that I see is re-arrange my slides so that the video
clip is not the first slide to play in any given module.
We tried this on at least 7 computers, all of which were just
rolled out new last fall, so the machines are definitely beefy
enough to handle this.
Any ideas?
Thanks,
Mike

quote:
Originally posted by:
CatBandit
I just read your title, Mike (I don't have time for the whole
article - sorry), but felt it might help to point out that 60% is
40% less than 100%.
Nope, I am not being a wise guy, but I know it's possible to
have so much "weight" in the content of the last 40% that
additional delay might be required while a (early) required element
or object completes down-streaming. Just a thought...
Hi Larry,
Good to see you back on the forums and thanks for the reply.
What you posted further proves my point. From what I've been taught
about Captivate, it loads to 60% and begins to play while the
remaining 40% loads. Not loads to 60% and then some portion of the
remaining 40% may or may not have to load before it starts. If
that's the case, why not just load 100% before it starts and then
have no problems?
It shouldn't matter how large the file is, right? The only
difference is that larger files would take longer to reach the 60%
mark. 60% is 60% is 60%. Compare a feather to a car. 60% of the
weight of each item is still 60%, it doesn't matter how much it
weighs.
60% of a cubic foot of rock is the same percentage
as 60% of a cubic foot of marshmallows.
Anyway, I think the solution here is to fudge the problem by
putting a few 'less weighty' slides in front of the slide with the
embedded video so that the user has something to look at other than
a blank screen. I was just hoping somebody else might have
experience this and had a magic button I could press to make it all
better.
I could handle this if the preloader continued running so the
user had some clue that it was still working, but when the
preloader hits 60% and disappears and then nothing happens for
another 10-20 seconds, that's a problem.

Formatting Pre-Loaded Templates

Is there any way to format a pre-loaded template? I am creating a document using the "Garden Project Poster Small" template, but I would like the background to be lighter than it automatically is. Is there a "Master" for each template that I can mess with?
thanks in advance!
~mary

Welcome to Apple Discussions
You could "mess with the 'master'" but I don't recommend it. They are well buried in the application package. If you do want to play with them, do it on a copy. You can find them by Control- or right-clicking on the Pages application > Show package contents > Contents > Resources > Templates. I don't find anything that can be manipulated but you might.
Why not just resave the template with your desired changes as a template? It will show up under My Templates in the template chooser.

Can I install Snow Leopard on the latest Macbook Pros? (the ones pre-loaded with Lion)

The problem and solution is pretty simple, I just want to know if anyone has tried this before. I have a brand new Macbook Pro that I bought more or less for the sole purpose of having a more powerful machine to run AVID Media Composer on. AVID is only compatible up to OS version 10.6.7 at the moment, and the machine I got was pre-loaded with Lion, 10.7....So I look at the support documentation Apple provides, and notice that in the nifty little chart they have, the latest line of Macbook Pros out there (early 2011) originally had version 10.6.6, so I'm assuming that's the previous version I can't downgrade past.
To revert back to Snow Leopard, however, I need to install it from the DVD which has version 10.6.3 on it, and then upgrade to any version between Snow Leopard 10.6.6 and Lion 10.7. In theory this could work, the only problem being that for a brief time between installing Snow Leopard and updating to the version of it that I need, the computer will have version 10.6.3 on it.
Now I'm pretty sure if the only thing I do on the computer is immediately update to a safe-to-use version, there will be no problems. However, if the machine's hardware is so terribly non-backwards compatible with the Snow Leopard OS, I may do all this backing up and reverting and not even be able to start the computer once I get the old install on it. Before I just go ahead and try this for myself, I was wondering if anyone else has, and more importantly, have you had any success?

Hi r,
EDIT: disregard my post. Waiting for that disc is a far better option.
I hope w won't mind if I add a thought here:
rmo348 wrote:
Now I don't mind if some drivers are messed up and resolution is all funky when I install 10.6.3 on it, I just need to know if it'll be functional to the point where I can run the 10.6.6 update dmg. Once I update to 10.6.6 everything should work fine.
Or could I install 10.6.3, have the 10.6.6 update burned to a disc, and boot straight from that? This is my first Mac so I'm not sure what little tricks work or not.
Your first idea may work; the only way to know for sure is to try it. If you do, make sure you download and run the Combo update for 10.6.7 or 10.6.8. There can be different versions of a point update, those which are available for download, and those which ship on Macs, so you want to install one beyond that which shipped with some of the new MBPs.
If the MBP won't boot to 10.6.3, something else to try is installing it to an external HD, then installing the 10.6.7 update on it, clone it to the MPB's internal HD, and run the 10.6.7 or 10.6.8 Combo update on it.

Pre load or background load .flv's??

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