Embedding Quicktime, support standards and non-IE browsers

[toicontien]

Gotta perplexing problem: How do you support Web standards and still allow non-Internet Explorer browsers to see embedded Quicktime movies. I have the working code already (http://template-tk.ispi.net/pages/html/movie.html), it just doesn't validate. Gecko browsers seem to like the <embed> tag and Internet Explorer likes the <object> tag. Can I have my cake and eat it to, or do I just get to stare at it and be happy it's a cake?

[Derrick217]

The code you have looks fine. It should work fine. The embed tags will be used with certain browsers and the object tags and Param tags will be used with the I.E. browsers.

Here's a link to my code.

I also tried your movie in my I.E., firefox and Safari browsers and it works fine. I'm not familiar with any other browsers.

Gotta perplexing problem: How do you support Web standards and still allow non-Internet Explorer browsers to see embedded Quicktime movies. I have the working code already (http://template-tk.ispi.net/pages/html/movie.html), it just doesn't validate. Gecko browsers seem to like the <embed> tag and Internet Explorer likes the <object> tag. Can I have my cake and eat it to, or do I just get to stare at it and be happy it's a cake?

[toicontien]

That's not really my point. The EMBED tag isn't valid XHTML. My question really is can browsers use the OBJECT tag to embed media rather than the deprecated EMBED tag?

[jules213]

Hi toicontien,

I had/have this very problem (although with RealMedia files). I've been learning through Elizabeth Castro's (X)HTML book, and she states that you should use <object> & <embed> to accommodate the eccentricities of IE. But the embed didn't validate, and i couldn't logically figure out what to do about it. So I tried removing it and just leaving the <object> portion. Thing is, it still worked on both IE and NN with no visible errors on either. I'm using IE6 and NN7, and I have her 2003 edition, so i'm thinking that these latest browsers are up to date with dealing with this issue.

I would love someone who knows to state what the deal is with embedded media, and to tell me if I will have problems with older browsers having now removed the <embed> tag.

But, at the moment, this appears to be the only way to validate in xhtml transitional.

www.youth-tv.co.uk if you want to see/check out it working (and if anyone who goes notices anything i can/need to do to make it better, please point it out)

Thanks

[Coonce-Ewing]

I've been trying to embed a quicktime film of my daughter onto my site: http://www.coonce-ewing.com and while the video is there I can't get the controller to display.

I'm viewing the site in both Opera and IE and both will display the clip, auto-playing it but no controller.

Any idea what I'm doing wrong?

[BeachSide]

You mean something like this?

http://www.alistapart.com/articles/flashsatay/

[Coonce-Ewing]

Yes like that, but not for Flash or Shockwave, but for Quicktime. I've already read a couple of different tutorials for embedding quicktime, including copying the code linked at the start of this thread, but it won't show the controller for me.

I'm really confused at this point.

My code looks like this:

<object classid="clsid:02BF25D5-8C17-4B23-BC80-D3488ABDDC6B" codebase="http://www.apple.com/qtactivex/qtplugin.cab" width="340" height="256"></p>
<param name="pluginspage" value="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/" />
<param name="src" value="./images/movies/100_0017.MOV" />
<param name="target" value="myself" />
<param name="controller" value="true" />
<embed width="340" height="256" controller="true" target="myself" src="./images/movies/100_0017.MOV" pluginspage="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/" bgcolor="#ffffff" border="0"><br />
</embed><br />
</param></param></param></param></object><br />

[BeachSide]

Sorry wasn't posting for you I posted that for toicontien You and I posted at the same time

I have no idea how to embed quicktime movies sorry

::Edit:: but that deals with the embed and object tags nevermind that it is specifically driven toward Flash

[toicontien]

So more reading online only to find that the classid="clsid:02BF25D5-8C17-4B23-BC80-D3488ABDDC6B" part is a reference to an Active-X object that handles quicktime video. Active-X = Microsoft = Internet Explorer-Only.

That's the problem. Quicktime hasn't done anything to make it work with the OBJECT tag because it already is bound to an active-x component. At least that's what seems to happen.

RE Coonce-Ewing: I also read somewhere to add 16 pixels to the height of the object to account for the controller.

[Coonce-Ewing]

Yeah I originally had the height as 240 with a width of 320. Then I added the 16 to the height making it 256. Just now I changed the height to 300, it doesn't matter, it still isn't showing the controller.

The problem is that if people want to watch the video a second time, then they need to reload the page, which increases bandwidth usage.

[toicontien]

Try getting rid of the "</param></param></param></param>". PARAM tags do not have closing tags.

[Derrick217]

Coonce-Ewing,

Been gone for a while, toicontien is exactly right on the Param tags . Your videos are downloadable so unless someone saves it to their hard drive they will need probably need to download it again. I did run across this embed tag that might help you:

targetcache="true"

for Param tags it would be

<PARAM NAME="targetcache" VALUE="true">

I've never tried it but let me know if it fixes your download problem.

So far the other problems I see are with your embed code. I viewed your video on-line and the code on-line is different from what you have in your post. For the movie you had on-line you should add 16 pixels added to your height to display the video properly, which you did. For a video width=640 and height=480 it will be 496 for your height. If your video size is width=320 and height=240 it will be 256 for your height.


What's the size of the video you are trying to embed 320 x 240 or 640 x 480?

Also you need to use both embed tags and param tags surrounded by object tags to get your videos to display properly, which you have.

Here's code you have at the close of you tags:

</embed><br />
</param></param></param></param></object>

It should be like this:
</embed></object>

Also I don't believe you need these items in your source code for you movies

bgcolor="#ffffff" border="0">

Also adding the type attribute is helpful in your embed and param tags. It deals with the MIME type and tells the browser which plug-in to load. In your case the QuickTime plug-in.

<PARAM NAME="type" VALUE="video/quicktime">
for embed tags: type="video/quicktime"

If you need other examples of how to embed different types of QuickTime content whether Live or on-demand look at:

www.cityofdayton.org/cdtn

View the source code and check it against your code for errors. Also, sometimes you might be doing everything right but have typographical errors or spaces in your code. Any errors or mispellings will cause your movies not to display poperly. Also test your videos in several browsers because many browsers view media content differently.

Hope this helps,

[wheelhouse]

I have a page that has an embedded media player, and I'm using javascript to call-up either Quicktime or Windows Media files. It's working, but the Quicktime won't always show the controller bar and I need it to. Here's the link: http://www.njn.net/newspublicaffairs/science/test4.html.

Thanks!