audio on load?

Evoir · 03-03-2007, 08:59 PM

I have a client who needs to have some audio play when the home page loads... I have no idea what format the audio should be in, and how do I make it play when the page loads?

I have no idea, because, well, I have never done this before (nor do I imagine ever doing it again). Any ideas?

Thanks,
Evie

phppete · 03-09-2007, 06:52 AM

You will need to convert the audio into mp3 and use a Flash mp3 player, many of which are available for free online.

I've recently been doing similar with .mov movie files, converting to Flash to play after the page has loaded.

Google for 'flash mp3 player' and then convert your music file to mp3, you might have a program already that does that, if not I am sure people can recommend one. Then follow the mp3 instructions to load in your mp3 file.

Evoir · 03-09-2007, 05:49 PM

Thanks. I can convert to mp3, no problem. So, it's not that i create a flash movie of the audio? i create an mp3 and then there is ascript that converst it to flash on the server? Will take a closer look at those google results soon!

phppete · 03-09-2007, 05:54 PM

I would use something like this

http://www.jeroenwijering.com/?item=Flash_MP3_Player

The above is used to play the mp3.

*kitchin* · 03-09-2007, 08:13 PM

Can't you autoload the mp3 without Flash? Most computer+browsers can at least play an mp3 non-incrementally??? Not sure, just not sure Flash is the best way. ??

*Matt* · 03-09-2007, 09:15 PM

The last time I checked, Flash was the best way. Flash allows you to stream the audio to the browser, rather than require that it download completely before you can play it. -Matt

NoahM · 03-10-2007, 01:25 AM

I had looked at these a little while ago and if you want a free mp3 player take a look at this. The only drawback is the link that is part of the player.

phppete · 03-10-2007, 04:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kitchin

Can't you autoload the mp3 without Flash? Most computer+browsers can at least play an mp3 non-incrementally??? Not sure, just not sure Flash is the best way. ??

Depending on the users setup a mp3 file that is just embedded might open iTunes or some other app rather than play in the browser, it might also not play at all or cause some other undesirable effect. Flash is most certainly the most reliable way to play music on a web page.

With JS you can also set it to start loading or playing exactly when you want, such as after certain page elements have loaded or so many seconds after a certain user action (assuming you know some JS and AScript).

*sheila* · 03-10-2007, 08:08 PM

OK, this has finally got me curious...
I'm helping a family member set up a website (this is something I'm "volunteering" to do for free...it's a non-profit organization thing).

Anyhow, I have zero experience with including multimedia (movies or sound) in any websites I've worked on previously.

We will be putting up some videos on the site (it is for an educational TV show). We already have a short demo that we should be putting up within the next week or two...

Now this isn't just audio, like Evie is doing. It's a whole video...
Should I look into using Flash to show it? I had considered that if it were necessary to look into some of the previously discussed video hosts that specialize in streaming/hosting video (just hadn't gotten around to that yet). For this video that I need to put up within the next week or two, I had been considering to just put a link to the video file for the end user to click on and providing both WMP and Quicktime formats.

This probably sounds pretty ignorant... Well, like I say, I have zero experience in this area... Any tips are welcome. (If this is too far afield from Evie's questions, let me know. I'll pull this out into a separate thread...)

*sheila* · 03-10-2007, 08:41 PM

All right. Google and some questions and I've got a pointer to my answers:
http://www.boutell.com/newfaq/creating/video.html