No knowledge of a Flash IDE is necessary and it is not necessary to have a Flash IDE installed in order to use the Pollstar100 Web Content Manager. All a designer needs to know is how to embed a Flash Applet within an HTML document. The process of embedding Flash Applets within HTML pages is well documented and straightforward. For further information on how to achieve this, see the following link to the Macromedia website:
| http://www.macromedia.com/go/tn_4150
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In addition it is suggested that designers unfamiliar with this process take a look at the following HTML pages that come as part of the worked examples installed with this software release.
| example1.html
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| example2.html
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| example3.html
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| example4.html
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Pollstar100 Applications
The Pollstar100 Client is a Flash Applet that typically gets embedded into an HTML document. When the end-user loads this HTML document into their browser, it will in turn also attempt to load an instance of the Pollstar100 Client.
The Pollstar100 Client is context-free. The designer uses three externally defined Control File Variables in order to provide the context that defines a specific custom Pollstar100 Application.
Pollstar100 Control File Variables
The following Control File Variables provide references to the location of the Custom XML file, the Pollstar100 Service and Sample Data file respectively:
| CustomFile
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| Specifies an absolute or partial URL for location of the Custom XML File on your webserver. Partial URLs should be relative to the location of the HTML document that embeds the Pollstar100 Client SWF file.
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| The Custom XML File file provides definitions of the designers' custom requirements for the look-and-feel of the Pollstar100 Application.
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| ServiceFile:
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| Specifies an absolute or partial URL for location of the Pollstar100 Service on your webserver. Partial URLs should be relative to the location of the HTML document that embeds the Pollstar100 Client SWF file.
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| The Pollstar100 Service PHP File is the interface between the Pollstar100 Client and the Sample Data CSV file.
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| DataFile
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| Specifies an absolute or partial the pathname for the location of the Sample Data CSV file on your webserver.
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| Partial pathnames should be relative to the location of the Pollstar100 Service.
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| The Sample Data CSV file file contains the web-content and web-content references corresponding to a specific Pollstar100 Application.
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Either of the following approaches may be adopted in order to provide values for these Control File Variables and the embedded Pollstar100 Client SWF file:
| · | Using <Object> And <Embed>
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| · | Using an URL encoded query string
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Using <OBJECT> And <EMBED>
This is the standard mechanism -as suggested by Macromedia -commonly used to embed Flash SWF Applets within HTML documents
You can provide an absolute or partial URL to the location of the Pollstar100 Client on your webserver for both the <OBJECT> and <EMBED> tags. Partial URLs should be relative to the location of the embedding HTML document. In the example below, an absolute URL: http://mywebsite.com/pollstar100D.swf is defined.
Define the Control File Variables using Macromedias' FlashVars attribute within the HTML <OBJECT> and <EMBED> tags as described in the following link to the Macromedia technote:
http://www.macromedia.com/go/tn_16417
Example:
classid = "clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase = "http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,0,0" WIDTH = "100%" HEIGHT = "85%" id = "PollStar100" ALIGN = "" > <PARAM NAME = movie VALUE = "http://mywebsite.com/pollstar100D.swf"> <PARAM NAME = loop VALUE = false> <PARAM NAME = quality VALUE = high> <PARAM NAME = scale VALUE = exactfit> <PARAM NAME = wmode VALUE = transparent> <PARAM NAME = bgcolor VALUE = #999999> <PARAM NAME = FlashVars VALUE = "ServiceFile=http://mywebsite.com/pollstar100.php&CustomFile=mycustom.xml&DataFile=mydata.csv"> <EMBED src = "http://mywebsite.com/pollstar100D.swf" loop = false quality = high bgcolor = #999999 WIDTH = "100%" HEIGHT = "85%" scale = exactfit wmode = transparent NAME = "PollStar100" ALIGN = "" TYPE = "application/x-shockwave-flash" PLUGINSPAGE = "http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" FlashVars = "ServiceFile=http://mywebsite.com/pollstar100.php&CustomFile=mycustom.xml&DataFile=mydata.csv"> </EMBED> </OBJECT> |
Using An URL Query String
An alternative method is to supply values for the Control File Variables via an URL encoded query string.
See the following Macromedia technote for further information:
http://www.macromedia.com/cfusion/knowledgebase/index.cfm?id=tn_14253#querystring
Example:
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