The correct way to embed Adobe Flash in your web page... again

I previously posted about a neat little JavaScript library called SWFObject. This wonderful little library easily gets you around the Internet Explorer activation control issue. In doing some work for Company X, I found that though SWFObject works under normal conditions, it didn't seem to work when made part of our larger JavaScript framework. I suspect it has something to do with doing DOM modifications after the page has rendered. I looked around and found another library, UFO.

UFO stands for Unobtrusive Flash Objects and is another free (under the creative commons GNU LGPL license) JavaScript library for embedding Flash in web pages. It seems to be well supported (currently it's on version 3.22) and it's just as flexible and easy to use as SWFObject. It's slightly larger that SWFObject, so my advice is to choose the one that works best for your project. My thanks to UFO's author, Bobby van der Sluis, and his employer Refunk for allowing him to work on it during work hours!

Flash Activation Workaround (UFO): $0

Total cost of project to date: $59.99

The correct way to embed Adobe Flash in your web page

One of my pet peeves is when I go to a "professionally designed" website and there is that annoying outline around their embedded Adobe Flash objects. This only effects Internet Explorer (of which only about 88.66% of you) due to a process called "Activating an ActiveX Control's Interface" which was added to IE 6 in response to loosing a patent lawsuit with a Eolas (Eolas seems to me to be one of those companies that does nothing but patent ideas and then sit on them until they can sue... a prime example of what's wrong with the patent system in the United States). Essentially, it means that you can no longer use the APPLET, OBJECT or EMBED tag on a web page if you expect your user to interact with that control unless the user "Activates" it my clicking on it. But there is a work around, use JavaScript to embed your control instead of HTML. A pain in the butt, but it works.

Luckily there is SWFObject, a nice little JavaScript file that makes embedding Adobe Flash (the most common ActiveX control in world) easy. You include swfobject.js, create a DIV where the flash should be shown and then create SWFObject object with a few parameters (location of the .swf file, size, frame rate, etc.).

I know a lot of websites are created by designers on using the Mac... which means they usually test their websites on either FireFox or Safari. But, please, please, please be considerate of the other 88% of us and use SWFObject for your embedded flash.

Flash Activation Workaround (SWFObject): $0

Total cost of project to date: $59.99