New changes are killing: FLASH sites, FLASH themes..

registered · Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 1:15 am

New changes are causing many needed updates to website owners:

Why do I see a message prompting me to “click to activate and use this control” when I roll my mouse over a Flash animation?

This is a result of the latest Internet Explorer update.

Microsoft recently lost a legal battle with a patent holder about the way Internet Explorer displays OBJECTs and EMBEDs in webpages. Microsoft then decided to update its Internet Explorer browser with changes requiring user input to display and activate ActiveX based media.

This affects all Flash animations but also other files such as QuickTime, RealPlayer, Java and Adobe Acrobat among others. It means users have to click the object first in order to activate its functions.

Luckily, there are ways for website developers to modify their website so that the user experience is not impacted by Microsoft’s changes. I have selected the easiest and most user-friendly option available at this time and have implemented this solution throughout this website.

More on this: click here

pcn

Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 6:46 am

This was addressed in an earlier thread, but I like how you have summarized this. Thanks!

Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 11:29 pm

montego

could you give me a link to that other thread on this issue, thanks

pcn

Posted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 1:19 pm

I have found a bit of a sloution, but I am still cleaning it up with all the feedback from people. Once I get all the problems to stop I will update it
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Posted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 5:27 pm

Just stop using flash and activex crap, it makes webpages unuseable for many people with uncapabilities.

Ok your website may look interactive and cool but it will distract many that:
- have no mouse
- use PDA/WAP
- are (color) blind
- etc., etc.

Did you know that 1 of 5 men are colorblind so that will distract a million of visitors?

P.S.: a javascript workaround will not work on javascript disabled browsers

I just say: get firefox/safari

Posted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 5:46 pm

Yeah but you cannot make everyone happy. You are always going to loose with someone.

If IE wasnt such a huge market I wouldnt even do anything about it. If MS wants to do something stupid let them.

Posted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 9:47 pm

Not taking anyones sides here, but I do not see how any court can force one browser maker to do these changes without including every browser maker on planet earth. What I mean is MS should not have to do any changes until everyone has to do these changes.

and more than likely that will come to Firefox, Safari, and the others.

Thanks Technocrat for your solution, I havent tried it yet, but will soon. I was thinking of creating something, I just never got around to it yet.

pcn

Posted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 10:08 pm

MS had to do these changes, or risk further litigation.
Really doesn't matter to me too much... getting people to move off ActiveX and Flash is a good thing in my book. Better to move towards Web 2.0 ideas, AJAX for cross-platform compatibility and no need to download proprietary things to use them.

Posted: Fri Apr 28, 2006 7:00 am

The solution I came up with is ok. It works better now that I fixed the window.load problems and stoped it from crashing IE versions that dont need it Mad

but it will cause that annoying double flashing. Which I dont find that bad. But I try to use IE as little as I can.

I will give you active x, I always thought it was pretty poor web device. But I think flash is pretty good for some solution. And I think most themers are going to agree on that point.

Web 2.0 and AJAX are great solutions, but I am not sure that they can completely take the place of Flash in all applications.

Posted: Fri Apr 28, 2006 1:12 pm

AJAX is bad as well. It is invented to make a nice client side response of Javascript+XML but, what happens if JavaScript is turned off?

Posted: Fri Apr 28, 2006 1:18 pm

Well where do you draw the line between functionality and esthetics?

Plus I know this is not the 100% but java is pretty comon and its hard to find people with it off. I just dont know where you are supposed to draw the line for support and cross platform usability.

Posted: Fri Apr 28, 2006 2:41 pm

java !== javascript

Also have ever tried to create one script that runs on all browsers?
As i said above PDA/WAP doesn't have AJAX so down the drain your script goes.

Posted: Fri Apr 28, 2006 3:31 pm

Sorry yeah I mean javascript.

Actaully I have and its a pain as you probably know. Especially IE, why couldnt they follow standards from the start. Mad

But there has to some type of line drawn, and I would imagine its up to the admin, or the programmers to make that line. I mean if you want access from WAP/PDAs then you probably show have little or no GFX to help cut down on bandwidth. Really how far do you want to take down esthetics for functionality? Do you really need a site or a system that instead of 100% user access you can get maybe 95%? Are people with PDA/WAP going to visit your site enough to have this be an issue?

I guess this is drifting off topic.

Posted: Sat Apr 29, 2006 6:10 am

Ok let me explain:

These days everyone has a mobilephone and blogging is hot.
When you put your website full of flash, javascript/ajax and who knows what else, then it would be hard to show off at school and post to your blog instead of sleeping at school.

I don't say using ajax nor javascript is a bad thing, but as for accessibility you should think if it is realy necesary to have those on your website.
For example a gamers website is a definatly good idea to have ajax/flash but not for this website.

My goal has always been "get rid of it" but we all know there are website where it's definatly a good addition.
So yes the scripts to get around IE bugs is good but not a must.

Oh about compatibility you can report IE bugs to the IE development team at [ Only registered users can see links on this board! Get registered or login! ]
Or IE Feedback site

Posted: Sat Apr 29, 2006 10:30 am

I could spend awhile giving them feedback.

Posted: Sat Apr 29, 2006 10:59 pm

Making a text-only, noscript version for some people is a good idea. There are needs for accessibility, since I know the US federal government requires its websites to be 508 compliant. For the majority of users though, they will most likely have JavaScript on anyway.