=== SWFPut - SWFlash Put === Contributors: EdHynan Donate link: https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=4Q2Y8ZUG8HXLC Tags: video, audio, movies, tube, flash, flash player, graphics, movie, audio-visual, a/v content Requires at least: 3.0.2 Tested up to: 3.6 Stable tag: 1.0.2 License: GPLv3 or later License URI: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.html SWFPut provides a flash video player for posts and pages, and a widget, and forms to configure display and video playback. == Description == SWFPut helps place flash video within posts, on pages, and in the sidebar or other widget areas (by providing a widget). Video objects are placed and configured with forms, so the user doesn't need to learn a shortcode or maintain one with hand-editing. A shortcode will be visible in the editor for posts and pages; it can be considered a visual indication that the video is in place. The widget does not use a shortcode. If you don't know what a shortcode is, that's okay, SWFPut does not require you to know. Here are some features of SWFPut to consider if you wonder whether it will suit your purpose: * SWFPut includes and uses its own video player program (that runs in the web browser's flash plugin). It is not designed to work with other flash video player programs. * SWFPut works directly with media file (.flv, .mp4) URLs; that is, SWFPut does *not* embed the video players of providers such as YouTube or Vimeo. SWFPut is for video files which are accessible by URL, whether hosted at your site or off-site. The setup form provides two media lists: one offers media files (.flv, .mp4) that you can upload with the WordPress 'Add Media' feature, and one offer media files (.flv, .mp4) that are found in a search under the "uploads" directory (this allows you upload media files without using the WordPress PHP upload, which might have a size limit too low for audio/visual material). Of course, a URL may be placed directly in a text input field. * An initial image (sometimes called a "poster") that will display until the play button is clicked can (and should) be provided. The setup form provides for this in the same way as described above. * SWFPut should not interfere with the appearance of a site: a video is presented much like an image (such as .png or .jpg) is, with the same sort of border and optional caption. * SWFPut allows you to set the size of the video player window. Generally, you would want the aspect ratio of the window to match that of the video (but that is not required). The size of the player window does not need to match the display size of the video frames; the video will be scaled to fit the player window, maintaining the video aspect ratio as set by you or as implied by the width and height. Note that the widths of the page columns set by your theme's CSS limit the width of the player window. * SWFPut allows you to set the display aspect ratio for the video. Some video is 'anamorphic' in that the pixel width and height do not match the intended proportion of display width and height. You might film your child's school play as 16:9 'widescreen' but use a space saving feature of your recorder that saves the video at 480x360 (which is not 16:9). You can set SWFPut to display the video at the intended 16:9 aspect ratio. You may set any aspect ratio (make it distorted if you wish). * The core features of the flash video player program included with SWFPut have been verified to work with the Gnash free-software browser plugin, which is good because non-free binary-only software is bad. (At the time of this writing, Gnash does not handle the MP4 video container format, so it is preferable that you prepare video in the FLV container, even using the h.264 and AAC codecs. Of course, you may use MP4 if you must.) * The flash video player program included with SWFPut is written and compiled with the *Ming* PHP extension, and the code is included, so you may modify the player. * SWFPut does not add any JavaScript to the pages generated for your visitors, which might be helpful if you try to keep your pages useful to those who disable JavaScript in their browsers. (Such visitors might need to explicitly enable the flash web browser plugin, but that is another, unavoidable, issue.) JavaScript is only used in the administrative interface for the forms and manipulation of shortcodes in the editor. == Installation == SWFPut is installed through the WordPress administrative interface. 1. Fetch the SWFPut zip file; save it on your computer 1. Log in at your WordPress site 1. Select 'Plugins -> Add New' 1. Select 'Upload' 1. Select 'Browse' 1. In your system's file selector, select the SWFPut zip file; select 'OK' or equivalent 1. Select 'Install Now' 1. Select 'Activate Plugin' At this point "SWFlash Put" should be an entry on the plugins page. The Settings menu should have an item "SWFPut Plugin". If the above is not so, there is probably a problem at your site's host; for example if the host is Unix system there is very likely a problem with incorrect permissions metadata (mode) on a directory such as wp-content/uploads, or an unsuitable user or group ownership of (probably several) files and directories. This can be a frequent problem if the host has PHP configured in "safe mode". If the host is not a Unix system, I'm sorry to say I cannot help; maybe your hosting provider can. If the installation was successful, you should see a "SWFPut Flash Video" widget under 'Appearance -> Widgets' and a form entitled "SWFPut Flash Video Shortcode" on the posts and pages editing pages. For additional help, you will find README* files (differing in format, and excluding 'readme.txt', which is this file) that discuss the flash video player in more detail. == Frequently Asked Questions == = Is this really a FAQ? = At the time of this writing, 0 (zero) questions have been asked, which implies that few have been asked frequently. Until this becomes a true FAQ, it will be used to answer questions that are merely anticipated, as is common practice. = Do I really need to understand "aspect ratio" and such-like? = Probably not. In most case the width and height of the video will match the intended display proportion. "Anamorphic" video is not rare, but probably not too common either. The author has seen videos on e.g., YouTube, that are distorted by wrong display aspect ratio (which is not YouTube's fault), but only a few. If you find that your video looks squeezed or stretched, you can always use a little trial & error with the display aspect setting until it looks good. What you *must* understand is that you *must* convert video to the format (the type) that the web-browser plugin can handle; namely, FLV or MP4. If you use a converter program designed for non-experts, you won't need to understand too many details. A web search should turn up some converter programs that might be worth a try. = Why doesn't SWFPut support HTML5 video? = Because the author has decided that that would be done best in a separate (but similar) plugin. The author might write one, particularly if SWFPut generates some interest. The problem with including HTML5 video in the same package is that HTML5 video in its current specification does not provide features that SWFPut provides; for example, HTML5 video will not scale video disproportionate to the pixel width and height and will *only* scale video (proportionally) to the width or height of the html video element. (An insane JavaScript hack can create a not-displayed video object and use a timeout callback at at least the video frame rate to paint the current frame on a canvas with scaling suitably calculated for an anamorphic video, but using this method squanders the visitor's CPU, increases dropped frames, has no full-screen mode, and provides no built in controls, and is a bad idea that the author has looked into and rejected.) There are other reasons, such as different supported file formats. Update 1 August 2013: WordPress 3.6 is released, with HTML5 video and audio support. That's another reason. = Are you going to anticipate more questions? = Maybe later. == Screenshots == 1. The SWFPut widget setup form (bottom). 2. The SWFPut posts/page setup form ('meta box') with the first section hidden. 3. The appearance of video placed by SWFPut (Twentyeleven theme with dark custom colors, sidebar on left), not yet playing. == Changelog == = 1.0.2 = * Corrections in (vaguely distinguished) add_(action|filter) calls, according to tag used, checked against WP source (whether do_action() or apply_filters() is invoked for the tag in question). * Changed JS unescape() to decodeURIComponent(). * Removed compiled README.{tty,tt8} from distribution. * Changed 'wptexturize' to 'htmlentities' for paths and things that should not be pretty-pretty'd. * Changed 'Tags:' in readme.txt (and stable, etc.). = 1.0.1 = * Maintenance. * Editing and corrections in readme.txt. * Behavior change: without initial image ('poster'), medium is no longer fetched automatically (without visitor play); was a misfeature that would simulate an initial image by pausing at a random point within first few seconds of the video, but the unsolicited download is a bad idea. (Might be an option in future.) = 1.0.0 = * Initial release. == Upgrade Notice == = 1.0.2 = BUG FIX: URLs with non-8-bit characters would be corrupted in form fields, causing not-found errors in the player: changed JS unescape() to decodeURIComponent(). (Feedback on non-UTF-8 charsets would be welcome!) = 1.0.1 = This revision has one important change: a misfeature that would simulate an initial image (if one was not set) by pausing at a random point within first few seconds of the video, but causing an unsolicited download of the medium in order to do so, has been disabled.