Interestingly this is a concept I began to scratched the surface of with my presentation at Flash On the Beach Last Year, and over the last few months has been a subject I have continued to keep close to hand both in my day job and my personal development projects. At the moment the Flash Player Fragmentation offers a considerable challenge to any developer wanting to design and or develop for multiple devices and multiple screens.

Articles like the one posted over at ADC on adaptive screen layouts offer a great foot up. But before we get to visual display we need to know what player version we are targeting. And to do that, we have to hit the time machine button and roll back all the way to Flash 4.....

The Following code should be exported as a Flash 4 ActionScript 1 .swf. This will ensure it can run on the broadest client base. The resultant .swf acts a cross platform redirect that should work within both stand alone and browser based flash clients. Once the .swf loads it will identify the player variation and then redirect the viewer to the appropriate content for there player platform by loading a replacement content swf at the main player level.

 
/**
Declare flash platform player strings here. As more devices are discovered this list will grow, the strings are from the getVersion() function
*/
// FlashLite 1.1 player platform string
FL1PLATFORM = "5.2";
// FlashLite 2 or 3 player platform string
FL2PLATFORM = "FL ";
// psp Flash Player Platform string
PSPPLATFORM = "NF3";
// Wii Player Platform String
WIIPLATFORM = "WII"
// windows Flash Player Platform string
WINPLATFORM = "WIN";
// mac Flash Player Platform string
MACPLATFORM = "MAC"
/**
Declare files names for flash files of different device configurations
NOTE! Include the full path name here
*/
flashLite1 = "fl_fl1.swf";
flashLite2 = "fl_fl2.swf";
flashLite3 = "fl_fl3.swf";
flash6PSP = "flash6PSP.swf";
flash7WII = "flash7WII.swf";
flashFull8 = "FullFlash8.swf";
flashFull9 = "FullFlash9.swf";
// get the player version
flashVersion = getVersion();
// display full player information
trace(flashVersion);
// test for existence of player version for very early players
if(flashVersion == "")
{
	/*
	Player does not support $version so is VERY early Flash PLayer
	Decide how you wish to handle this case here
	*/
}
// crop the player version to store the platform
playerPlatform = substring(flashVersion, 0, 3)
// Assign a player version for testing
// playerPlatform = PSPPLATFORM;
// display platform information
trace("playerPlatform");
trace(playerPlatform);
// use flashLite 1.1 file
if(playerPlatform eq FL1PLATFORM)
{
	// launch a FlashLite 1.1 version of the file.
	trace("Launch FlashLite 1.1 player version");
	loadMovie(flashLite1, "_level0"); //+"?stgWidth="+Stage.width+"&stgHeight="+Stage.height);
}
else
{
	if(playerPlatform eq PSPPLATFORM)
	{
		// launch a PSP or Flash 6 version of the file
		trace("Launch PSP player version");
		loadMovie(flash6PSP, "_level0"); //+"?stgWidth="+Stage.width+"&stgHeight="+Stage.height);
	}
	else if(playerPlatform eq WIIPLATFORM)
	{
		// launch a PSP or Flash 7 version of the file
		trace("Launch WII player version");
		loadMovie(flash7WII, "_level0"); //+"?stgWidth="+Stage.width+"&stgHeight="+Stage.height);
	}
	else if(playerPlatform eq FL2PLATFORM)
	{
		// grab the player version number for flash lite
		playerVersion = substring(flashVersion, 4, 1);
		// display version information
		trace("playerVersion");
		trace(playerVersion);
		if(playerVersion == "7")
		{
			// launch a FlashLite 2 version of the file.
			trace("Launch FlashLite 2 player version");
			loadMovie(flashLite2, "_level0"); //+"?stgWidth="+Stage.width+"&stgHeight="+Stage.height);
		}
		else if(playerVersion eq "8")
		{
			// launch a FlashLite version of the file.
			trace("Launch FlashLite 3 player version");
			loadMovie(flashLite3, "_level0"); //+"?stgWidth="+Stage.width+"&stgHeight="+Stage.height);
		}
	}
	else if((playerPlatform eq WINPLATFORM) || (playerPlatform eq MACPLATFORM))
	{
		// grab the player version number for desktop player
		playerVersion = substring(flashVersion, 5, 1);
		// display version information
		trace("playerVersion");
		trace(playerVersion);
		if(playerVersion == 8 )
		{
			// launch a desktop version 8 of the file.
			trace("Launch desktop player version");
			loadMovie(flashFull8, "_level0"); //+"?stgWidth="+Stage.width+"&stgHeight="+Stage.height);
		}
		else if (playerVersion == 9 )
		{
			// launch a desktop version 9 of the file.
			trace("Launch desktop player version");
			loadMovie(flashFull9, "_level0"); //+"?stgWidth="+Stage.width+"&stgHeight="+Stage.height);
		}
	}
}
stop();
 

The below zip includes the full source and example 'redirection' movies. If you have any other Client version strings that can be added please let me know and I will try and keep the script updated. For example I would love to know what the Sony Ericcson Java client version reports.

Identiying Flash Client Versions

Marco has put a monumental amount of work into this book. Believe me the 900 hundred or more pages that you read are a slim account of the gargantuan task Marco undertook in documenting the extent of the Flex Application Framework.

I can honestly say I it was fantastic to read the original work. The thing that I found even more incredible as I inflicted my nit picking is that this huge technical resource was produced by Marco in English, not his native Italian. I know i would not be up to the task. Congratulations Marco.

Now on to the rant
{/UPDATE 1}

{UPDATE 2}
After re-reading Ted's post there is one section that i quite important to point out, that I missed.

The day you download Flex 3.0, you will be able to deploy 100% of the new features to the entire Flash Player 9 installed user base.

Of course we all want to know what those new features will actually be. Also though if the Flash 9 Player is going to be around a little longer than the previous player versions, will it mean we have to put up with its short comings a little longer too? Accessibility, Bi-Directional Support immediately spring to mind.
{/UPDATE 2}

Most of the flash blogosphere will have read the post here . I have to say I was left feeling a little fished in. There appeared to be little information actually about Flex 3.0 although there are an awful lot of mentions of both Flex 3.0 and also Flash player 9. In fact some of the information sounds down right wrong.

This is the first time Adobe or Macromedia has released a development toolset targeting a widely deployed Flash Player

Will this not be the Flash 9/Blaze IDE, which will surely be released well before Flex 3.0. I imagine Flash 9 will be targeting a widely deployed Flash 9 Player and the new ActionScript 3 standard. The clue would be Adobe releasing the AS3 update for flash 8 on Labs. What it would be accurate to say is;

This is the first time Adobe or Macromedia has released a development toolset, that hasn't been released yet.

Scatter in some simple logical version statements, such.

When Flash Player 10 hits 90%, Flex should target Flash Player 10 in all future releases

Its a wonderful recipe for Google Keyword Candy. But has very little content.

Sorry Ted. Not impressed.

The release, which is dated 7th November 2006 can be found here and provides more information. From the release it sound like the code is to be included into future releases of the fire fox browser.

Does this mean an end to the Flash Plug-in for future Mozilla based Browsers? How will this impact XUL runner and its capabilities in comparison to Adobes much talked about Apollo?

Adobe and Mozilla Foundation to Open Source Flash Player Scripting Engine

The issue I have with the patent is its broad and sweeping coverage of very common interface and application GUI design systems. As an example reading one portion of the "Summary of The Invention".

When editing a component, the user may modify a number of features associated with a component including, but not limited to, the volume of an acoustic component, the link between a menu entry and an associated component, the font, font size, color, or effect of a text field, or the layout, size, transparency, rotation, color, position, or level of any graphical rich-media component. The user may modify these components by means of a slider bar or a textual input field. In addition, the user may modify the volume of a sound component by means of up and down volume buttons. The user may undo modifications made to a component's parameters. The user may also modify the position of a graphical rich-media component by a graphical input field, by clicking and dragging said component, or by text fields. When the user modifies the position of a graphical rich-media component by means of clicking and dragging said component, said component may align itself to a grid point or a guide line. The user may also modify the style and the Uniform Resource Locator (URL) of a component linked to a menu entry.

Unless I am mistaken the recently posted link to Netvibes would actually infringe on this part of the patent. In that the user can select 'panes' or 'graphical rich-media components' of the netvibes application and alter there position within the application by clicking and dragging them to a new position.

In this example, because there is no specific technology linked to the patent claim, any RIA in any technology, Flash, Ajax, Appolo, XUL Runner, HaXe, Sparkle, add any other future technology here..... These systems would all be in break of the patent claim.

And this is just ONE of the EIGHTY THREE different claims in this patent.

Very worrying I think any developer would agree. Everyone involved in Internet application development, in my opinion, should take a serious look at this patent. Think about ANY work they have done or seen in past. The work they are doing today. Then consider the possible implications of future networked development. If you know of anything that has been posted, exhibited or shown publicly that can bring this patent down, it is in every ones interest to make it known to strengthen the Magix reexamination.

And remember we are not just talking about flash applications or work here. If you remember or are aware of ANY online application, in any technology, be it DHTML, Director, Java or anything else. If it used any, all or even one of these systems to allow user interation then it may well be enough to show that Mr Neil Balthaser did not invent these systems, and certainly has not right to lay claim to doing so as he has in his patent application.

I placed this in a folder in the root of my project called docs. The final docs are produced to sub folders of the docs folder called output/AppDocs. A screen shot of output can be seen here.

The XMl source is below the fold along with a link to the raw build.xml file

[XML]
< ?xml version="1.0"?>

Incase the XML above does not work the file is available here

ASDoc:Using ASDoc
ASDoc:Creating ASDoc Comments

I had a good idea the area(s) that people might like more in depth information, but I also wanted to take into account some broader work flow and process issues that I feel really need to be discussed. In this post I would like to present some more detailed information regarding one of the slides I used at the LFPUG presentation that, as expected, has generated a lot of feed back.

Managing Text & Fonts

During the presentation I had split this key area of localizing flash content into two sub-headings, each sub-heading had a number of points I wanted to cover.

Part 1 - Fonts

• Understanding character sets, character maps & glyphs tables.
• Using embedded fonts and or non-embedded fonts.
• Flash 8 and advanced anti-aliasing.
• File size implications of fonts in flash.

Part 2 - Construction & Style

• Using font symbols.
• Using dynamic text fields.
• Shared fonts, font libraries and font symbols.
• The TextFormatObject & CSS.

Understanding Character sets, character mapping and glyph tables

Before getting into the nitty gritty of the practical side of how you go about managing the text based content in a localized flash project, I want to cover off the underlying concepts and processes that support it. Hopefully my terminology will be correct enough for the purpose of this article, feel free to leave comments correcting me where appropriate.

When trying to localize text based content in flash you will need to understand a little regarding Unicode, and how the fonts and applications you are using support it. So what is Unicode.

Unicode provides a unique number for every character, no matter what the platform, no matter what the program, no matter what the language

In addition to this Unicode characters are grouped into character sets. Within flash these can be found in the embed fonts options of the text field properties inspector.

As flash developers we should be able publish content to pretty much any language on the planet. "we should be able". What often upsets this localization utopia is that many, many times we will find that the fonts provided, or requested within a project don't completely support Unicode. If this is the case it will result in a number of display issues within your flash production, including missing characters, or often a "?" or a square symbol, being displayed instead. Another, slightly less common problem can be a poorly constructed font that has characters incorrectly mapped. This would result, for example, in the glyph for "A" being returned and displayed as "B".

In actual fact there are few font faces that do fully support the whole Unicode table, and generally they are the standard system font faces for "sans", "serif", and "monospace" display, (Arial, Times, Courier on Windows). In part this is because to implement a complete Unicode font would be a time consuming and costly, production. There are around 65,000 (I think?) individual Unicode character codes to support, meaning over 65,000 characters to produce and test for some poor font maker.

With this in mind it is always worth checking the level of Unicode support that the fonts you are being asked to use support, you will save yourself a lot of tears as your project progresses.

Having assessed the support that your fonts offer for Unicode you need to find an acceptable level of Font Embedding. I have found this to be very similar in approach to deciding the compression that is applied to an image for the web. There is always going to be a trade off between the number of fonts you embed, and the final file size of a project. For example as a test, and to refresh my memory, I did an export of a flash movie that simply had a Dynamic text Field supporting Arial MS Unicode and embedding all character sets. The resultant SWF was 9.7MB uncompressed (7.8MB compressed).

The reason for large file size is that when flash embeds fonts for use in the player they are essentially converted to vector shapes that are embedded in your movie. When you get to some of the more exotic languages (Asian and Right to Left Languages for example) the individual glyphs are very elaborate, these results in some complex vectors, and thus larger file sizes. In addition the shear number of characters is HUGE, a number of languages have many more individual characters than us Europeans, the basic Korean character set has 3454 glyphs!

As of flash 8 the use of embedded fonts becomes less of an issue, with respect to visually acceptable text rendering. Making use of the advanced anti-aliasing options we are able to yield far better readability than is possible even with embedded font glyphs. However there are still some issues related to these options when trying to animate and scale text that is displayed using them. So depending on the design and visual treatment you are dealing with you will need to keep this in mind.

In my next post I will look at how to manage fonts within your files, it will roughly follow the structure of the 'part 2' heading above apply some of the code examples from my brief previous post.

References from this Article
Unicode.org, an invaluable source of information regarding UTF and Unicode
Online Unicode look up table
Information on Flash 8 text rendering issue in Saffron
Further information on Flash 8 text rendering issue in Saffron
LFPUG Presentation Running Notes

Links in this Article
London Flash Platform User Group
The presentation slides I used. More details are in the running notes above.
Code Snippets for localizing flash

Thanks to AKQA for the venue, support, beer and pizza, very nice it was to. Thanks also to Tink for the opportunity to break my cherry, so to speak. And finally thanks to every one that came along to listen to me gibbering on. It must be said this is a subject I have come to build a love-hate relationship with over the many years I have spent in the field. I love the challenge of working to localise the content. I hate the fact that Flash makes even some of the most mundane solutions or Ideas a HUGE Challenge. It would seem I am not alone in this.

In addition to nattering on myself, I also received some useful information as well, which was great. So thanks for correcting my terminology of Polish as a Cyrillic based Language. Apparently it's an Extended European language, which would account for me having issues with that one.

Something I didn't do last night was to show any code. This was due to operating on a Mac (thanks again Tink) and not being confident enough in my app switching on the alien technology. Below are some snippets I made reference to.

Using System.capabilities.playerType to allow altered path references dependent on whether you are testing through a browser.
[AS]
/*
str_xml variable is a string appended to the SWF file name in the HTML
this is used to dictate which XML language version the flash movie
will load and display. If no XML variable is detected then the movie will
default to the UK English version (en-GD) this allows for easy testing in the
flash IDE
*/
var str_defaultLang:String = "en-GB";
// use the playerType to asertain whether the movie is playing in the browser or not and alter the Pathing acordingly
var str_siteRoot: = (System.capabilities.playerType == "External") ? "../" : "";
var str_xml:String = (str_xml == undefined) ? str_defaultLang : str_xml;
var str_xmlSource:String = str_siteRoot + "xml/structure" + str_xml + ".xml";
[/AS]
A simple (nasty) prototype to string that offers find and replace functionality. This is then shown searching for pesky windows carriage return and line feed symbols and replacing them with single newline statement. I hope the URL encoded values are correct; I have actually done this from memory. Please let me know it this not the case.

[AS]
/*String object prototype adds find and replace functionality*/
/*
usage : str_myString.replace(str_stringToFind, str_stringToReplace);
str_stringToFind: string you wish to find in 'str_myString'
str_stringToReplace: string you wish to replace str_stringToFind with in 'str_myString'
returns: str_myString with all occurances of str_stringToFind replaced with str_stringToReplace
*/
String.prototype.replace = function(str_f:String, str_r:String):String
{
return (this.split(str_f).join(str_r));
}
var myString:String
myString = escape(myString)
myString = myString.replace("%0A%0D", newline);
myString = unescape(myString);
[/AS]

Finally a snippet showing how to store Country/Language code combinations in order to switch fonts to Arial MS Unicode in those more troublesome language character sets.

[AS]
/* Array to list non supported county/language codes */
var arr_nonSuportedCC:Array = new Array("gr-GR", "ru-RU", "tr-TR", "cr-CR", "kr-KR", "pl-PL", "si-SI", "cs-CZ", "da-DK", "el-GR", "sv-FI", "hu-HU");
/*
setFontFace loops trough an array of Values that represent Country/language codes for the
current content, if the current document country code is in this list then return true to
say use a default font face that supports the countries glyphs more fully.
e.g Arial Unicode MS for russian/greek/cyrilic languages
*/
var setFontFace = function(str_CC:String, arr_CountryList:Array):Boolean
{
var bln_retval:Boolean = false;
var i:Number = 0;
var iTotal:Number = arr_CountryList.length;
var str_curCC:String;
str_CC = str_CC.toLowerCase()
while(i < iTotal)
{
str_curCC = arr_CountryList[i].toLowerCase();
if (str_CC == str_curCC)
{
bln_retval = true;
i = iTotal;
}
++i;
}
return bln_retval;
}
/* switch to determin if the font glyphs are supported*/
var bln_useArial:Boolean = setFontFace(str_xml, arr_nonSuportedCC);
var str_defaultDisplayFont:String
str_defaultDisplayFont = bln_useArial ? "Arial Unicode MS" : "HelveticaNeueLT Pro 43 LtEx";
// Text Formating object that will use the 'default' or 'switched' font
__tf_navigationDefault = new TextFormat()
__tf_navigationDefault.font = str_defaultDisplayFont
__tf_navigationDefault.size = 14;
__tf_navigationDefault.color = 0x102C4A;
[/AS]

This last Snippet could also be extended to switch Font Size based on Asian Language or country codes as well. In addition I have used a similar script to check for 'preferred' fonts based on TextField.getFontList().

If you can help us, or you know some one who might be able too PLEASE leave a comment. Let me know if you want it made public or not and I will abide your wishes. What is important is that myself or Mike (flashgen.com) can contact you some how to follow it up.

If you lead to the project going like I will personally buy you a BIG beers or six, and give you a great big hug (kisses optional).

The companies and or departments required are.

BBC Education Department -- need to be able to sign release for Medicine Through Time Website. (circa 1998, Flash 3).
British Telecoms Education Department -- need to be able to sign release for BT Time Trek Game. (circa 1998, Flash 3).

Remember this may be the only opportunity to see these historical examples of what us oldskoolers 'bled our eyes on'.

Please spread the word if you are able.

As you will have seen Mike Jones (FlashGen.com) and I are meeting to take notes, share war stories and generally reminisce the 'Good OldSkool Days'. To find out what files we still have, and even which URLs are still live (Flash 3 (alpha) circa 1997/8 btw JD produced by Spooky & the Bandit - you may remember them :p)

Keep your eyes peal for more news as events unfold....

The Actual Location of the ActionScript 3 Language reference is in fact now here.
**UPDATE**

As I got a few moments to play with ActionScript 3, I thought now would update the Syntax involved in some earlier posts....... And also it would seem some of the examples in the ActionScript 3 Language reference. So here are some replacements you may need to use to get the examples to work from the ActionScript 3 Language Reference.

1. A number of the Text classes are imported from incorect package structures. For example the StyleSheet example.
   
   package {
   import flash.util.trace;
   import flash.display.Sprite;
   import flash.display.TextField;
   import flash.display.TextFieldAutoSize;
   import flash.text.StyleSheet;

   -- snip --

   TextFieldAutoSize is in the flash.text package now. Not the flash.display package.

2. Previously I had posted a snippet guiding how to Embed fonts in a movie. This syntax seems to be incorrect now.
   
   package
   {
   import flash.util.describeType;
   import flash.display.MovieClip;
   import flash.display.TextField;
   import flash.text.TextFormat;
   import flash.text.AntiAliasType;

   public class Test extends MovieClip
   {
   // be sure this is pointing to a ttf font in your hardrive
   [Embed(source="C:\WINDOWS\Fonts\somefont.ttf", fontFamily="foo")]
   public var bar:String;
   public function Test()

   -- snip --

   It should be use like this.
   
package
{
import flash.util.describeType;
import flash.display.MovieClip;
import flash.display.TextField;
import flash.text.TextFormat;
import flash.text.AntiAliasType;
// be sure this is pointing to a ttf font in your hardrive
[Embed(source="C:\WINDOWS\Fonts\somefont.ttf", fontFamily="somefont")]
public class Test extends MovieClip
{
public var bar:String;
public function Test()

   -- snip --

   i.e the Embed meta data has now to be moved outside the class, the same way as stage meta data exists outside the class (example posted by Mike Jones At FlashGen.com);

So thats as far as I got last night, I really lost interests. Maybe I chose the wrong package to start on (flash.text.TextRenderer), but there were so many problems in that example alone that I gave up trying to work out how to get the example to compile. The idea of working on my own stuff after that just completely lost its appeal.

If any one can get the example in flash.text.TextRenderer working i would love to see it :p.

• A single SWF file cannot combine ActionScript 1.0 or 2.0 code with ActionScript 3.0 code.
• ActionScript 3.0 code can load a SWF file written in ActionScript 1.0 or 2.0, but it cannot access the SWF file's variables and functions.
• SWF files written in ActionScript 1.0 or 2.0 cannot load SWF files written in ActionScript 3.0. This means that SWF files authored in Flash 8 or Flex Builder 1.5 or earlier versions cannot load ActionScript 3.0 SWF files.

  The only exception to this rule is that an ActionScript 2.0 SWF file can replace itself with an ActionScript 3.0 SWF file, as long as the ActionScript 2.0 SWF file hasn't previously loaded anything into any of its levels. An ActionScript 2.0 SWF file can do this through a call to loadMovieNum(), passing a value of 0 to the level parameter.

• In general, SWF files written in ActionScript 1.0 or 2.0 must be migrated if they are to work together with SWF files written in ActionScript 3.0. For example, say you created a media player using ActionScript 2.0. The media player loads various content that was also created using ActionScript 2.0. You cannot create new content in ActionScript 3.0 and load it in the media player. You must migrate the video player to ActionScript 3.0.

  If, however, you create a media player in ActionScript 3.0, that media player can perform simple loads of your ActionScript 2.0 content.

The full information can be found here:

Programming ActionScript 3.0 > Overview of ActionScript Programming > Introduction to ActionScript 3.0 > Compatibility with previous versions

As mentioned in a previous post here. This is the first time the flash player/VM has not been linked to the production and development of a formal Flash IDE.

While Flex 2 could certainly fall under the remit of an IDE, I would be surprised if it will be installed across the design and development teams of many of the agencies I have worked for recently.

[as]package
{

import flash.util.describeType;
import flash.display.MovieClip;
import flash.display.TextField;
import flash.text.TextFormat;
import flash.text.AntiAliasType;

public class Test extends MovieClip
{

// be sure this is pointing to a ttf font in your hardrive
[Embed(source="C:\WINDOWS\Fonts\somefont.ttf", fontFamily="foo")]
public var bar:String;

public function Test()
{

var format:TextFormat= new TextFormat();
format.font= "foo";
format.color= 0xFFFFFF;
format.size= 130;

var label:TextField= new TextField();
label.embedFonts= true;
label.autoSize= TextFieldAutoSize.LEFT;
label.antiAliasType= AntiAliasType.ADVANCED;
label.defaultTextFormat= format;
label.text= "Hello World!";
addChild(label);
}
}
}[/as]

Kevin's article also has some information about setting the values outside your classes as options in the compiler. Sweet.