Dynamic text in banner ad??

I've got a client that I've developed flash and html banner ads for in the past and now they're wondering if I can create a banner ad for them with dynamic text in it. For example, within the graphics of the ad, there would be a place that would say something like "Over XX,XXX copies sold" and that number would auto increment (every few seconds). The tricky part is that they want the number to increment based on a variable number that will be generated on their website, but the banners will be posted to various advertising websites around the web.

So, having never done this before, I'm thinking it will be some combination of php/javascript on their site to create the auto-incrementing variable and, within the html code of the banner, there would be some sort of javascript (with some Ajax perhaps for the continuous updating) to grab that number from their site and display it.

Anyone ever done/seen anything like this?? Anyone have any tips/advice? I'm sure it's doable, just a matter of figuring out the easiest/best/most reliable way to do it without spending way more time building it than needed.

Thanks!!!

hmm...nobody?? Seems like it would be pretty straight forward, but maybe I'm getting myself into more than I should...I'll play around with it to see how well it works.

unless you need this (starting) number to be changing dynamically, you can just put text file on their server with the number, and then use URLLoader to load it. alternatively, you can do whole counter thing as a separate animation that sits on their site, and load it into your banner using Loader. your question is broad and your options are so numerous, that nobody can be bothered to list them all :) I mean, if your question was more like "I have this file and I try to load it and it does not work and here is the code", one or two people here could pick it up and answer.

Thanks realMakc. Yeah, I knew it was a pretty broad question. I need to play around with it a bit to see if it's feasible or not, but, I DO need the number to be changing dynamically and it needs to be consistent across all of their banners on all the different sites they have them on...so, they have to be pulled from a separate variable on a separate site :) that's the kicker. :)

Thanks!!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by realMakc

unless you need this (starting) number to be changing dynamically, you can just put text file on their server with the number, and then use URLLoader to load it. alternatively, you can do whole counter thing as a separate animation that sits on their site, and load it into your banner using Loader. your question is broad and your options are so numerous, that nobody can be bothered to list them all :) I mean, if your question was more like "I have this file and I try to load it and it does not work and here is the code", one or two people here could pick it up and answer.

---

by dynamic I mean that there is some logic that updates this value. if they can just log in their winscp and edit the file with that number couple of times per day, I do not consider it to be dynamic.

Yeah, it will be dynamic. It's actually going to be fed from their real-time sales which is going to be pulled from their e-commerce back-end db. :) They want it to reflect their ACTUAL sales. :)

Hi

dynamic 1a: when the banner loads, it calls a server for the current count ... but does not update (so if someone stares at the banner for a while, it would not change). Requires crossdomain files for the banner to be able to fetch the value
dynamic 1b: a php script on the server would fetch the value and stuff it into the embedding. Requires changes to the way the banner is installed on the website
dynamic 2: like 1a, but the banner would fetch new values every so often (e.g. once every 30 seconds)

Musicman,

Yes, this will be dynamic 2, so the banner will have to update dynamically based on the updated variable on the client's site. They initially wanted it updated constantly so it reflected the specific variable value (they're predicting that the counter will be updating every few seconds), but I told them that would create a lot of updating calls that some sites may not want from the banners that they have. That's why I was thinking some sort of Ajax updating might be necessary...

Thanks for any advice!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Musicman

Hi

dynamic 1a: when the banner loads, it calls a server for the current count ... but does not update (so if someone stares at the banner for a while, it would not change). Requires crossdomain files for the banner to be able to fetch the value
dynamic 1b: a php script on the server would fetch the value and stuff it into the embedding. Requires changes to the way the banner is installed on the website
dynamic 2: like 1a, but the banner would fetch new values every so often (e.g. once every 30 seconds)

---

you are making it sound waaaaaay harder than it is.

here is a very complete code example of how to load the file from server and read the variable from it. I'd say it is even more complete than it has to be, but that's good thing, right?

Yes, realMakc, that's the way to do it...BUT the variable needs to be grabbed from another site, it has to be updated on a consistent basis and, ideally, done in html, not flash...

I haven't committed to doing this for them yet, just started looking into what it might take technically, so thanks to ALL you guys for the help and suggestions...still have some testing to do...

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by flashpipe1

Yes, realMakc, that's the way to do it...BUT the variable needs to be grabbed from another site

---

Youvegottabekiddinme... just change

PHP Code:

---

new URLRequest("urlLoaderExample.txt"); 


---

to

PHP Code:

---

new URLRequest("http://thatstupidsite.com/urlLoaderExample.txt"); 


---

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by flashpipe1

and, ideally, done in html, not flash...

---

http://cdn.memegenerator.net/instanc...x/42986080.jpg

lol...yeah, but I know there are a lot of smart people in here and that's why i put it in the scripting section. :)
Thanks for the direction, should be playing around with it today to make sure I can get all the pieces working before I tell the client it can work the way they want it...
Thanks!