Ok answer this and you are crowned Flash god!

[Stefan150]

And the question is.....

I have had this really great idea but it requires the user to be able to edit txt in flash themselves.

ok basicly I dont wanna give my idea away and see one of you lot burning by me in your brand new bmw z8 after implementing it yourselves, not that I think any of you honist flashers would but just in case.

ok this isn't my idea but I will modify it slightly, I need some basic flash web page templates that people can choose from, then have windows that they can edit the txt of the page in, without me having to do it e.g. they choose what template they like then a window will open for them to put the txt in for the home page then the about page then all the other pages. then they see the preview of the whole site then if they like it they give me some dollar, you get the picture. Now I have concidered just doing all the editing myself but that is the long and hard way, what i need to do i think requires xml but i am not sure, can anyone tell me how i should go about doing this and if it is possibe to do.

cheers guys.

[erlenmeyer71]

Well you'll need SOME kind of backend scripting, like ASP or PHP or ColdFusion, whatever, so that you can save the user-entered text to text files or XML files on their server. Then the flash templates could go grab them.

[Stefan150]

and how do I learn how to do all of that bussiness? that tells me what to do but I need to know how to do it. where could i find that sorta info?

[jweaver]

I think what you just described above has been tried, developed, and failed at least half dozen times...feel free though to try your shot, I hope you have better luck...

-jweaver

[Stefan150]

If you throw enough mud at a fan some will eventually stick. What I described wasn't what I am doing but I need to be able to do that stuff. and there are people that do flash web pages that you buy and edit yourself but i cant remember who they are and they do well. I don't need people telling me 'It wont work' I need people to tell me how to do what I am trying to do so in future can you not waste my time, thankyou.

Stef.

[edgeweb02]

letting users edit the flash text part of your idea is easy enough.

I have been using a great perl script/system I found online that lets a user login and edit text files (or any other files you let them) that are then loaded into the movies.

go to

http://www.xav.com/scripts/genesis/

this is free and even can be auto installed if you know and have access to the cgi-bin on your server.

You will have to do some customising as the templates included are pretty basic but it works A1.

if you want to see my versions or need help with it just reply as such.

[jweaver]

I am not saying 'it wont work', I'm saying many business' have thrown lots of money at this scheme only to have their plans crash and burn in a roaring ball of fire.

The type of project that you are talking about doing, is *totally* about back-end scripting/know-how...so if you know nothing about that, how do you plan on making something professional and polished and than selling it and driving of in your bmw z8 into the sunset, eh?

Again, that is still assuming this sort of thing was even in a position to *make* money, which in my opinion, it is not.

So in conclusion, if your idea is, in some form or variation, take old, crappy flash templates, hook it up to a back-end so some user/business owner can "make their own website", than I suggest you spend your time more wisely by doing something else...like watching your toe nails grow.

-jweaver

[Stefan150]

LOL,
Ok I dont know anything about 'back-end scripting' and didn't even know that word existed until now. But did you just wake up one day and know all about it, err i think not. I want to learn how to do it and I am willing to put in the time to learn, and when I do be assured I give you a lift to the buss stop in my new bmw z8
and i am slightly perplexed how you can say 'it will fail' when you dont know what my idea is yet.
but thankyou for the link anyway.

Stef.

[edgeweb02]

hey, if the guy wants to learn something new then thats OK isn't it?
besides, I left the link not Jweaver

"is *totally* about back-end scripting/know-how"

well, i made perl back-end scripting work with flash movies
quite well with no experience just about 1 week of
intense reading/playing.
there are plenty of free scripts and tuts and
almost as many free tips on how to do it.

If you really wnat to do it then do it,
making it work as a money maker is a totally different
task which may or may not fail but why not try
and while your trying, learn something new.

By the way, content managment of flash movies DOES return me some good dollars now so....

[jweaver]

Dont get me wrong guys--I made no intention to communicate that you or anyone else shouldnt learn all that you can. Learning is great.

My comments were pointed toward Stefan150's somewhat strange post, that he had this "great idea" but he was too paranoid to tell us, for fear of us stealing it.

Top that with the fact he doesnt even have a *clue* of what a "back-end" is, let alone where to start, and you have Stefan150 in a situation that might as well be this...

[analogy post]
Hey, guys I got this cool idea, it involves making a flying car...i dont think anyone has done it before and i think it would be down right awesome! (not to mention i'd make a ton of money off of it!)

The only problem is i have absolutely no experience in mechanical engineering or just about anything I'd probably need to know to build, or get this thing going, so I'm gonna need some help.

So if any of you have an idea of where i should start or can help, i'd be gratefully, 'cause this idea is just too great to pass up...

ps- please dont steal my idea.
[/analogy post]

So, Stefan150, my advice to you, based on my assumptions of your knowledge would be to keep learning and keep that idea in the back of your mind, because it is a little more advanced than what it sounds like you are ready for.

-jweaver

[Stefan150]

ROFL!!!

I wish I never asked now.

*crawls back under his rock*

[gizmodyer]

Hey Stephan, man...

Maximum respect for trying, eh? And maximum respect for having the good sense of humour to laugh it off.

Nice to see a thread that didn't degenerate into a slanging match.

:-)

Chris.

P.S. There's always cut and paste.

[Capoeirista]

I'm very interested in learning about linking Flash to back end scripting, but am at a loss at how to start. I've perused a few tutorials, but am flummoxed by them. The XML tutorial on Flashkit appears really complex and I got lost in it.

Do you have any suggestions for baby steps?

Thanks,

Lee

[erlenmeyer71]

It's becoming apparent that Macromedia is developing ColdFusion to be the back end script of choice for their products. It concerns me a little, and I hope (ALL MACROMEDIA EMPLOYEES TAKE NOTE) that they will continue to assure that Flash and Dreamweaver continue to support ASP and other backend technologies.

That being said, there's lots of stuff you can learn about ColdFusion at the macromedia.com website. Maybe start there.

Or maybe back up one more step. Where are you hosting your site? If it's on a remote server, you'll need to know what technologies they support. It is a Windows operating system? Unix? Linux? Do they support ColdFusion? PHP?

Then you'll know which one to start investigating.

[Capoeirista]

Hi There--

I'm currently doing graphics work for a large site that's going to be XML driven. It would be a great opportunity for me to learn XML. Instead of PHP or Perl, the back end person wants to use C Sharp.

If I want to experiment with the XML on this site, do I need to learn C Sharp as well or can I just learn XML?

Here's what I think I understand - and I'm way way fuzzy.

There's a database. It can be in any one of a number of types.

A web page gets called up by a browser. The browser can feed info to the page that will be sent to an application server.

The application server queries the database and returns a document in XML according to the data structure laid out by a Document Type Definition, or DTD, which is a file different from, but referenced by, the initiating web page, something like a style sheet.

The web browser reads the XML document and the DTD and places the data in the appropriate parts of the web page. Does this information need to be text only? Can it be pictures or sounds? If so, how do the photos and sounds get placed on the XML document? (The Big Site that I'm doing graphics for deals with a huge database of thousands of sounds for hearing research.)

I've also read somewhere that XML can bypass the app server.

Is this model of what goes on even close to being right?

Where does Flash fit in here? How does Flash interact with XML? Post and Get?

ANY clarity on this issue will be greatly appreciated. Please remember that I'm a graphics person and need baby steps. The XML tutorial on Flashkit boggled me very quickly. I didn't really understand what was going on. Sorry I'm so dense.

Cheers,

Lee

[erlenmeyer71]

Flash interacts with XML through the XML object. In flash, you create an XML object, and then load data into it, and send data from it. The data is structured according to the XML data, in nested arrays. You add or edit nodes via methods. It can get rather unweildly, looking something like:

XMLObject = new XML();
XMLObject.load("file.xml");

XMLObject.childNodes[1].childNodes[3].childNodes[5].appendChild("newNode");

XMLObject.send("file.xml");


I haven't worked much with XML and databases. You'll have to get someone else to comment on that. C# will be used, I assume, to write web services that talk between Flash and the Database. I also assume that you won't be coding the web services. If that's the case, you don't need to know C# at all. Just let the coder write the services. All you'll have to do is send the information, and receive it, and it will do all the really tough work.

If he expects you to do the C# coding too, well, that will be a lot more complicated than getting Flash to work with XML!!!

[Capoeirista]

Thanks!

Lemme see if I can get this straight.

I can write a flash movie.

In this movie, I can create XML objects.

There exists an XML file created somewhere in the server ether with and address".../filename.xml".

Flash can load the XML object ".../filename.xml".

It will have several nodes on it with data in each node.

Flash can recognize and extract the data from these nodes using XML to structure the data.

Can these nodes also contain graphic and audio data or pointers to the graphic and audio data?

Flash can interpret the information on the document and display it.

It can also send data inputted from the user. Does it create the file ".../filename.xml"? or is the file already created and Flash just fills in the blanks, so to speak?

What does XML do when it's not busy interacting with databases? I thought that was its job, structuring database input and output.

What else can Flash do with XML?

If I can call C# and ask it to talk to the database for me, why use XML?

Thanks. I really appreciate your help with this. Your clarification is really helpful.

Lee

[Stefan150]

jesus lee are you talking English here?
: )

[Stefan150]

can anyone tell me what

a: pearl is
b: coldfusion is
c: c# is

thanks guys.

[erlenmeyer71]

yes, what you stated is correct.

I would imagine that you would simply have your XML nodes contain the paths to images or other files, and then have Flash go load them up separately. Flash MX can load jpgs and mp3s now, you know.

You could certainly use C# components to talk to the database, and bypass XML altogether. But XML is a way to 1. Structure the data in meaningful hierarchical relationships and 2. Use a universally accessible format for your data.

Stefan:

Perl and ColdFusion and C# are all programming languages. Perl is a tried and true programming language that is usually used to write scripts that run on Unix web servers. ColdFusion is the easiest to learn by far, but is the least powerful. It's obviously very integrated with Macromedia's products. It requires your web host to be running ColdFusion server. C# is Microsoft's new programming language that can be used to write web scripts, or Windows programs, or anything like that, to run on the Windows platform.