publishing a site

[sacremenger]

help i am trying to teach myself flash and i have built a flash site saved to a .fla file but i need to know how to get from here to uploading it to my server in laymans terms.

thanks

[marshdabeachy]

With the FLA open in Flash, got to File > Publish. This will generate a SWF and corresponding HTML file in the same folder you have your FLA saved in. Upload the HTML and SWF file to the server.

[sacremenger]

i have done that but my swf file comes up as a ? on my web page

[marshdabeachy]

Hmm, are you sure you have the plugin? It should have installed the plugin when you installed Flash, but maybe that got messed up.

What's the website URL? I can check to see if it works for me.

[sacremenger]

www.funfairforhire.co.uk

[marshdabeachy]

It's looking for http://www.funfairforhire.co.uk/messabout.swf, which doesn't appear to be there. You sure you uploaded the SWF to the right spot?

[sacremenger]

i just uploaded the swf and html file using ftp but changed the name i think to index.swf first. what is the plugin you was talking about?

[Loyal Rogue]

If you changed the name of the swf after you published it with the html page, then the html page is going to be looking for the wrong swf file on the server.

You can change the name of the html file to index.html, but the swf you want to leave as the name that's already embedded in the html code.

[marshdabeachy]

Originally posted by sacremenger
i just uploaded the swf and html file using ftp but changed the name i think to index.swf first.

That's exactly the problem, as Loyal Rogue said. Go into the HTML code and make sure everywhere it says messabout.swf is changed to index.swf.

Alternately, go back into Flash and use File > Publish Settings to change the file names (Flash will handle the HTML stuff).

[sacremenger]

ok i have gone to flash and published the site again but left the names of the files as messabout.html and messabout.swf uploaded that to my site but nothing. what do i have to do know?

[Loyal Rogue]

Goto http://www.funfairforhire.co.uk/messabout.html andyou will see your animation with the red box.

If you want, you can now rename the HTML page on the server from messabout.html to index.html, but leave the name of the swf alone.
The html page will still be looking for messabout.swf nomatter what you change the name of the html page to.

[sacremenger]

it works fine now thanks for your time.

[woodman650]

I actually am also trying to publish my movie and for some reason when I run it in the browser, it's slow and laggy in comparison to the movie outside the browser, which is smooth and normal speed. Any suggestions? Thanks!

[sacremenger]

does it play ok the second time around?

[Loyal Rogue]

What are you using for frames per second (fps)?
Also what are your publish settings?

[woodman650]

nah, it's slow both times. 30 FPS, publish settings are... Version: Flash Player 5, Load Order: Bottom up, (no options checked), JPEG quality = 100%. The flash I just imported into Adobe Golive and placed in a new HTML doc as a movie... thats about it. thanks!

[marshdabeachy]

It's normal for it to play a bit slower in Internet Explorer (another Microsoft thing I guess). Try opening it in Netscape or Mozilla if you've got it - those run it full speed.

[woodman650]

so there's nothing I can do to make it play normal speed in Internet Explorer?! That seems a little odd to me... How come every other Flash site I've ever visited in IE doesn't seem slow? LoL

[marshdabeachy]

It's possible you've got some sort of performance issue somewhere. Did you actually try running it in Mozilla? Typically IE knocks off like 2 or 3 fps; nothing major.

[woodman650]

http://www.thepixelsink.com/Site/Business/business.html does it look slow on your browsers?