Many people like embedding video into their webpages as it can give rise to interesting multimedia effects like this
As we've said before give your audience the option of seeing movie files or not so a make a link to the page containing the movie
However we'd just like to remind you thing are much more stable if you use a link to open a video (see here) rather than embedding it.
We've found lots of problems of browser incompatibilities but here is a run through of the major ways to embed files
(1) Using The insert => video option (Internet explorer only)
This is a great way of embedding a video. Sadly it only works for Microsoft's browsers. Click below to see it
Click on insert -> Html Tag..
Type in the following
<img dynsrc="mouse.avi" width=160 height=120 start="fileopen" loop="infinite" alt="sorry Netscape users this don't work see main text">
Okay lets break that down. The first line tells the browser to load the video called mouse.avi. The second sets the area it will occupy (careful this may stretch your image).
The next line is very important.
The attribute start means the file will start playing as soon as loaded (fileopen). Alternative value would include "mouseover" (when the mouse crosses the image)
Loop on the other hand controls how many times the file will play round. Set a value or infinite
(2) As A PLUG - IN
This is one of the best ways to embed video files. We find it works with navigator and explorer when using .mov files (most people will have quicktime player or some other plug-in for these browsers) but curiously not .avi
here's an example
Click on insert -> Html Tag..
Type in the following
<embed src="mouse.mov" pluginspage="http://quicktime.apple.com/" width=192 height=168 loop="true" controller="true" autoplay="false" alt="Mouse.mov. You need quicktime plug in for this to work">
Close this and click on insert -> Html Tag..
Type in the following
</embed>
Lets run through the code. The <embed> tag tells the browser to load and embed our file called mouse.mov.
Pluginspage lets a browser without the required plugin display a link to a suitable download site (here http://quicktime.apple.com/). Width and height control the plugin window size on the browser (but don't stretch images)
The next 3 attributes are key. Loop tells tell the browser to either repeatedly loop (true),play a no of times (enter a no e.g. "3") or not to loop (false). Controller determines if controls are present (true) or not (false). Whilst autostart determines if the file will autostart (true or false)
The alt is simply added for an alternate message (please put it in for visually impaired people)
The embed tag is a pretty safe way of doing things and although will be depreciated will be usable for some time after that even on the latest browser.
(3) The <object> tag
The use of the <embed> tag is numbered. At some point the <object> tag will replace it. This is a jack of all trades tag and allows you to use many items called objects on a web page which include things like video video and will eventually replace the <embed> (and the<applet> tag)
Guess what ? Sadly at the moment you'll need quite a lot of code to get this up and running and certainly the code concerned is not easily explainable
We've mentioned this primarily for the future. Some advocate the use of multiple tags to cover all eventualities but you run the risk of getting numerously simultaneous file run interfering with each other.
At the end of the day we still sadly say you're safer off using Links
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