SilverX is a free software which aims to help Silverlight designers/developers for converting existing Flash content to Silverlight.
It supports most of the Flash’s basic features like: vector primitives, images, texts & animations.
SilverX can be used for other scenarios as many applications has "export to SWF features" which means they can be converted to Silverlight now (ex: exporting CorelDraw vector graphics to SWF file and then convert it to Silverlight XAML).
The software has clipping layers, sounds, buttons & filters/effects in the roadmap.
Requirements: Windows OS
Open Video Player Initiative is a community project by companies like Adobe, Microsoft, Akamai & for sharing player code and best practices around video player development and monetization
It comes with 2 versions: for Flash & Silverlight.
A ready-to-deploy video player and a configuration tool (for easier configurations) is provided besides the source code.
Video player can be totally customized from colors to buttons & features included.
Demos for the player can found here.
Requirements: Flash or Silverlight
OpenZoom is an open source framework for creating zoomable user interfaces.
The framework is similar to Silverlight’s Deep Zoom control (see WRD post), but for Flash.
The power behind OpenZoom is Flex MultiScaleImage component, which is built on top of the OpenZoom framework.
The name is same wih the Silverlight Deep Zoom’s built-in control & the usage is similar too.
The component has built-in support for keyboard / mouse activities & supports Deep Zoom, Zoomify & OpenZoom images.
For now, OpenZoom can sound to specific, but considering its abilities & usage areas, we’ll probably be hearing more about it soon.
P.S. The framework is so fresh & still in development but it can be downloaded (& it is documented).
Requirements: Adobe Flex
FlowPlayer, which is an amazing video player for websites, has a new version: FlowPlayer 3, with powerful features.
The player has a JavaScript API (with jQuery support) that enables you to control almost every aspect of the player. This makes the player so flexible & easy to transform into any form.
FlowPlayer is totally skinnable & every part (component) of the player can be removed or re-positioned.
It can display images besides the videos (& audio-mp3 support will be added very soon).
And, with a plugin support (implemented in JavaScript and Flash) there are even more features like playlist support, displaying content over the videos & more.
FlowPlayer has both free & commercial licenses where free license has a logo & commercial licenses are totally unbranded.
Chance To Win 3 Commercial Licenses
FlowPlayer is running a contest: "most creative use of Flowplayer". They are simply asking you to use FlowPlayer in an innovative way & 3 best ideas will win commercial licenses ($95/value).
To join the contest, post your URL where you used FlowPlayer to here (contest is running until the end of the year).
Want to get inspired? See the beautiful demos here.
Requirements: No Requirements
Google Analytics has a fresh & nice feature that Ajax & Flash developers will like. Yes, it is now possible to track pageviews in Ajax & Flash applications. And, it is simple.
It is enough to call a function named _trackPageview when an Ajax request or Flash event is called.
An example provided by Google is:
...
http_request.onreadystatechange = sendAlert;
http_request.open('GET', url, true);
http_request.send(null);
}
function sendAlert() {
if (http_request.readyState == 4) {
if (http_request.status == 200) {
alert(http_request.responseText);
pageTracker._trackPageview("/pagefilename1" ); }
else {
alert('Error.');
}
}
}
...
To summarize, after an Ajax request is made, the function is called with the page name that is viewed. And, Analytics tracks this page name.
An important usage tip about this feature is that, Google Analytics codes are normally installed just before the </body> tag. When calling _trackPageview function, you’ll need to use it after the Analytics codes are included. Which means installing the Analytics codes just after the <body> tag is a guaranteed solution.
Google is presenting detailed info & examples for both Ajax & Flash.
P.S. The feature is only available with the new Analytics code: the gaJsHos one.
Xe-VideoGalV1 VL is an open source Flash video player.
The player has a gallery/category support which multiple movies can be presented as a thumbnail & a user can select any of them.
Xe-VideoGAlV1 VL has other features like:
- A transparent info window above the video
- Download of FLV file support
- JPG/PNG/GIF support at movie screen
- Play/pause/sound on-off buttons
- Autoplay
- Player can be resized & more..
Video files to be displayed are configured from a XML file which makes it easy to edit & update.
Requirements: No Requirements
flashmo.com has a new free Flash image gallery named 3D Grid Photo Gallery.
Photos are presented with a beautiful 3D effect, you can switch between the thumbnails easily & see the original images by clicking on them.
Image information including the file names and explanation (shown with the original image) are configured within a XML file.
This Flash gallery is built with Papervision3D & download package includes the FLA file too.
haXe is an open source & multiplatform programming language.
A code written with haXe can be compiled to JavaScript, Flash (AS2 & AS3), PHP and NekoVM which is all the idea behind the project: "let the developer choose the best platform to do a given job".
haXe has installers for Windows, OSX & Linux and the platform is well-documented.
For writing haXe code, plugins for several popular editors can be found here.
Requirements: No Requirements
Compatibility: Windows, OSX & Linux
PostcardViewer, similar to AutoViewer (see WRD post) which is created by the same company, is a free Flash image gallery application with a very nice presentation.
The interface is just like a set of postcards shuffled onto a surface & this is supported with the effects.
This Flash gallery can controlled via mouse & keyboard. And it displays image captions (including URLs).
Besides this free version, pro version offers more customization and no backlink.
Requirements: Flash 8+
ToobPlayer is a lightweight (approx. 14-8 KB) FLV player component that comes in 5 flavors, provides a mechanism to play back YouTube videos, and can also display preview images.
Some features of this FLV player:
- Resizable, optional full-screen mode
- Several video resize mods
- Loading status feedback
- Mouse wheel support (seeking & volume)
- Auto-repeat, buffer time
- Customizable
- Extensive API
ToobPlayer YouTube integration is done with a simple PHP proxy script to automate acquaring videos & images.
The component requires Flash Player 8+ & AS2.
Requirements: Flash Player 8+, AS2
