Web Designer 7.0.2

[covoxer]

This situation frankly ruins it for those Flash users.

Automatic flash embedding code generation is for the basic uses. If you want any specific way of embedding and/or setting specific properties you are free to use code placeholders instead.

but that is NOT what Web Designer 7 Premium was supposed to be all about.

As far as the unexperienced users are considered, they do not have such specific requirements, neither do they are supposed to be familiar with HTML enough to make conclusions similar to yours. For the advanced users, such as you, we have code placeholders to allow direct code modifications as the most flexible way to go. So it's basically user's choice - simple but limited or advanced but less simple.

[josephrot]

Automatic flash embedding code generation is for the basic uses. If you want any specific way of embedding and/or setting specific properties you are free to use code placeholders instead.
As far as the inexperienced users are considered, they do not have such specific requirements, neither do they are supposed to be familiar with HTML enough to make conclusions similar to yours. For the advanced users, such as you, we have code placeholders to allow direct code modifications as the most flexible way to go. So it's basically user's choice - simple but limited or advanced but less simple.

Thank you for the reply.

However, your summation and response is dead wrong.

Xara will be losing customers over this Flash / SWF gaffe, especially since most all other capable web-tools do it the right and proper way, which is to include all the SWF settings as the end-user intended them, IN the generated HTML code that the web-tool generates.

Xara Web Designer 7.02.x has a major fault in it in this respect, and if running this entire course of commentary past the product manager or Xara board, is what needs to be done, then so be it.

AND...if all Xara Web Designer end-user OR prospective buyers were to also be this informed about it, I would almost wager your job and mine that there would be a Xara board, product management and end-user call to arms.

The problem needs to be rectified, and it really does NOT take that much programmer investigation and hand-work to solve it.

What's really just as worrisome?

Is that if this reply to me is the feelings of Xara, the product teams and product manager, then there may well be MANY more problems just like this one, or similar to it, lurking within Xara Web Designer 7.

Regardless if the problem can be cured, it has all the appearances of being that Xara will not recognize nor clear the problem up in suitable time-frame.

If so, woe be to Xara.

Joe
Skype: joerotello

[Soquili]

Joe you seem to be under a misconception about Web Designer.

Covoxer is the author of the html export dll for Web Designer and knows what Xara's intent and future aspirations for the application my be.

The target demographic for Web Designer is the beginner/amateur, people that have no knowledge or desire to learn html, css, javascript, etc.

Placeholders as Covoxer has already stated allow more experienced users to enter code for more advanced pages.

The key to learning any newly acquired software is to accept that it is not a clone of any previous software, it has it's own way of doing things. Stubbornly insisting that it work the way as another application only defeats and frustrates a users ability to learn new things and methods.

[josephrot]

Joe you seem to be under a misconception about Web Designer.

Covoxer is the author of the html export dll for Web Designer and knows what Xara's intent and future aspirations for the application my be.

The target demographic for Web Designer is the beginner/amateur, people that have no knowledge or desire to learn html, css, javascript, etc.

Placeholders as Covoxer has already stated allow more experienced users to enter code for more advanced pages.

The key to learning any newly acquired software is to accept that it is not a clone of any previous software, it has it's own way of doing things. Stubbornly insisting that it work the way as another application only defeats and frustrates a users ability to learn new things and methods.

Thanks for the reply, quite appreciated.

Xara thus better change their advertising and the website to reflect that the product was and is intended for intro use only and for amateurs to get them started.

When one reads the advertising, one clearly gets the impression that the product was made for intro use and for at the least intermediate use, as well.

None-the-less, the situation still stands that the SWF code is defective, and it should be patched in the soonest Update possible.

How the code stands now, amateurs and first time users are thrown a SWF problem right off the bat, and it's clear that Xara, and Covoxer intend the users to learn rudimentary HTML programming if they wish to fix the problem seen.

The SWF problem not withstanding, Xara Web Designer Premium 7 is actually quite a nifty tool...it truly is.

There's a lot of positive potential there.

Joe

[covoxer]

Joe, if you have any suggestions about program improvements or want to ask for a feature, you have to create a thread here: http://www.talkgraphics.com/forumdis...p?56-Dear-Xara..
Posts in threads like this (not dedicated for the wish list) are very likely to be lost with time and go unnoticed.

[covoxer]

How the code stands now, amateurs and first time users are thrown a SWF problem right off the bat

This is not true. We do not override looping property in the HTML code to let flash player decide whether to loop animation or not, based on the SWF file.

Here's the example. I have created two similar SWFs with WD7. The one with the white circle is set to loop continuously in the animation loop properties. The one with the yellow circle stops after the first pass.
Then I dragged and dropped both of them onto the new page in the WD7.
As I preview the resulting webpage, I see that both animations behave correctly as expected. First one loops continuously while the second one stops after the first pass.
See attached.

This code was not changed since Xtreme 4 Pro release, some 3 years ago. And for all this time, there was not a single user complaint about looping problems related with produced HTML.

[josephrot]

This is not true. We do not override looping property in the HTML code to let flash player decide whether to loop animation or not, based on the SWF file.

Here's the example. I have created two similar SWFs with WD7. The one with the white circle is set to loop continuously in the animation loop properties. The one with the yellow circle stops after the first pass.
Then I dragged and dropped both of them onto the new page in the WD7.
As I preview the resulting webpage, I see that both animations behave correctly as expected. First one loops continuously while the second one stops after the first pass.
See attached.

This code was not changed since Xtreme 4 Pro release, some 3 years ago. And for all this time, there was not a single user complaint about looping problems related with produced HTML.

Understood.

Here, Web Designer Premeium 7.02 does NOT follow your example. All SWF's, whether looping or not, produce final HTML pages where the SWF's loop, whether distinctly created to NOT loop -- e..g., play once, then stop -- loop over and over.

In fact, when you right click the SWF file on the produced web-page, you can see that the "Lopp" command is checked off -- that is, it's enabled and there's a check-mark next to the Loop text. THAT is what's dead wrong here. Even when the SWF was created and "told" to NOT loop, it still is looping in the Web Designer 7.02 produced page.

Is it POSSIBLE, that you are using the updated 7.03, and that little problem with the SWF's was resolved?

Joe

[covoxer]

Is it POSSIBLE, that you are using the updated 7.03, and that little problem with the SWF's was resolved?

Not possible. As I say, this code was not altered for years now.
Have you tried the example design that I have attached? Does it work correctly for you in 7.0.2?

If you attach your design (or some example design that have this issue) with SWF file in question, I could check what's wrong with it.