How to add sound to a WD7 page

[jon404]

Web sound is messy. I'd like to start a discussion about how to get sound clips on a WD7 web page... so I can figure out a reliable way to add user-controlled audio to training pages. Here's my starting place, based on the process below:
http://jon404.com/test

Process --

Make a rectangle, 200px x 20px, any color.

Go to its Web Properties > Placeholder tab and select Replace with HTML code (body).

Click the HTML code (body) button, and enter this code in the box:

<EMBED ALIGN="CENTER" SRC="index_htm_files/test2.mp3" HEIGHT="18" WIDTH="200" AUTOSTART="FALSE" VOLUME="100%" MASTERSOUND></EMBED>

Do ‘File > Export website’ which will save the page and create the supporting files folder, in this case the default ‘index_htm_files’.

Copy your .mp3 or .wav sound file to the supporting files folder. Modify the placeholder code, as above, to put in the correct folder name and sound file name.

Run ‘index.htm’ to test the page.

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... would REALLY appreciate any tips about adding sound clips ... anything you've tested that runs sort of reliably in IE and Firefox; I don't care about Safari. And testing, here, means testing by running from an actual website, not locally, and not via WD7's preview. Thanks in advance!

P.S. -- not having much luck with HTML 5's <audio> tag. Anybody using it, or the <video> tag?

[raweller]

This Works in Internet Explorer
<bgsound src="index_htm_files/test2.mp3" loop=1>

[jon404]

Thanks Raweller... it works fine in IE but not in Firefox... like I said, sound is messy!

Here's something that may work -- Flash sound using an external audio file:

The attached (see zip) Flash SWF file looks for an external sound file, audio.mp3. Because the sound file is outside the SWF, you can change it at any time as long as the filename stays audio.mp3.

This assumes you are making a page with the default index.htm filename.

Put audio.mp3 in the main folder (the folder that has index.htm).

Put audioplayer.swf in the index_htm_files folder.

Make a small rectangle, right-click it, and do Web Properties > Placeholder, select Replace with Flash, and enter audioplayer.swf

Save the web file and Export the website as Index.htm.

Go to the folder and click index.htm to open the page, the sound will play as the page opens.

Note: when you record the sound, add at least 1/2 second of silence at the start... in case the Flash loads slowly (I forgot to do this in the test file).
I've included the Flash 8 .fla file used to make the external player, but you don't need Flash to get this working... just follow the steps above.

Hope this helps anyone else who is frustrated with inconsistent web sound code...

Jon

[jon404]

Sound for eLearning solved! See this post by athman at the Xara Users website...

http://board.xara-users.info/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=1728

Clear, online demos plus zipped example files -- EXACTLY what you need if you want to start making rapid-development WD7 training material with audio. Bingo! Bye-bye, Adobe!