Dear all,
I am writing to request your help and expertise... I would like to have my movable type blog viewable in it's entirety inside of a flash movie. I know that i'm gonna want the data to be formated in an XML file and imoprted that way, So far i've managed (using the data connection wizard) to get flash to read and display the contents of atom.xml in a datagrid. I also know that eventually (when it all works) i'll have to bind the data to components. With this in mind my question is, how? Should i create a custom template for every file that MT will output or can i import the data from that atom.xml file? (it had entries and id's etc) Will doing this still enable me to have comments visible? Has anyone attempted / done this? Please help, any information is useful. Many thanks and respect.
Craig Mackenzie
Full Version: Movable Type & Flash
*bump*
sorry to bump guys but i am kinda desperate!
*bump*
sorry to bump guys but i am kinda desperate!
*bump*
You might see if this thread has tips that can help you. I searched for "flash" in the forums seach, and there were quite a few results, so you might check that too 
Kristine
Kristine
Please be a bit more patient. You're asking for something extremely unusual that no one here may have done. In any case, the forum is staffed entirely by volunteers. You do not need to bump your post after only a few hours. When someone who knows how to help you finds it, they will answer it.
In the meantime, if you know of a blogger who is already doing their blog in Flash, perhaps you could contact them to ask them how they did it.
In the meantime, if you know of a blogger who is already doing their blog in Flash, perhaps you could contact them to ask them how they did it.
Eh, Kristine beats me to it again.
kirstine: thank you, i'll check it out
almuhajabah: sorry
almuhajabah: sorry
Rule number one: Search then post
Rule number two: Be patient, especially if you're asking for something unusual
I didn't mean to bite off your head, but you'll find that if you follow the two rules I've listed here, you'll get better results from the forum.
Rule number two: Be patient, especially if you're asking for something unusual
I didn't mean to bite off your head, but you'll find that if you follow the two rules I've listed here, you'll get better results from the forum.
ok i've read all the links i can find on the matter and have learnt a lot! only thing is i've yet to see comments in flash???
That's what I was saying: your request is so unusual that it may be that no one here has done what you want to do.
Have you seen other blogs that are set up this way that you want to copy? Do you belong to any Flash developers forums?
If you can find out exactly what format the output from MT needs to be in for Flash to process it, we can try to help you create an output file that is in that format. But it's Flash developers not MT users who would know how to use the output file inside of a Flash movie. That's just way beyond the scope of the MT forums; it's a question of how Flash works.
Have you seen other blogs that are set up this way that you want to copy? Do you belong to any Flash developers forums?
If you can find out exactly what format the output from MT needs to be in for Flash to process it, we can try to help you create an output file that is in that format. But it's Flash developers not MT users who would know how to use the output file inside of a Flash movie. That's just way beyond the scope of the MT forums; it's a question of how Flash works.
Hello ~
I use the flashloaded.com Rss reader when I use Flash and MT together.
It doesn't work wonders, but it'll display your recent entries and that might be enough for you or not.
Good luck
Sue
I use the flashloaded.com Rss reader when I use Flash and MT together.
It doesn't work wonders, but it'll display your recent entries and that might be enough for you or not.
Good luck
Sue
almuhajabah;
as far as i know flash can parse any xml in an array (?) but don't quote me on that!
i have been posting in two flash forums (flashkit & were-here) and have asked the guys to review the standard xml files (index.xml, atom.xml and rsd.xml) to tell me what is usable, in terms of what i'd like it to displsay, well everything!
I'd like a template that outputs the post title, post content, date & time of post along with post author. I'd also like the comments count and link to the comments pop-up window.
i'd like the template for the archives to be outputed in xml
i'd alo like a template that just displays comments related to a post.
I'm not asking you to sort the flash stuff out, i'll have to sort that, but if you could offer advise and direction on setting up the above mentioned tamplates i would be very grateful.
much love X
as far as i know flash can parse any xml in an array (?) but don't quote me on that!
i have been posting in two flash forums (flashkit & were-here) and have asked the guys to review the standard xml files (index.xml, atom.xml and rsd.xml) to tell me what is usable, in terms of what i'd like it to displsay, well everything!
I'd like a template that outputs the post title, post content, date & time of post along with post author. I'd also like the comments count and link to the comments pop-up window.
i'd like the template for the archives to be outputed in xml
i'd alo like a template that just displays comments related to a post.
I'm not asking you to sort the flash stuff out, i'll have to sort that, but if you could offer advise and direction on setting up the above mentioned tamplates i would be very grateful.
much love X
QUOTE (agoni @ Mar 19 2004, 10:11 AM)
i have been posting in two flash forums (flashkit & were-here) and have asked the guys to review the standard xml files (index.xml, atom.xml and rsd.xml) to tell me what is usable, in terms of what i'd like it to displsay, well everything!
Were you able to get an answer from them on this? If one of the default templates would work, then we can modify it to include the other information.
Here are some various types of RSS feeds:
Full posts with comments
Comments only feed (another one)
Sitewide RSS feed
Category-specific RSS feed
Individual entry feeds, with comments
i've not got any feedback from the guys on the flash forums yet, but i will try these templates and see if they work in flash, thank you so much for your help. I'll update you when i know if they worked or not.
x
x
ok i've tried your full posts with comments feed, and this is the screen grab i get from flash MX04 sing a built in wizard which pulls the data it can and puts it in a data grid, from there i don't know what i'll do, but i'm sure the flash boards can help me with that one)
http://www.suckmyrazor.org/blog/screengrab.JPG
it doesn't have the comments link though, would this have to be a seperate node in the array?
http://www.suckmyrazor.org/blog/screengrab.JPG
it doesn't have the comments link though, would this have to be a seperate node in the array?
Here's an RSS feed that includes a comments link: philringnalda.com. I don't know if he's posted his template anywhere but it might be possible to work backwards from his outputted RSS feed.
ok i've looked at the template for the index.xml feed and it looks very complicated, i think i need it to be simple, i'm going to try and write it myself i think each post needs to be it's own array of nodes which only display the following info:
title
content
author
comments (just the line which says number of and post not the actual comments)
how would i go about doing this? i've no experiance with xml before, i take it there are special MT tags that would MT would parse when it outputs the file, what are these?
i think each post needs to be it's own array of nodes which only display the following info:title
content
author
comments (just the line which says number of and post not the actual comments)
how would i go about doing this? i've no experiance with xml before, i take it there are special MT tags that would MT would parse when it outputs the file, what are these?
ok i've created the template that i'm going to use (if it works with flash!, which it does with the data connection wizard but i'm going to be hard coding it in) the only other thing i can think of that i might need help with at this point is that the comments link is default to point to a html file, is there anyway of making this point to an xml file that i create? You see i'm going to use the link in a variable which will load the comments into a seperate movie clip in flash, but this again would have to be xml! so basically any file that MT outputs i have to be able to access an xml version which i can edit the template of!
phew, right i'm off to the flash boards to find out how i can access this data... THANKS GUYS XXX
oops by the way the file is here:
http://www.suckmyrazor.org/blog/flash.xml
phew, right i'm off to the flash boards to find out how i can access this data... THANKS GUYS XXX
oops by the way the file is here:
http://www.suckmyrazor.org/blog/flash.xml
It looks like your comment link is being generated inside of MT with something like:
Your default MT permalinks are pointing to HTML pages. If you want to keep that as a default but also have a XML page listing the comments, it seems like the best thing to do would be to modify the individual entry feed with comments to only show the comments or something.
On that page, Phil explains how to create an XML page for each entry:
After this, you could create a link to this page such as:
Put this in place of the link I mentioned at the start of this.
CODE
<$MTEntryPermalink$>#comments
Your default MT permalinks are pointing to HTML pages. If you want to keep that as a default but also have a XML page listing the comments, it seems like the best thing to do would be to modify the individual entry feed with comments to only show the comments or something.
On that page, Phil explains how to create an XML page for each entry:
QUOTE
Then, create a new archive template (Templates -> Create new archive template), name it something useful like Individual post RSS feed, paste in the template code above and save the template
Tell MT what sort of archive template it should be (Blog Config -> Archiving -> Add New...): Archive Type should be Individual, and the Template should be the one you just created
Tell MT how to name the new files: in the input area in the Archive File Template by your newly created entry, add <$MTEntryID pad="1"$>.xml so that the filename for your RSS feed for entry 666 (which has a filename like 000666.php or 000666.html) will be 000666.xml
Save your changes, and then Rebuild Individual Archives Only, and you should have RSS feeds for each entry and its comments. If it worked, and adding a new comment rebuilds the feed, you just need to add a link to the feed (in your individual entry template at least, possibly also in the comment popup template), and then sit back and enjoy the increase in comments once people discover that they can keep track of replies
Tell MT what sort of archive template it should be (Blog Config -> Archiving -> Add New...): Archive Type should be Individual, and the Template should be the one you just created
Tell MT how to name the new files: in the input area in the Archive File Template by your newly created entry, add <$MTEntryID pad="1"$>.xml so that the filename for your RSS feed for entry 666 (which has a filename like 000666.php or 000666.html) will be 000666.xml
Save your changes, and then Rebuild Individual Archives Only, and you should have RSS feeds for each entry and its comments. If it worked, and adding a new comment rebuilds the feed, you just need to add a link to the feed (in your individual entry template at least, possibly also in the comment popup template), and then sit back and enjoy the increase in comments once people discover that they can keep track of replies
After this, you could create a link to this page such as:
CODE
<$MTBlogArchiveURL$><$MTEntryID pad="1"$>.xml
Put this in place of the link I mentioned at the start of this.
ok so far i've got an index template to display the five most recent posts and the associated link to the individual archieve for that post...
http://www.suckmyrazor.org/blog/flash.xml
i've got the individual archieve posts template which displays the post and then the comments...
http://www.suckmyrazor.org/blog/archives/000003.xml
all i've left to do is an archieve page which outputs currentley archieved months (like the default side bar)
a monthly archieve page, listing title, description (limited to 15 words from the post) and the date of every post that month.
and i'm done! then i'll i've got to do is get my head round using this data in flash! but i'm getting there on that front. i'm so grateful to all of you guys for helping me. much love.
x
http://www.suckmyrazor.org/blog/flash.xml
i've got the individual archieve posts template which displays the post and then the comments...
http://www.suckmyrazor.org/blog/archives/000003.xml
all i've left to do is an archieve page which outputs currentley archieved months (like the default side bar)
a monthly archieve page, listing title, description (limited to 15 words from the post) and the date of every post that month.
and i'm done! then i'll i've got to do is get my head round using this data in flash! but i'm getting there on that front. i'm so grateful to all of you guys for helping me. much love.
x
Just wanted to add a couple more RSS templates I found.
The first is for trackbacks:
RSS feed for trackbacks
The second lists both comments and trackbacks and uses the SimpleComments plugin:
Combined comments/trackbacks RSS feed
The first is for trackbacks:
RSS feed for trackbacks
The second lists both comments and trackbacks and uses the SimpleComments plugin:
Combined comments/trackbacks RSS feed
I vote for you to make these rss templates a WikiEntry if its not already *whistles*
That's a good idea. Now I just need to get around to it... Feel free to do it yourself, all I did was search around for the templates, I didn't create any of them 
nyet, I'm too lazy, you do it! *hides*
plus, I didn't create any of them either ;p
plus, I didn't create any of them either ;p
i would be extremely interested if anyone can get mt to feed a flash document...
what is the call that brings in the data to the templates?
what is the call that brings in the data to the templates?
*** UPDATE ***
Just to let you all know that i have now successfully managed to do the following with flash & MT:
Display Blog Index
Display Comments
Post Comments (if allowed)
Display Archives
Display Catagories
Display Posted images in Flash (allthough when posting you have to edit the pop-up code)
Live update of posts and comments
Display total posts and comments (again live)
Blog via e-mail (still testing)
Blog via Mobile Phone (still testing)
And i have to admit it wasn't as difficult as i thought it would be; i will of course let you all see it when it is up and running, but i'm not getting a lot of time to work on at the moment as i'm going through a nasty legal battle with my employer so it might be a while....
Just to let you all know that i have now successfully managed to do the following with flash & MT:
Display Blog Index
Display Comments
Post Comments (if allowed)
Display Archives
Display Catagories
Display Posted images in Flash (allthough when posting you have to edit the pop-up code)
Live update of posts and comments
Display total posts and comments (again live)
Blog via e-mail (still testing)
Blog via Mobile Phone (still testing)
And i have to admit it wasn't as difficult as i thought it would be; i will of course let you all see it when it is up and running, but i'm not getting a lot of time to work on at the moment as i'm going through a nasty legal battle with my employer
so it might be a while....
that's great... i would like to see it. i would even more like to see how but that is up to you of course...
i just noticed that screentime.com has a desktop blog reader in flash... and that are giving the source... i just plugged in my xml url and it works... very basic but works. the fla is a little bit of spaghetti but i think i can sort it out to be reusable.
i just noticed that screentime.com has a desktop blog reader in flash... and that are giving the source... i just plugged in my xml url and it works... very basic but works. the fla is a little bit of spaghetti but i think i can sort it out to be reusable.
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