Where have I gone wrong?

kaitco

05-08-2006, 02:04 AM

No matter what I do, I cannot get the file to play from this page: http://xfiles.doriennesmith.com/seasonone.html. I have ensured that the file is uploaded to my server, and I have poured through the code numerous times, but I cannot figure out what I have done wrong.

Here is the code I am using:
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">

<html>

<head>
<link rel="shortcut icon" href="favicon.ico" />
<link rel="stylesheet" href="home.css"
type="text/css" />
<link rel="stylesheet" href="navbar.css"
type="text/css" />

<meta name="KEYWORDS" content="dorienne smith, calvin and hobbes, x-files, harry potter, fashion, entertainment, procrastination, games, mp3, rant, politics" />
<meta name="DESCRIPTION" content="Catch up on Fashion and Entertainment or simply procrastinate; featuring Calvin and Hobbes, The X-Files, and Harry Potter" />
<meta name="OWNER" content="kaitco@doriennesmith.com" />
<meta name="AUTHROR" content="Dorienne Smith" />
<meta http-equiv="CONTENT-LANGUAGE" content="English" />
<meta name="RATNG" content="General" />
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=windows-1252" />

<title>X-tras: Season One Episode - The X-Files -- Dorienne Smith.com</title>

<style type="text/css">
body {color: #ffffff; background-color: #000000; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;}
a.exe:link, a.exe:visited, a.exe:focus, a.exe:active {color: #ffffff;}
.title {font-size: 26px;text-align:center;}
.subtitle {font-size:20px;text-align:center;}
</style>

</head>

<body>
<p class="title">Season One Episode</p>
<p class="subtitle">Episode: Ice</p>
<p class="subtitle">Original Air Date: November 3, 1993 - <a class="exe" href="1.php#ice">Guide</a></p>

<div style="text-align:center;">
I know the problem is in the bold items somewhere...
<object id="player" name="player" width="320" height="240"
classid="CLSID:6BF52A52-394A-11d3-B153-00C04F79FAA6"
codebase="http://activex.microsoft.com/activex/controls/mplayer/en/nsmp2inf.cab#Version=5,1,52,701"
standby="Loading Microsoft Windows Media player components..." type="application/x-oleobject">
<param name="url" value="video/Ice.wmv" />
<param name="uiMode" value="full" />
<param name="autoStart" value="true" />
<param name="loop" value="false" />
<embed type="application/x-mplayer2"
pluginspage="http://microsoft.com/windows/mediaplayer/en/download/"
showcontrols="true" uimode="full" width="320" height="240"
src="video/Ice.wmv" autostart="true" loop="false"></embed></object>

</div>
<br />
<p>View this episode in <a class="exe" href="seasononefull.html">Full Screen</a></p>

</body>

</html>

I am writing the code using Frontpage and the file will load and play in the Frontpage viewer, but not when I look at the page in FF or the actual html document from the server. I know I have the file's source correct, because it would not play in Frontpage if I did not, but the fact that it will not play when I view the page from my hard drive tells me that something has gone wrong with my code.

My first thought was that the file was simply taking forever to load, but I cannot manage to get it to work from the document on my hard drive....

Whatever it is I am doing wrong, I know it is something small and ignorant and I just cannot see it. Can anyone help me with this?

_Aerospace_Eng_

05-08-2006, 02:59 AM

Does it play in IE? Recent updates of FF have cause the windows media player not to work in Firefox at least from what I've noticed. Could be my system. You might want to convert it to flash video. www.gotoandlearn.com is a good site to learn more about flash video and the riva flv encoder is free and decent to convert common movie files to flv format. I went to the url for the video directly and get a page not found error.

kaitco

05-08-2006, 03:11 AM

It will play on IE from my hard drive, but not from the server, which means it's probably a source issue, but I swear I uploaded everything correctly....

I have been automatically coding in FF for so long I hadn't even thought of looking in IE. I do need to learn flash, but is there a way to make the video play in FF for the time being?

drhowarddrfine

05-08-2006, 04:15 AM

You have 10 html errors, mostly related to this embedded music, so that must be the problem.

kaitco

05-08-2006, 04:49 AM

I know...the errors are all from the <embed> tag which is deprecated, but there is no other way to ensure that media files will play in all browsers without it; at least that is my understanding of it. I have used this (http://xfiles.doriennesmith.com) same type of code before and it works fine, it just will not validate with the <embed> tag. Thanks though...

Arbitrator

05-08-2006, 05:58 AM

In works for me in Firefox. The problem is that the latest version of Windows Media Player doesn't install the necessary DLL files for Firefox. I needed Windows Media Player to play videos on CNN.com awhile back so I tried doing a full install of the player and it still wasn't working. It's almost like Microsoft designed it that way... Anyway, enough with the conspiracy theories. Here's the resource I used:

http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?t=206213

The gist of it is that you need to download and add the following files to your Firefox plug-ins folder: npdrmv2.dll, npdsplay.dll, and npwmsdrm.dll. The files are all provided on that page. Obviously, having each person install the files will be impractical so that means you either have to give them instructions and/or accept that some people won't be able to hear the sound or use something like Flash.

kaitco

05-08-2006, 06:22 AM

Thanks Arbitrator! ...it looks like I'll have to break down and learn flash...

I went to the url for the video directly and get a page not found error.
I just now saw this: I have hotlink protection on all my images, sound and video files, so you should not be able to directly view the video. Also, the link you gave me was missing an "o," but I figured it out eventually: www.gotoandlearn.com (http://www.gotoandlearn.com) :thumbsup:

drhowarddrfine

05-08-2006, 12:32 PM

I've been using FF since 1.0 and currently use 1.5.0.2 and have never had problems using Windows Media Player in Firefox. Just now checked the CNN site and everything there plays fine, too.

Arbitrator

05-08-2006, 01:09 PM

Well I guess that makes you one of the lucky ones. :p

You're using the latest version (WMP 10)? I didn't have the problem on my old computer but that started out with WMP 9.

drhowarddrfine

05-08-2006, 03:24 PM

Yep. I'm also darn good and dashingly handsome.