User Guide

Getting Started

To access CineSound, go to Tools->CineSound AV in the osCommerce admin component.

Initially, you will see a message to the effect that you haven't created any audio or video units yet. Once you have created one or more unit, the CineSound 'home page' will contain a table of all your previousy created a/v units. This existing units table is explained below. The first thing to do is define some global settings.

Before you visit the Global Settings section and decide what the default behaviour of the system will be, you must consider which media players you will offer your users. This decision will be based mainly on the extent of your own time and server resources.

It is impossible to know in advance which player plugins a user has installed in their browser. So for example, Internet Explorer (IE) users may well have the Windows Media Player (WMP) plugin, but catering only for WMP would mean losing users of the Apple Mac's Safari browser. CineSound supports the 4 most popular players on the market, so if you wanted to offer all 4 players to a user's browser you would be virtually guaranteed that the media would be played in one form or another. However, that would mean that you may have to upload 4 different versions (file types) of each clip in order to optimize playback, and this could consume a lot of your time and/or server space.

Once you have created one or more a/v units, you will see the existing units table, which contains a summary of the information you entered when you created the unit(s):

• Clip Name - The CineSound name for this clip.
• Files - This field can contain up to 4 filenames which are associated with the clip unit. Each filename is associated with a specific player.
• Description - An optional brief description of the clip unit to help you keep track of it.
• Position - The selected position the clip will appear in within your site.
• URL Substring - The URL substrings(s) which must appear in the playback page's URL in order for the clip to be rendered.
• Active - Shows if the clip is avaiable for playback or not.
• Edit - Click on the icon to adjust the settings for this clip unit.
• [Trashcan] - Check the box and click 'delete' below to erase this clip unit.

Global Settings

• Use Players - Check the box(es) corresponding to the media players you would like to embed in your web pages. Player-specific settings are accessible from here also.
• Player Width - The width in pixels of the player area.
• Player Height - The height in pixels of the player area.
• Auto Play - This setting determines if clips will begin playing immediately when the player loads, or if the user has to start playback manually.
• Loop - Decide if your sound/movie clips will stop after one play, or loop continuously.
• Show Controls - Choose if you would like users to be able to manipulate the playback of the audio/video clips. Please note that to access the Flash player controls, users must right-click on the movie clip.
• Caption Position - Captions can appear above or below a clip, or can be hidden entirely by selecting 'None'.
• Caption - Enter the caption you wish to appear in the position specified in 'Caption Position'. If 'Caption Position' is set to 'None', this value will not be displayed.

Creating New Clips

• Clip Name - This is the name of the clip which CineSound will use for reference. It will not be shown anywhere in the store-side web pages.
• Active Files - Here you will see a list of the players which you have selected to use via the Global Settings section. You can upload audio/video files that you wish to be played by each player that you may find on the user's browser. Please take care to ensure that you upload the correct filetype for each individual player otherwise the clip won't be payed. You can see a table detailing which players play which types of file in the Appendix. If any files have previously been uploaded for any of the players, you will see the existing filename greyed out. You can overwrite an existing file by uploading a new one in its place.
• Active - Should be set to 'Yes' in order to display the clip. Can be set to 'No' if you want to temporarily disable the clip.
• Description - This is an optional brief description of the clip for your convenience, to help you keep track of it. This description is not used anywhere else in the CineSound system.
• URL Substrings - This is how you designate which page(s) the clip will appear in. Enter a part of the URL of the page in which you want the clip to appear in. Examples include:
  • index.php - Home Page
  • product_info - All product information pages
  • 36 - Product information page for product with id number 36
  URL Substrings will also work for Search Engine Optimized URL's. Multiple URL Substrings can be assigned for display in a wider range of pages. Multiple URL Substrings should be separated by a comma. (minimum 2 characters).
• Position - Choose a position where the unit will be displayed within the page. New positions can be created using the Position Manager.

1. It is Active.
2. It is linked to a successfully deployed position within the webpage.
3. One of its URL substrings appears in the URL of the webpage.
4. The browser has one of the plugins which you have chosen in the Global Settings section and uploaded a suitable file for.

• Player Width - Set the width of the playback area here (in pixels).
• Player Height - Set the height of the playback area here (in pixels).
• Show Controls - Choose if you would like users to be able to manipulate the playback of the audio/video clip. Please note that to access the Flash player controls, users must right-click on the movie clip.
• Hidden - You should only select 'Yes' for this setting if you wish to play an audio clip as background ambience for your webpage.
• Auto Play - This setting determines if the clip will begin playing immediately when the player loads, or if the user has to click on it for playback.
• Loop - Decide if your sound/movie clip will stop after one play, or loop continuously.
• Caption Position - Captions can appear above or below a clip, or can be hidden entirely by selecting 'None'.
• Caption - Enter the caption you wish to appear in the position specified in 'Caption Position'. If 'Caption Position' is set to 'None', this value will not be displayed.

Position Management

The position manager allows you to create, monitor and delete positions in CineSound. Positions are places within your web pages where you would like to display CineSound AV units. Multiple clips can be assigned to a single position. The position manager is split into two parts:

Current Positions - This section displays a list of currently available positions. The coloumns in this list are:

• Name - The name of the position. This will be referenced when linking clips to this position.
• Deployed - The CineSound system will detect if the position has been correctly placed within your webpage. If after having placed your position code in your webpage and opening that page in your browser this setting remains on 'No', then your position code has not been placed correctly. Please try to place it elsewhere in your page and try again.
• Linked - This will be set to 'Yes' if any audio/video clip has referenced this position.
• Get Code - Clicking this icon will display the PHP code which must be placed in the webpage where you require the position to be.
• [trashcan icon] - Check the box for the position you wish to delete and click 'Delete'. Only positions which are not currently linked to a content unit can be deleted.

New Positions - Creating a new position requires only two steps:

1. Name the Position - Enter the name of the new position and click 'Save Position'. This will be the name referenced when linking clips to this position.
2. Deploy the Position Code - Once you have entered the name and saved it, you will see the position listed in the 'Current Positions' section. Click on the 'Get Code' icon for this position and you will be presented with some PHP code which you should copy and paste directly into your webpage at the point where you want the content associated with this position to appear. Take care not to place this code in areas where it might not easily be read, for example within 'if' clauses. Also, pay attention to the surrounding HTML. You may need to enclose your position code within <tr> or <td> tags. Feel free to experiment with positions until you find the correct place. The new position will now become available when creating or editing CineSound clips. Click 'Cancel' to return to the CineSound AV home page.

Player-Specific Settings

Windows Media Player

• Animation At Start - Sets if a Windows Media Player animation should show whilst the clip loads. This should only be used for larger clips which may take longer to load.
• Auto Rewind - If set to 'Yes', the clip will play to the end and then reset itself in the start position before stopping.
• Click To Play - Decide if the user should click inside the play area before the clip is played.
• Show Audio Controls - Sets if the audio controls should show. Will only work if 'Show Controls' is set to 'Yes' in the Global or Clip-level settings.
• Show Display - Sets if the display detailing the filename and playlist should show.
• Show Goto Bar - Sets if the GotoBar should show. Works only with older versions of WMP.
• Show Position Controls - Sets if position controls such as rewind and fast forward are displayed.
• Show Status Bar - Sets if the status bar, which shows fiel activity and playing time elapsed, should show.
• Stretch To Fit - Sets if the video should be stretched to fit the entire playback area. Only availabe for certain versions of WMP.
• Transparant At Start - Sets if the playing area remains invisible until playback begins, or not.
• Volume - Sets the volume of the audio stream. Values can range from 0 (lowest) to 100 (highest).

QuickTime

• Auto HREF - When set to 'Yes', the URL specified in the HREF parameter (below) will load immediately in a new window, without waiting for a mouse click.
• Background Color - This should be a 6-character hexadecimal value representing the color which will fill any space in the playback area which is not taken up by the video clip. This is useful for blending your clip in with the background color of your webpage.
• HREF - This should be a URL beginning with 'http://'. It can be a webpage or a video/audio file. If the 'Auto-HREF' setting (above) is set to 'No', this URL will open in a new window only when the user clicks on the video playback area.
• Kiosk Mode - When set to 'Yes', the plug-in does not include its pop-up menu in the movie controller, so users will not be able to access the player menu by right-clicking on the playback area. Also, kiosk mode does not allow drag and drop for saving the movie.
• Play Every Frame - When set, this attribute causes the movie to play every frame of the movie even if it is necessary to play at a slower rate to do so. This attribute is particularly useful to play simple animations.
• Show QT Logo - If set to 'Yes', the QuickTime logo will be displayed in the playback area until the movie begins.
• Scale - The 'x1' setting displays the true size of the clip as it was created. The 'x2' and 'x3' settings magnify the movie 2 and 3 times respectively. If set to 'To Fit', the movie is scaled to fit the playback area. If this is set to 'Aspect', the movie will scale to fit the playback area while maintaining its aspect ratio.
• Target - Usually set to 'None'. If set to 'Myself' the QuickTime Plug-in will replace the movie you uploaded using CineSound with the movie specified in the HREF setting (above) when a user clicks on the movie. If set to 'QuickTime Player', the movie specified in the HREF setting wil be opened using the full QuickTime Player Application.
• Volume - Sets the volume of the audio stream. Values should range from 0 (lowest) to 100 (highest).

Real Player

• Number of Loops - Enter the number of time the clip will loop before coming to a stop. This setting is only relevent if the 'Loop' setting in the Global or Clip-level settings is set to 'No'.
• Background Color - This should be a 6-character hexadecimal value representing the color which will fill any space in the playback area which is not taken up by the video clip.
• Center - If set to 'No', the clip will fill the entire playback area. If you set to 'Yes', the clip wil be centered within the playback area and displayed at its encoded size.
• Maintain Aspect - This setting determines whether the clip's height-to-width ratio stays constant when the clip scales to fit the playback area.
• No Logo - When set to 'Yes', the Real logo will not be displayed in the playback area. When there are no clips playing, only the specified background color will show in the window.

Flash Player

• Align - 'Center' centers the movie in the browser window and crops edges if the browser window is smaller than the movie. 'Left', 'Right', 'Top' and 'Bottom' align the movie along the corresponding edge of the browser window and crop the remaining three sides as needed.
• Background Color - This should be a 6-character hexadecimal value representing the color which will fill any space in the playback area which is not taken up by the video clip.
• Playback Quality - 'Low' favors playback speed over appearance and never uses anti-aliasing. 'Auto Low' emphasizes speed at first but improves appearance whenever possible. Playback begins with anti-aliasing turned off. If the Flash Player detects that the processor can handle it, anti-aliasing is turned on. 'Auto High' emphasizes playback speed and appearance equally at first but sacrifices appearance for playback speed if necessary. Playback begins with anti-aliasing turned on. If the actual frame rate drops below the specified frame rate, anti-aliasing is turned off to improve playback speed. Use this setting to emulate the View > Antialias setting in Flash. 'Medium' applies some anti-aliasing and does not smooth bitmaps. It produces a better quality than the Low setting, but lower quality than the High setting. 'High' favors appearance over playback speed and always applies anti-aliasing. If the movie does not contain animation, bitmaps are smoothed; if the movie has animation, bitmaps are not smoothed. 'Best' provides the best display quality and does not consider playback speed. All output is anti-aliased and all bitmaps are smoothed.
• Scale - 'Show All' makes the entire movie visible in the specified area without distortion, while maintaining the original aspect ratio of the movie. Borders may appear on two sides of the movie. 'No Order' scales the movie to fill the specified area, without distortion but possibly with some cropping, while maintaining the original aspect ratio of the movie. 'Exact Fit' makes the entire movie visible in the specified area without trying to preserve the original aspect ratio. Distortion may occur.
• S-Align - 'Left', 'Right', 'Top' and 'Bottom' align the movie along the left, right, top or bottom edge, respectively, of the browser window and crop the remaining three sides as needed. 'Top Left' and 'Top Right' align the movie to the top left and top right corner, respectively, of the browser window and crop the bottom and remaining right or left side as needed. 'Bottom Left' and 'Bottom Right' align the movie to the bottom left and bottom right corner, respectively, of the browser window and crop the top and remaining right or left side as needed.
• Window Mode - Sets the Window Mode property of the Flash movie for transparency, layering, and positioning in the browser. 'Window' - movie plays in its own rectangular window on a web page. 'Opaque' - the movie hides everything on the page behind it. 'Transparent' - the background of the HTML page shows through all transparent portions of the movie, this may slow animation performance.

Further Support

Please remember to send us your versions of PHP, MySQL and osCommerce when sending a support query.

Appendix

Supported File Types Per Player Plugin

Player Plugins Per Browser

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