TalkingSoft.com Forums: Adobe (Macromedia) Flash in K-Lite MegaCodec MPC - TalkingSoft.com Forums

This message does not ask a question, but if any of its information is wrong, or if I have misinterpreted it, I would very much appreciate any corrections.


With Media Player Classic (6.4.9.0 revision 611) and K-Lite MegaCodecs (1.55) installed, Media Player Classic's formats list includes a "Flash Video File" and a "Shockwave Flash File."

With that installation, but with Apple's (Macromedia) Flash not installed, Apple's (Macromedia) Flash VersionCheck site, at http://www.adobe.com/products/flash/about/,
reports the following:

"You have version 7,0,19,0 installed."
For "Legacy" software (Windows 95, Windows NT) that same site lists an available later version, 7,0,63,0.
For "Windows" (apparently Windows 98, 2000 and XP), the available later version is 9,0,16,0.

So K-Lite's Flash version is quite far behind. And that explains these rather mixed results from testing K-Lite's Flash:

The following Macromedia Flash test pages (visited with only Media Player Classic and K-Lite Codecs installed, and with Windows Media Player disabled (by having all its formats assigned to MPC), reported that Macromedia Flash did work on their sites (the tests were that some nonstationary images displayed properly):
http://www.timestrip.com/
http://www.ncrel.org/info/faq/flashtst.htm

Adobe's own test site recognized the player as installed, but it described the test object as a "movie" and it was stationary:
http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/knowledgebase...cfm?id=tn_15507

One site reported that Macromedia flash was installed, but that it was not the current version:
http://www.ronniewood.com/ronnie_alternate.html

The following test site indicated that Macromedia flash was not installed, because a "picture," probably a short movie, was supposed to display but did not do so (although that could have been a broken link since the page was more than a year old):
http://shutterblog.blogspot.com/2004/06/ma...flash-test.html


The bottom line appears to be that at least for now, I probably will need to keep Adobe Flash installed.

Roger Folsom

Media Player Classic has the ability to set file associations. A file association is nothing more than opening a specific filetype in a specific program.

The K-Lite Mega Codec Pack does NOT contain Flash. The old Flash version that you found on your computer comes pre-installed with Internet Explorer.

Setting Media Player Classic as the default player for a specific filetype has absolutely NO effect on how that same filetype is played inside a browser. Media files that are embedded in a webpage are played with special browser plugins, not with external players.

Thank you very much for that information. My understanding now is that your first paragraph means that the in Media Player Classic's formats list, the checkboxes for "Flash video file" and "Shockwave Flash Video File" simply associated Media Player Classic as the player for the old Flash version that came with Internet Explorer. Correct?

So I guess that the timestrip and ncrel websites that displayed properly in my SeaMonkey browser must have found and used the old Internet Explorer plugins (wherever they are), since there is no Flash plugin in SeaMonkey's plugins folder.

Although my reasoning was totally confused and wrong, at least my bottom line conclusion was correct: I'll have to install Adobe Flash (which won't be a great hardship....).

Roger Folsom

Playing Flash video (FLV) is done by internal filters in MPC plus the help of ffdshow.

Shockwave files are played using the plugin from Internet Explorer.

Now I'm thoroughly confused. (I mean that literally. I'm not arguing.) In an earlier message, you said "The K-Lite Mega Codec Pack does NOT contain Flash. The old Flash version that you found on your computer comes pre-installed with Internet Explorer."

Is there a difference between "playing Flash video" and "containing flash"?

I installed MPC and ffdshow when I installed the K-Lite MegaCodecs pack 1.55. Maybe we are talking about different MegaCodecs packs?

I need Flash capability (from wherever) to steam Flash content located on websites, not to play local flash files on my own computer. Is my conclusion that I need to install Adobe Flash, because MPC (and ffdshow) won't do what I want with regard to Flash content, still correct?

I don't use MSIE except for Windows Updates. Instead, I use the SeaMonkey browser (the latest incarnation of the Mozilla Suite).

In any case, at least for right now, I haven't needed to play anything using Shockwave (Flash I've needed, Shockwave I haven't needed), so I'm not worried about it.

Roger Folsom

Flash video (.flv) is just a bit different from regular Flash files (.swf).

MPC is capable of playing the video that is contained in a Flash video file. It does not need nor use any Flash plugins to do so.

I conclude that Flash files that do not require a plugin (and I guess also make no use of a browser, and perhaps must be local files to play?) use the .flv extension, while flash files that do require a browser-with-a-plugin use the swf extension.

I conclude further that MPC (regardless of what K-Lite package may also be installed) cannot play swf files --- or at least, cannot play swf files located on the internet, because they require a browser Flash plug-in from Adobe. Consequently, I need an Adobe Flash plugin.

Correct? Or, at least am I getting any closer to understanding this? <frustrated grin>

Roger Folsom

Correct.

Everything that you play in your browser requires a browser plugin. Flash video is played in the browser using the Flash plugin. The browser plugin will download the file into your browser's cache and play it inside a webpage.

Thank you!