Is it possible to link to external FLV files using a button?

[jackstrat]

I have a project with a two pages with buttons to access 30+ technical videos (FLV files). When I publish (as .exe), and click on the buttons, there is no response. I could swear this has worked in the past. The buttons action is Open URL or File, the URL specifies the external FLV file, and the FLVs are stored in the same folder as the project .exe...Should this work?

Is there a better way to do this?

I did test embedding the FLVs in the project, and it works (using the before mentioned buttons to access the appropriate video page), however, it increases the size of the project .exe beyond what is desirable...

Thanks

Jack L

Captivate 7

Windows 7 x32

[Justenuf2bdangerous · Accepted solution]

Jack:

I'm pretty sure the FLV is not supported by any type of player as a standalone video. I was never able to get an FLV to work unless it was embeded. The only linked video formats thaht have worked consistently for me have been .swf and .mp4.

Justenuf

[HimanshuSatija]

Hello Jack,

I am afraid that the video cannot be embeded in Captivate project .

Once you insert a video with any of the formats in Captivate the Adobe media encoder converts it to mp4 with proper codecs.

Yes it is required that if you publish to exe or swf or any other format , the external videos which are linked to the project must be saved in the same published folder.

Ideally they should be saved in published folder once you publish , but if in case you are don't see them over there please manually copy those files in published output.

Hope this answeres your query

Thanks

Himanshu

[Justenuf2bdangerous]

Actually Himanshu- the only type of video you can embed in a Captivate file is an FLV or F4V - Adobe Encoder (which opens whenever you publish a file in Captivate that includes video) will convert any video you embed into those formats . Jack was trying to link to a video included in his upload, but not embedded or included within the Captivate file. those links have to be to a .swf or .mp4

Justenuf

[jackstrat]

Thank you for your replies.

I ended up insert the 40 videos at the end of the project, then created buttons to access them. Looks and works great, but I really did not want to create all of those pages, etc.

But it works, everyone will be happy.

The odd thing is, I produced a course last year using similar FLV files using buttons to link to them externally and I could swear it worked. Would not have gone this long without a trouble report if it had not worked. However, today when I run that year-old course, the FLVs don't launch. Very strange indeed.

Thanks again

jack

[www_cpguru_com]

Perhaps you had the VLC Media Player or the Adobe Media Player (discontinued now) installed on your system at that time. Both these applications would have allowed you to view FLV videos directly.

[jackstrat]

Again, thanks for the replies. Justenuf understood exactly what I was trying to, and cpuguru, both were (and VLC is) installed. But I have learned for future projects, either embed the FLVs, or convert them. Would be nice to have the option to "embed" them, but still have the actual files reside external to the project. And then loaded when the learner access the page containing the video. But again, all is well that ends well, and I appreciate that you understood my issue.

Thanks again

jackL