XCIII. Shockwave Flash functions

PHP offers the ability to create Shockwave Flash files via Paul Haeberli's libswf module. You can download libswf at . Once you have libswf all you need to do is to configure --with-swf[=DIR] where DIR is a location containing the directories include and lib. The include directory has to contain the swf.h file and the lib directory has to contain the libswf.a file. If you unpack the libswf distribution the two files will be in one directory. Consequently you will have to copy the files to the proper location manually.

Once you've successfully installed PHP with Shockwave Flash support you can then go about creating Shockwave files from PHP. You would be surprised at what you can do, take the following code:

Esimerkki 1. SWF example

<?php
swf_openfile ("test.swf", 256, 256, 30, 1, 1, 1);
swf_ortho2 (-100, 100, -100, 100);
swf_defineline (1, -70, 0, 70, 0, .2);
swf_definerect (4, 60, -10, 70, 0, 0);
swf_definerect (5, -60, 0, -70, 10, 0);
swf_addcolor (0, 0, 0, 0);

swf_definefont (10, "Mod");
swf_fontsize (5);
swf_fontslant (10);
swf_definetext (11, "This be Flash wit PHP!", 1);

swf_pushmatrix ();
swf_translate (-50, 80, 0);
swf_placeobject (11, 60);
swf_popmatrix ();

for ($i = 0; $i < 30; $i++) {
    $p = $i/(30-1);
    swf_pushmatrix ();
    swf_scale (1-($p*.9), 1, 1);
    swf_rotate (60*$p,  'z');
    swf_translate (20+20*$p, $p/1.5, 0);
    swf_rotate (270*$p,  'z');
    swf_addcolor ($p, 0, $p/1.2, -$p);
    swf_placeobject (1, 50);
    swf_placeobject (4, 50);
    swf_placeobject (5, 50);
    swf_popmatrix ();
    swf_showframe ();
}

for ($i = 0; $i < 30; $i++) {
    swf_removeobject (50);
    if (($i%4) == 0) {
        swf_showframe ();
    }
}

swf_startdoaction ();
swf_actionstop ();
swf_enddoaction ();

swf_closefile ();
?>

Huomaa: SWF support was added in PHP 4 RC2.
The libswf does not have support for Windows. The development of that library has been stopped, and the source is not available to port it to another systems.
For up to date SWF support take a look at the MING functions.

Sis�llys
swf_actiongeturl -- Get a URL from a Shockwave Flash movie
swf_actiongotoframe -- Play a frame and then stop
swf_actiongotolabel -- Display a frame with the specified label
swf_actionnextframe -- Go foward one frame
swf_actionplay -- Start playing the flash movie from the current frame
swf_actionprevframe -- Go backwards one frame
swf_actionsettarget -- Set the context for actions
swf_actionstop -- Stop playing the flash movie at the current frame
swf_actiontogglequality -- Toggle between low and high quality
swf_actionwaitforframe -- Skip actions if a frame has not been loaded
swf_addbuttonrecord -- Controls location, appearance and active area of the current button
swf_addcolor -- Set the global add color to the rgba value specified
swf_closefile -- Close the current Shockwave Flash file
swf_definebitmap -- Define a bitmap
swf_definefont -- Defines a font
swf_defineline -- Define a line
swf_definepoly -- Define a polygon
swf_definerect -- Define a rectangle
swf_definetext -- Define a text string
swf_endbutton -- End the definition of the current button
swf_enddoaction -- End the current action
swf_endshape -- Completes the definition of the current shape
swf_endsymbol -- End the definition of a symbol
swf_fontsize -- Change the font size
swf_fontslant -- Set the font slant
swf_fonttracking -- Set the current font tracking
swf_getbitmapinfo -- Get information about a bitmap
swf_getfontinfo -- The height in pixels of a capital A and a lowercase x
swf_getframe -- Get the frame number of the current frame
swf_labelframe -- Label the current frame
swf_lookat -- Define a viewing transformation
swf_modifyobject -- Modify an object
swf_mulcolor -- Sets the global multiply color to the rgba value specified
swf_nextid -- Returns the next free object id
swf_oncondition -- Describe a transition used to trigger an action list
swf_openfile -- Open a new Shockwave Flash file
swf_ortho -- Defines an orthographic mapping of user coordinates onto the current viewport
swf_ortho2 -- Defines 2D orthographic mapping of user coordinates onto the current viewport
swf_perspective -- Define a perspective projection transformation
swf_placeobject -- Place an object onto the screen
swf_polarview -- Define the viewer's position with polar coordinates
swf_popmatrix -- Restore a previous transformation matrix
swf_posround -- Enables or Disables the rounding of the translation when objects are placed or moved
swf_pushmatrix -- Push the current transformation matrix back unto the stack
swf_removeobject -- Remove an object
swf_rotate -- Rotate the current transformation
swf_scale -- Scale the current transformation
swf_setfont -- Change the current font
swf_setframe -- Switch to a specified frame
swf_shapearc -- Draw a circular arc
swf_shapecurveto -- Draw a quadratic bezier curve between two points
swf_shapecurveto3 -- Draw a cubic bezier curve
swf_shapefillbitmapclip -- Set current fill mode to clipped bitmap
swf_shapefillbitmaptile -- Set current fill mode to tiled bitmap
swf_shapefilloff -- Turns off filling
swf_shapefillsolid -- Set the current fill style to the specified color
swf_shapelinesolid -- Set the current line style
swf_shapelineto -- Draw a line
swf_shapemoveto -- Move the current position
swf_showframe -- Display the current frame
swf_startbutton -- Start the definition of a button
swf_startdoaction -- Start a description of an action list for the current frame
swf_startshape -- Start a complex shape
swf_startsymbol -- Define a symbol
swf_textwidth -- Get the width of a string
swf_translate -- Translate the current transformations
swf_viewport -- Select an area for future drawing

Fonts must be in the directory named "fonts". Lets see... if your code is in /www/swf.php4, you sould make a directory /www/fonts. If you use the example above, copy the files dist/fonts/Mod.f and dist/fonts/Mod.l of the source distribution to into /www/fonts/ to use the font Mod. I think you can use also SET_SWF_FONTS or similar

There are 2 prerequisites that must be met to run the test program: 1.) The directory where the test program resides in must be writeable to the PHP user (depending on installation either the apache user (module version of PHP4) or the script owner) 2.) The fonts directory from the swflib distribution must be in the same dir as the test script file so when the test file is foo/swftest.php the fonts dir should be foo/fonts/ containing Mod.f and Mod.l Otherwise you will get a segfault when executing the test program.

It would be instructive to explain the function of the example. It writes a swf file, it does not return it to a browser.

To get it to do what I expected it to do, I deleted the empty line 1, fixed line 2, made the directory writable, added the fonts, and added the line

Header("Location: test.swf");

just after the swf_closefile command.

Of course you don't really want to re-gererate the .swf file each time. And in most cases you want to add something like:

(HTML)(BODY) (EMBED src="test.swf" quality=high pluginspage=" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="256" height="256") (/EMBED) (/BODY)(/HTML)

With the correct brackets of course.

Writing on directory is not required. You can generate a run-time movie .. by replacing swf_openfile("<filename>", .... ) with swf_openfile("php://stdout", ....) and add before that an Header("Content-type: application/x-shockwave-flash")

As the installation guide said "Once you have mylib all you need to do is to configure --with-my[=DIR] where DIR is a location containing the directories include and lib. The include directory has to contain the my.h file and the lib directory has to contain the mylib.a file. " I untar the file and name the dir "swf" It locate at /usr/local/lib/swf The problem is .the "DIR" in configure --with-my[=DIR] should be what? I fill /usr/local/swf and it now work PS. the lib and include dir of php is /usr/local/lib/php/phplib/php and /usr/local/include/php or it shoud fill /usr/local in [=DIR] thanks alot

This works also! Write into the script: putenv ("SWFFONTPATH=/path_to_swf/fonts"); Maybe you can do the job with apache somehow, but it did't work for me. (With getenv it looked ok, but the swf failed to find the font) isu

First the distribution inflates to dist directory not swf. Second, just configuring PHP does this mean only do ./configure --with-swf=/usr/local/swf ? or does it mean go though the regular sequence? ./configure --with-swf=/usr/local/swf make make install And then switching to httpd directory and doing: make make install undefined reference to `swf_openfile'

Hot to make it right. I have a /kit/php4 folder I made a flash folder into that folder. Looks like /kit/php4/flash Here made 2 folders called lib and include /kit/php4/flash/include /kit/php4/flash/lib Copy libswf.a in lib folder and swf.h in include folder go to /kit/php4 folder and ./configure --with-swf=flash [--add your other configure params] make make install works great Note. In fact I have all unziped swf kit in /kit/php4/flash folder and I added the new 2 folder [lib and include]. Then copy specified files into them.

For those having problems with libswf fonts you can add a system wide variable to point to the fonts dir in your shell. In linux open up /etc/profile and add the lines : SWFFONTPATH=/path/to/fonts export SWFFONTPATH Please not all of that is case sensitive, so copy it carefully. Logout and log back in to see changes (should affect all users). Test it from the command line with echo $SWFFONTPATH For windows users you should be able to add SET SWFFONTPATH=/path/to/fonts in your autoexec.bat or autoexec.nt. Test it with echo %SWFFONTPATH% HTH! =)


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