Troubleshooting sporatic Sound problem

programming flash
1

Please help, I’m very clueless at this point.

Here is the background:
Published in Flash 5.
Simple interface—5 buttons index, help, previous, replay & next.

Preloader (one frame)
script:
if (_framesloaded>=_totalframes) {
gotoAndPlay (2);
} else {
gotoAndPlay (1);
}

Audio files are aif’s.
Audio is set to stream.

Project has minimal action script—very minimal!
Did not use load & unload movie, (because no one could offer me an idea as to how to make my navigation work the way it needed to, as the next back & replay buttons cannot come up until the last frame of the screen. I am doing learning modules for an LMS syste, & it is a client requirement that the student has to listen to the entire audio prior to hitting the next button.
Therefore my project is set up to run this way.
Clip 1 - layer 1 page elements.
attached script
onClipEvent(enterframe){
if(this._currentframe==this._totalframes){
_root.clip3.gotoAndPlay(2);
}
}

Clip 2 - layer 2 interface & help & index button.
Clip 3 - Next, back & replay button. Which are set up to run when clip one is complete.

Although this doesn’t utilize the most conventional way of running flash. It gets the needs of the project…for the most part.
So I am not so sure that this is the problem that I need to address.
Locally this runs flawlessly. HOWEVER

I seem to have a sporatic problem with the replay button.
Sometimes it works…sometimes it doesn’t. It was tested on the server yesterday & the person testing had to leave her desk & then came back & hit replay & the replay button worked But I had no sound?

On replay button I have this script:
on (release) {
_root.clip1.gotoAndPlay(1);
}

What would cause this sound issue?

If it plays the first time why not the second…& third & fourth?

Is there somethng I am missing somewhere in the mix?
Is there actionscript that would make my file less sporatic?
I was doing some reading online & was reading about a dude that had issues with streaming & a very secure firewall. I know for a fact that our client has a very secure server —could this possibly be a problem???

I don’t want to pin my problem somewhere else if I need to do something differently. We have been testing this for several months trying to find the most optimal way to meet the needs
of our client.

I don’t like the taste of eating crow which is what I will have to do if I have overlooked something essential.

Right now though I’m desperate for a definitive answer.
Since sound seems to be the sporatic problem where does a designer go from here?

Any thoughts or suggestions would be very much appreciated!

Janet

2

umm can you post a fla so I can take a look? I doubt its a firewall though it is possible. You could turn off streaming if that is an option. I think your problem lies in the fact that streaming sounds are much harder to control. streaming sounds arent saved in the memory on the local computer, they exist only in virtual memory and are more difficult to control. If the sound is streaming, put a call to restream it in the second frame and see what that does. I would reccoment making in not stream though.

3

Thank you.
Unfortunately, “Boss” won’t let me upload files anywhere. I will fiddle with an example file of what I am working with & basically how it is laid out so you can see what I am doing.

One solid note though, I published it & threw it onto Geocities server to test it. I figure if it works on a slow server it should work elsewhere. It ran slow & loaded slow but played by the book. Why I can play it online & not on a secure server is a mystery to me.

We are leaning towards it may be an LMS issue. Since yesterday we had sound problems & today we navigation issues (navigation didn’t even come up!)

4

are these 3 CLIPs lie on the same timeline? i mean do they exist on the frame where your CLIP 3 is placed?

…for clarification, did you say it all work out well when played locally?

…this is a shot in the dark, yea it’s better you post a sample fla so we can take a closer look and grandsp5 said…

5

ok here goes, attached is an example file of how my pages or laid out. The only thing different is size, actual streamed audio which is streamed to sync with the many transitions throughout the module. Also as I have said earlier I am using a one frame preloader (the script came from the one of many tutorials on this website) Everything else starts at frame 2. Throughout our module there is nothing extremely fancy. Minimal scripting used because

  1. I have minimal knowledge of action script (my supervisor is not an action script expert either.)
  2. My supervisor & I decided to keep it as simplistic as possible.

Just the facts as needed & action script I’m basically learning in bits & pieces.

I am self taught in Flash. Most anything I have learned I have researched or did trial & error method…or I have picked the brain of one of the many Flash experts online.

several months of research has gone into this looking for the most effective & efficient way to do what needs to be done.

Files run fine locally forwards, replay, back all navigation works flawlessly. Files run ok even tossed onto a slow server.

Why they are weirding out on the company server is beyond my wildest nightmare. (I must tell you at this point that up until a few months ago everything was done in Director 8. Director runs ok on the client server—We switched to Flash because it is AICC compliant & it provides the ability to track pages on an LMS system.)

If anyone can think of anything that might help run our stuff more efficiently. Please let me know.

Thank you for your time & patience.
Janet