It was back in March that many were warned of the threat or problematic occurence of the new update. Maybe it wasn’t so bad back then because it was few months ago and there wasn’t so much to worry. Not to mention the implementation or affects of it was actually taken for granted.
And I for one didn’t expect it to be so much of a problem. I’m not sure all of you have heard or read this before but when embedding Flash, there’s a lot of fugly code to deal with. You’ve got the OBJECT, PARAM and EMBED tags. The more important of the 3 are the OBJECT and EMBED for Internet Explorer.
A List Apart (ALA) came up with a cleaner and meaner code that can be used in modern browsers and stone age, Internet Explorer. The code not only was less texting on your files but it also validated your website! And when we say validate, we’re talking about setting the standards of the W3C.
Alas all is now in chaos as the new Internet Explorer update kills Flash using the ALA method. The only method that survives this update now is the fugly code. I’ve prepared a small test for anyone who wants to view the difference in Firefox and Internet Explorer.
It’s a simple comparison of implementing Flash with fugly code and the other with the neat ALA method. If both of it loads fine to you in Internet Explorer, it could mean a few things:
- You haven’t updated the browser.
- There’s a weird bug in the latest update. (I got this too.)
There’s nothing really to panic about because there exists solutions ever since this update was brought out by the team at Baekdal.com. The solutios on the other hand to us will be used as a last resort in resolving this issue.
The current solutions available:
- ActivateActiveX by ripper rhetoric (last reported with problems)
- SWFObject by deconcept (requires JavaScript ‘hacking’)
- Microsoft solution (forcing ActiveX with JavaScript)
- Use fugly code. (it works at a price)
So if you’ve clients or friends telling you that your Flash isn’t playing properly in Internet Explorer, use the mini Flash test and find out if the new Internet Explorer update killed your compliant to standards code.
p/s: The Flash has been set to Stream so you’ll need to give it a minute or two before being able to play the movie. Sorry about that.