Slideshowpro integration

[markhurd]

I am trying to get Slideshowpro set up in TL but can't get it working how I'd like.

The closest I've gotten so far is to add the JavaScript code directly to a template as discussed in their docs: http://wiki.slideshowpro.net/SSPsa/IS-Embedding. This gets the player working on the page, but any changes I make to param.xml don't take effect. In either case, I would prefer not to add it to the template since the player doesn't belong on every page that utilizes the template.

My next approach was using a Flash movie module, but I'm having trouble with the flashvars field. SSP requires JavaScript to set the initialURL parameter:

<script type="text/javascript">
	// SWFObject embed
	var flashvars = {
		paramXMLPath: "param.xml",
		initialURL: escape(document.location)
	}
*additional code removed*

Which obviously is not getting translated when TL outputs the markup. I noticed that modules/frontend/ModuleFlash automatically prepends a "URL" parameter but I tried adjusting this (temporarily! yes I know it's a kludge ) with no luck either.

There's also the matter of Safari and Firefox interpreting the path to param.xml differently but that's another story. :lol:

I think if I can figure out the flashvars field that should get me back on the right track. Any suggestions?

[ramjet]

Don't know about the Flash or Slideshowpro but.....
You can add javascript to the page head in the Page Layout (so without adjusting the template you could make a page layout, or several, for Slideshowpro pages).
Xml files get easily stuck in browser cache it seems to me, so after changes refresh the xml page with a direct browser call http://mysite/tl_files/whereverthexmllives.xml. This is probably why the xml has no effect.

I generally use Firefox set to dump all cache/history etc on close. This way simply closing and reopening the browser ensures I have a new copy (uncached) of any changed files.

[markhurd]

Thanks for the info ramjet!

In case anyone is interested, here's how I managed to work it out using the module approach (my preferred one).

Used the Flash version of SSP instead of the standalone version, which requires this to be inserted rather than what I listed in my first post:

<script type="text/javascript">
  var flashvars = {}
  var params = {
    base: "."
  }             
  var attributes = {}
  swfobject.embedSWF("test.swf", "flashcontent", "300", "120", "9.0.0", false, flashvars, params, attributes);
</script>

I wasn't able to figure out how to set the params array as shown above, which specifies the parent URL as the base href rather than the root of the site (which TL does automatically). Aside from that, TL's native Flash handler works ok for setting the rest of the parameters and flash vars.

As a result, I ended up placing my images.xml into the root of the site and manually adding

$GLOBALS['TL_CONFIG']['rootFiles'][] = 'images.xml';

to localconfig.php so it wouldn't be deleted automatically by TL.

[Ben]

Mark,

I've used SSP at www.mckessonclubphotos.com and a few other TL sites. As you mention, I just use a Flash movie module and enter FlashVars something like: "xmlfile=admin/images.php?gallery=2". I also use SSP Director, which I highly recommend unless you're only working with small galleries that never change.