Question

I have a music player swf embedded on an html page. Is there any way to have the music continuously play, even when the different html pages are loaded? When a link is clicked, the page is refreshed, also restarting the swf(music).

If the site was AJAX driven, this wouldn’t be a problem, but all my pages are static. I suppose I could put the entire body in an iframe, but there has to be a better option. I am certainly open to the idea of using ajax here, but I do not have much ajax experience. Any ideas?

Answer 1

Ajax is really not that hard to learn, use it.

If you reload another page or the same page with a normal link, you will lose your current status in your embedded player. So you either have to use a non-standard link-mechanism, separate your player from the page or save your current status on change of the page. Your options basically are:

• Use Ajax and never actually load a new page, but only new content (<- best solution, imho)
• Use the standard link mechanism, but do it in an iframe, the player runs in a parent page (I agree with you, that wouldn’t be nice)
• Load the player in a new Window, put it in the background or something. This might be better than the iframe-solution, but you might get some difficulties with popup-blockers. Remember to close your popup when the user leaves your page.
• Save the status of the player in a cookie whenever a link is clicked. On pageload check for the cookie and continue playing at the saved position. This will result in small breaks during playback and you need to be able to interact with the music player.