Question

I’m hoping to get pointed in the right direction here. The problem I’m having is trying to figure out how to read an HTML created cookie in Flash. I have a video player that should autoplay once in a 24hour period, the next day it should autoplay again for the end-user.

This is what the script on the HTML page looks like that displays the Flash player and the cookie:

<script type="text/javascript">
var so = new SWFObject("flvplayer.swf", "mymovie", "640", "394", "8", "#90ab69");
var x = readCookie('homepageIntro') // <- The Cookie (How do I read this in Flash?)
so.addParam("quality", "high");
so.addParam("wmode", "transparent");
so.useExpressInstall('expressinstall.swf');
so.addVariable("autostart", "false");
so.addVariable("file", "video.flv");
so.addVariable("key", "");
so.addVariable("showfsbutton", "false");
so.addVariable("noControls", "false");
so.addVariable("home", "true");
so.write("flashcontent");
</script>

Not knowing how to read that var x inside of Flash, I tried to get around having to use it by using a Flash cookie, however now the video player will only ever autoplay once and never ever autoplay again(unable to clear the Flash cookie).

public function sharedObjectCheck():void
{
    if (mySharedObject.data.flashCookie == "true"){
        //Code to NOT autoplay video
    } else if (mySharedObject.data.flashCookie == null){
        mySharedObject.data.flashCookie = "true"; //if first time, set the cookie value
        mySharedObject.flush(); //add the cookie
    }
}

I did some searching and found this Have a HTML page play Flash movie only once (not when revisited…) but again this is just a Flash function which never allows for a restart in a certain time period.

So my question to my fellow Flash stackers is how do I read that var x(cookie) in Flash?

Answer 1

A direct answer to your question is to use ExternalInterface

import flash.external.*

try {
  var cookie : String = ExternalInterface.call("readCookie", "homepageIntro") as String;
} catch (error : SecurityError) {
  trace("SecurityError:", e.message);
} catch (error : Error) {
  trace("Error:", e.message);
}

You likely also need to set allowScriptAccess to let the call run.

Using a LSO is probably your best option, or passing in the value of x as a FlashVar.