How I Add Macromedia Flash Files to My Blog

Macromedia Flash is pretty neat because it allows you to display a series of images in the space of one image on your blog. You shouldn’t be concerned about whether a visitor to your site has the Flash program installed because it is so widely used that most people already have it installed. I have discovered that OpenOffice can export presentations and drawings to the Macromedia Flash format (.swf). OpenOffice is freeware that imitates Microsoft Office. I haven’t actually tried it yet but the ability to create a Flash file from a program similar to Power Point appeals to me. Another freeware program that looks interesting but I have not tried is Powerbullet Presenter. It provides a way to create a Flash presentation from pictures and sound files. The Flash files I create are produced by Wink which I have reviewed elsewhere on my site. Since most of the Flash files I create are wider than what will fit in my blog, I created a whole new blog where I edited the template. I call it a supplemental blog. I used my supplemental blog for this posting. You might notice that it does not have my profile or archives on it. If your Flash file is narrow enough to fit on the main page of your blog, you can simply copy the html code below and insert it into a posting like any image. Otherwise, you can follow my procedure below.

1. Create a new blog.
2. Open the template of the new blog and delete everything that is there.
3. Click here to access a copy of my template. Highlight the text starting from just below the title and highlight everything down to end of the post (stop just before where it says “posted by George”). Then copy the text and paste it into the template of your new blog. Save changes to your template and then republish it.
4. I created three images to support the supplemental blog. The links to them are displayed in blue text. You may want to make back up copies of these images in case my free image host stops working.
5. Add your Flash file (.swf) to a free hosting site.
6. Create a new post in your supplemental blog and click on the “Edit html” option.
7. Add the following html code to the posting:

<EMBED SRC="http://www.myimagestore.info/upload/images/OrE71537.swf" WIDTH=659 HEIGHT=526 quality=low loop=false TYPE="application/x-shockwave-flash" PLUGINSPAGE="http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/index.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash"></EMBED>

The blue text is the location of your Flash file that is provided by the hosting site. The red test is the width and height of your Flash file.

8. Go back to the screen where you edit your posting. Note that to the right of the blue “Edit” button, there is an option that says “View” and to the right of that is another option that says “Delete”. Click on the “View” option. Your Flash file should be displayed.
9. A web address should be displayed that is unique to the posting. Copy the web address.
10. If you want to add a button that a visitor clicks on to open your flash file, paste the web address into the blue portion of the following html code:

<a href="http://georgesfreeware.blogspot.com/2005/02/wink.html"><img src="http://img114.exs.cx/img114/2198/upclickheretoseedemo6cp.jpg"></a>

The red text is the location of the image for your button. GRSites.com has a very good button maker. You can up load the button image to the Flickr free image hosting site and then paste the link to the button image in the red text above.

11. Add the above html code to the “Edit html” option of a posting on your main blog.

12. If you don’t want to use a button, you can simply insert a link to it in the body of your posting on your main page. Click here to access step by step directions on how to insert web links into Microsoft Word which you can then copy and paste into your blog.

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Return to Part 2, Adding Images to Your Blog