This test page uses the Google Custom Search API to retrieve and display the first Flash movies results for the given search term(s). PLEASE LIMIT YOUR SEARCHES, as we have set a cap of 1,000 queries/day.
Flash Movie Search
Some things to bear in mind:
- No paging functionality beyond the 9th result yet exists.
- The main aim so far is just to gauge the overall quality of results, speed of display, etc.
- The results from the Custom Search do not equal those from the normal Google interface. Something we’re going to have to live with.
This works! I know there is functionality yet to add (paging etc), and yes it’s a bit odd when you hit a few flash files with audio at the same time, I don’t know what you can do about that: perhaps /not/ play them automatically, but have a play button? But it’s fast enough, which was one worry that I had. Also, I guess there is still some work to do on limiting the sites or resources returned to be more engineering education specific, but it’s already not bad (bridge is a good search term for this since you get bridges in music and dentistry). A search for polymer works well, but polymer engineering brings up too many instances of ordinary websites that happen to be written using flash. The worst point that I can see is that I’m not convinced that the information displayed is enough–nothing that isn’t easily fixed.
Thanks Phil. One possible(???) solution would be for us to use a Flash ‘wrapper’ movie on our server which will then load in the remote files that Google finds. We might then be able to find a way of suppressing audio, whilst allowing any animation to play (as I think that gives a useful early indication as to the potential value of a resource). However, Flash does have a “protect from import” setting that may scupper this idea in its early stages.
As you say, meta- and paradata will tend to be thin on the ground – even titles are often missing. Of course we’ll have lots of willing and able helpers to fill in this missing info (and hence help populate Learning Registry) through our UI.
I agree – it seems to work. I was not sure how to get back after viewing a clip.
Thanks Peter,
For this (temporary) test page, the Flash movie opens in the same window/tab, so it requires the browser back button to get back. This is actually bad design on our part, as it will then initiate another precious call to the Google Custom Search – I’ll therefore change it to open in a new window.
In due course, the links on this page will actually open a detail page (see our earlier blog on wireframe UI design).
A major overhaul of this page today: the Flash movies from the source (remote) sites are now loaded into a ‘wrapper‘ Flash movie sitting on our server. This wrapper then:
(i) Re-sizes the source movie to fit the thumbnail dimensions,
(ii) Mutes any audio; this removes the potential for many Flash movies plating audio at the same time.
(iii) overlays an invisible “button” which, when clicked, opens the movie in its source location (and in a new tab/window).
This improvement now means that ALL our thumbnails can behave in the same way; up until now the Flash movies behaved differently to images, video and presentations, as they were unclickable.
Thanks, Andy, works really well!
Now we do not have an “open in a new window” button, we can just apply hyperlinks to all thumbnails (including Flash).
Good stuff Andy, seemed to work for me.
Whilst the large majority of Flash movies are displaying properly as thumbnails, there are a couple of reasons why some might not: