SUITE: Can we play video during installation progress
A project manager asked me today if it is possible to run a video during the file transfer stage of the install. I answered yes ... probably prematurely, because I know I had seen this information somewhere in help. Well, I see that this is possible with InstallScript projects.
However, I cannot find information regarding playing videos during the installation progress for the Suite/Advanced UI progress or Basic MSI projects.
I do see that I can add a billboard to the progress dialog, so it appears InstallShield supports static images in the Suite project.
Is there a white paper giving suggestions or something I have missed in the documentation? What if I create an InstallScript function that executes PlayMedia to launch the video? Can I schedule this even to run synchronously with the transfer of files?
I wouldn't expect any UI-related functions of InstallScript to work in a Suite. However you should be able to embed Flash in a Suite, offering a flash video with a static image as a fallback, just by putting an image control on the InstallationProgress page. See Special Uses for the Image Control in Suite Installations for some more details. But you may want to double-check your target platforms. I just gave this a quick test, and I'm getting a blocked content notification. Once I allow it through it works, but we may have to fix something on our end...
Thank you for the reply and your comments about the InstallScript code is as I expected due to the restrictions on loading UI related items; but it never hurts to ask. 🙂
I downloaded a flash object and tested it and only got a black box when I tested. I may explore this a bit more but I am more inclined to just recommend static images that are sequenced through the install.
I think I figured out how to manage sequencing images thanks to the excellent documentation in this area. Hats off to the technical writing team!
EDIT: Note that my test that results in the black frame was using the billboard control. I just retested with an image control and get a white box with the the swf file name shown. I tried the test using a PDF file and it shows a white box with the file name as well. My dev machine on which I am testing has Adobe Reader X installed. I also tested an avi file on the outside chance it may work, the box does not even show then. I am going to try this using IS2014 as well to see if I get the same results.
EDIT2: I tested this in InstallShield 2014 as well and get the same behavior. Anything I select other than an image file only displays the file name rather than the file contents.
EDIT3: I finally got swf to work. I had to download the Flash player for Internet Explorer for it to work. I use Chrome and the sample shockwave flash file worked in Chrome, but it occurred to me that this functionality may be tied to Internet Explorer. The way I got it to work initially was creating an html page that loads an object that points to the swf file. After I got that to work I went back to just including the swf file and it is now working. So the key will be if Adobe Flash is installed for Internet Explorer.
