RE: [Axiom-developer] documentation

[Page, Bill]

On Thursday, October 27, 2005 9:07 AM C Y wrote:

> ... 
> Hmm - I'm getting the initial screen, but then when I press
> next I get a black screen.  Maybe my work machine's flash
> install is too old?

According to the Wink web site: http://www.debugmode.com/wink

"Generated flash file plays in Flash players from version 3
and above ... "

Which of the other screencasts work for you?

http://page.axiom-developer.org/pamphlet-1.html

  This one is silent, with just balloon markup.

http://page.axiom-developer.org/pamphlet-2.html

  This one is silent, made using pyvnc2swf. No markup. I think
  it is in SWF "video" format. This might be a problem. From

  http://www.unixuser.org/~euske/vnc2swf/pyvnc2swf.html

  "The second encoding method, "video" provides a smaller SWF
  movie. This is, however, not recommended to use within vnc2swf.py
  for two reasons: This type of encoding is only supported by
  Flash Player version 7 or newer."

http://page.axiom-developer.org/pamphlet-3.html

  This is the same as pamphlet-2 (vncswf) but with a soundtrack
  added using pyvnc2swf/edit.py

http://page.axiom-developer.org/AxiomIn5.html

  The latest one was made using Wink but with a soundtrack
  added using SWFtools

I am not sure whether adding the soundtracks affects what
version of SWF is needed.

> ...
> > 
> > So, do you have any ideas for other "productions" and
> > about how we should package these things?
> 
> The first idea that comes to mind for this format is a 
> demonstration of the draw command and interactive tools it
> pops up, but that would require wink on Linux.

Unless Tim gets to it first, I could try something like
that this weekend.

> 
> Out of curiosity, what hardware are you using to record your
> voice?

So far none of my SWF screencasts are using voice. The
soundtrack has been derived from pre-recorded sources. But
on other hardware (not available where I am now) I have used
voice recognition software. But after some intense experiments
experiments I don't use it much anymore - I found that I
"think better" when I am typing rather than speaking. Must
be the way my brain is wired or something. :) But in that
case I started with the usual duplex CreativeLabs SoundBlaster
card with a cheap quality headset with mic.

> Voice recording was one thing I've never set up - never had
> the hardware.

It's easy and cheap on Windows. On up-to-date Linux distributions
its now also pretty easy. Windows still has the widest range of
audio/visual software but recently the software on Linux seems
to have made some major advances.

> Can one get decent sound quality with inexpensive hardware?
> 

Short answer: "No." :(  But of course it depends on what you
want to do and what you mean by "inexpensive". If you want to
do reliable voice recognition, the most expensive part would be
the microphone (maybe $200?). You really need something with good
ambient noise cancellation and frequency range - more or less
studio quality. A headset mic (e.g. the kind you get on a hands
free cell phone) is not likely to give good results. But if all
you want to do is add a voice over soundtrack to a SWF screencast,
then probably just about anything will do. A $25 audio card
and a $15 headset with mic should be fine.

Regards,
Bill Page.