Any way to force Flash video to play using QuickTime?

[Winston]

Without downloading?

There have been a couple of recent threads on Flash.

http://forums.macresource.com/read.php?1,878136

http://forums.macresource.com/read.php?1,877877

Which reminded me that Flash video does not play well at all on my TiBook. However, if I download the video, it plays fine in QuickTime Player (or Miro or VLC, and probably several other players).

Is there a way to force Flash video to play using QuickTime in Safari? Right now I basically can't watch YouTube or other Flash video unless I download it separately, which is a huge pain.

(If we figure that out, I'll have to get QuickTime working again in Safari, but that's another topic.)


Thanks.

- Winston

[Doc]

You want to play streaming Flash video in your browser window using the QuickTime plugin instead of the Flash plugin?

[Winston]

Yes, because it does not play very well using the Flash plugin.

If I download a Flash video it will play with QuickTime Player (or at least the one YouTube test I did worked well). My assumption is that the QuickTime plugin for Safari should be able to play Flash video as well.

Is there a way to do this?


- W

[Doc]

Not that I'm aware of.

I'm guessing that what you're playing in the QuickTime Player is a simple flv file.

What you'd get on one of those tv show streaming sites -- Hulu, for example -- is a specially encoded file with scripts to load the video in such a way that it can only be executed and viewed via Flash plugin.

[M A V I C]

No, not really. There are multiple codecs that can be played in Flash, and not all of them are supported by QT.

I'd still really like to see an example of two identical videos encoded the same. I'm making my own but it would be easier to test this if I had some examples of what people are finding.

[Speedy]

http://forums.macresource.com/read.php?1...msg-848811

[deckeda]

Winston wrote:

.. Which reminded me that Flash video does not play well at all on my TiBook. However, if I download the video, it plays fine in QuickTime Player (or Miro or VLC, and probably several other players). ...

Well, there's nothing wrong with Flash, just the way some people implement it. Flash is no worse than any other wrapper, regardless of your experience, my experience, everyone else's experience. This continued criticism has really gotten out of hand.

[Article Accelerator]

Winston wrote:
Is there a way to force Flash video to play using QuickTime in Safari?

Place a link in your Bookmarks Bar and associate this javascript with it:

j‌avascriptfunction%20()%20{var%20video_id%20=%20null;var%20video_hash%20=%20null;var%20video_player%20=%20document.getElementById(%27movie_player%27);if%20(video_player)%20{var%20flash_variables=video_player.attributes.getNamedItem(%27flashvars%27);if%20(flash_variables)%20{var%20flash_values=flash_variables.value;if%20(flash_values)%20{var%20video_id_match=flash_values.match(/video_id=([^(\&|$)]*)/);if%20(video_id_match!=null)%20video_id=video_id_match[1];var%20video_hash_match=flash_values.match(/t=([^(\&|$)]*)/);if%20(video_hash_match!=null)%20video_hash=video_hash_match[1];}}}if%20(video_id==null%20||%20video_hash==null)%20{var%20args=unsafeWindow.swfArgs;if%20(args)%20{video_id=args[%27video_id%27];video_hash=args[%27t%27];}}if%20(video_id==null%20||%20video_hash==null)%20return;var%20yt_mp4_path%20=%27http://www.youtube.com/get_video?fmt=18&video_id=%27+video_id+%27&t=%27+video_hash;var%20div_embed=document.getElementById(%27watch-player-div%27);if%20(div_embed)%20{div_embed.innerHTML=%27%3Cembed%20src=\%27%27+yt_mp4_path+%27\%27%20type=%22video/mp4%22%20width=640%20height=500%20scale=\%27aspect\%27%3E%3C/embed%3E%27;}})();

It will work for YouTube videos and possibly others.

[Article Accelerator]

deckeda wrote:
Well, there's nothing wrong with Flash, just the way some people implement it. Flash is no worse than any other wrapper, regardless of your experience, my experience, everyone else's experience. This continued criticism has really gotten out of hand.

I hope that was all tongue-in-cheek, deckeda...

[Winston]

M A V I C wrote:
No, not really. There are multiple codecs that can be played in Flash, and not all of them are supported by QT.

I'd still really like to see an example of two identical videos encoded the same. I'm making my own but it would be easier to test this if I had some examples of what people are finding.

M A V I C -

I don't understand your point. In one of the other threads I cited a random YouTube video which will not play properly in Safari via Flash, but plays perfectly when downloaded. (This is true of all YouTube videos on my computer, so it does not really matter which one I chose.)

Would the downloaded video be different in some way from the one Safari tries to play? If not, then you need to accept that what I've said is true. If you can't duplicate it because your computer can handle Flash better, that doesn't mean the problem does not exist for me.

Am I missing something?


- Winston