ExternalInterface.call(“window.location.host.toString”)

StackOverflow https://stackoverflow.com/questions/1265926

Question

I wrote a flex application that get the host string from the browser using this code

ExternalInterface.call("window.location.host.toString")

This line of code work prefectally to get the host string in both Firefox and Opera. However, when using IE, the returned string is always 'null'. I need to get such information from the browser. I know that there is a work around by defining a javascript function that get such string and calling that function from the application. However, my application require getting such information from a native source.

I was wondering if anyone had the same problem and managed to solve it, or if someone has any idea why I always get null in IE, but not when using Firefox and Opera

Edit 1:

Here is the HTML code for embedding the generated SWF file. Maybe this is useful to spot a mistake

<object id="myTest1" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" height="330px" width="600px">
<param name="movie" value="http://www.website.com/test.swf" />
<param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" />
<param name="wmode" value="transparent" />
<embed id="myTest1" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" src="http://www.website.com/test.swf" allowScriptAccess="always" wmode="transparent" height="330px" width="600px" flashvars=""></embed>
</object>

the id, classid, and the allowScriptAccess are set as shown

Any idea?

Edit 2:

for Lior Cohen The Flex file is the example used in your first link. The sub-directory history contains history.js, history.css, and historyFrame.html. The HTML page that include the generated SWF file is like this

<html>
<head>
<!--  BEGIN Browser History required section -->
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="history/history.css"/>
<script src="history/history.js" language="javascript"></script>
<!--  END Browser History required section -->
</head>
<body>
<object id="file1" classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" height="330px" width="600px">
    <param name="movie" value="file.swf" />
    <param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" />
    <param name="wmode" value="transparent" />
    <embed id="file2" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" src="file.swf" allowScriptAccess="always" wmode="transparent" height="330px" width="600px" flashvars=""></embed>
</object>
<body>
</html>

However, this is still not working as expected.

Edit 3:

I have spotted the problem, however, I cannot fix it. The problem has to do with the javascript engine of IE and not the ExternalInterface nor the object and embed HTML tags.

What I am doing in my case is write the object and embed tags into a div created using javascript and this div is appended to the end of the body using the DOM methods. However, such approach make the InternalInterface always return null in IE (but not in Firefox nor in Opera).

var swfDiv = document.createElement('div');
swfDiv.innerHTML = '<object id="test1" classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" width="600" height="330"><param name="movie" value="http://www.website.com/test.swf" /><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="false" /><param name="quality" value="high" /><embed id="test2" name="test2" src="http://www.website.com/test.swf" allowScriptAccess="always" allowFullScreen="false" quality="high" width="600" height="330" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" /></object>';
document.body.appendChild(swfDiv);

I tried to use document.write to append the HTML content, which made it work perfectly in IE, however, document.write wrote over the entire page (removing old content), which is something I don't want.

document.write('<object id="test1" classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0" width="600" height="330"><param name="movie" value="http://www.website.com/test.swf" /><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always" /><param name="allowFullScreen" value="false" /><param name="quality" value="high" /><embed id="test2" name="test2" src="http://www.website.com/test.swf" allowScriptAccess="always" allowFullScreen="false" quality="high" width="600" height="330" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" /></object>');

Any idea how to fix this?

Thanks

Was it helpful?

Solution 3

The solution to the problem that is mentioned in "Edit 3" is basically to create the object tag and its parameter tags using DOM objects, instead of just specifying them as string for the innerHTML attribute. This will make the returned value of the ExternalInterface work in Internet Explorer. Here is an example:

var swfDiv = document.createElement('div');

var obj = document.createElement('object');
obj.setAttribute('id','test1');
obj.setAttribute('codebase','http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=9,0,0,0');
obj.setAttribute('width','600px');
obj.setAttribute('height','330px');

var param = document.createElement('param');
param.setAttribute('name','movie');
param.setAttribute('value','http://www.website.com/test.swf');
obj.appendChild(param);

param = document.createElement('param');
param.setAttribute('name','allowScriptAccess');
param.setAttribute('value','always');
obj.appendChild(param);

param = document.createElement('param');
param.setAttribute('name','wmode');
param.setAttribute('value','transparent');
obj.appendChild(param);

swfDiv.appendChild(obj);
document.body.appendChild(swfDiv);

document.getElementById('test1').setAttribute('classid','clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000');

Note 1: This will make it work with Internet Explorer, any other browser should use any of the method mentioned above in "Edit 3" of the question. You can detect the browser and use the proper code accordingly.

Note 2: the last line is required to make it work properly, and it has to be like that and at the end after adding the object to the document. I do not know why, probably it has to do with the weird browser behavior.

OTHER TIPS

Take a look at the following link. It should provide you with what you're looking for, without using ExternalInterface.call().

http://livedocs.adobe.com/flex/3/html/help.html?content=deep_linking_7.html

As mentioned in the page above, for the BrowserManager class to offer its full functionality, the wrapper must include several supporting files (history.js, amongst others).

More information about how to obtain and use these supporting files can be found in the following link under the "Deploying applications that use deep linking" section.

http://livedocs.adobe.com/flex/3/html/help.html?content=deep_linking_2.html

A quick search reveals you will have to set some extra attributes on the object to make it work in IE. Set id classId and scriptAccess (the last one to 'true' of course) to get this to work. (google for more info)

(Not tested.)

http://www.google.com/search?q=externalinterface+internet+explorer

@AAA

Note 2: the last line is required to make it work properly, and it has to be like that and at the end after adding the object to the document. I do not know why, probably it has to do with the weird browser behavior.

Thank you very much ! I suppose it is a bug in IE. I wonder how you found out.

Using SWFObject (you'll find it at http://code.google.com/p/swfobject/) to place the Flash on the page also solves this problem in Internet Explorer.

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