LIX. Ming functions for Flash
| Warning |
This extension is EXPERIMENTAL. The behaviour of this extension -- including the names of its functions and anything else documented about this extension -- may change without notice in a future release of PHP. Use this extension at your own risk. |
Introduction
First of all: Ming is not an acronym. Ming is an open-source (LGPL) library which allows you to create SWF ("Flash") format movies. Ming supports almost all of Flash 4's features, including: shapes, gradients, bitmaps (pngs and jpegs), morphs ("shape tweens"), text, buttons, actions, sprites ("movie clips"), streaming mp3, and color transforms --the only thing that's missing is sound events.
Note that all values specifying length, distance, size, etc. are in "twips", twenty units per pixel. That's pretty much arbitrary, though, since the player scales the movie to whatever pixel size is specified in the embed/object tag, or the entire frame if not embedded.
Ming offers a number of advantages over the existing PHP/libswf module. You can use Ming anywhere you can compile the code, whereas libswf is closed-source and only available for a few platforms, Windows not one of them. Ming provides some insulation from the mundane details of the SWF file format, wrapping the movie elements in PHP objects. Also, Ming is still being maintained; if there's a feature that you want to see, just let us know ming@opaque.net.
Ming was added in PHP 4.0.5.
Requirements
To use Ming with PHP, you first need to build and install the Ming library. Source code and installation instructions are available at the Ming home page: http://ming.sourceforge.net/ along with examples, a small tutorial, and the latest news.
Download the ming archive. Unpack the archive. Go in the Ming directory. make. make install.
This will build libming.so and install it into /usr/lib/, and copy ming.h into /usr/include/. Edit the PREFIX= line in the Makefile to change the installation directory.
Installation
Now either just add extension=php_ming.so to your php.ini file, or put dl('php_ming.so'); at the head of all of your Ming scripts.
Predefined Constants
The constants below are defined by this extension, and will only be available when the extension has either been compiled into PHP or dynamically loaded at runtime.
- SWFBUTTON_HIT (integer)
- SWFBUTTON_DOWN (integer)
- SWFBUTTON_OVER (integer)
- SWFBUTTON_UP (integer)
- SWFBUTTON_MOUSEUPOUTSIDE (integer)
- SWFBUTTON_DRAGOVER (integer)
- SWFBUTTON_DRAGOUT (integer)
- SWFBUTTON_MOUSEUP (integer)
- SWFBUTTON_MOUSEDOWN (integer)
- SWFBUTTON_MOUSEOUT (integer)
- SWFBUTTON_MOUSEOVER (integer)
- SWFFILL_RADIAL_GRADIENT (integer)
- SWFFILL_LINEAR_GRADIENT (integer)
- SWFFILL_TILED_BITMAP (integer)
- SWFFILL_CLIPPED_BITMAP (integer)
- SWFTEXTFIELD_HASLENGTH (integer)
- SWFTEXTFIELD_NOEDIT (integer)
- SWFTEXTFIELD_PASSWORD (integer)
- SWFTEXTFIELD_MULTILINE (integer)
- SWFTEXTFIELD_WORDWRAP (integer)
- SWFTEXTFIELD_DRAWBOX (integer)
- SWFTEXTFIELD_NOSELECT (integer)
- SWFTEXTFIELD_HTML (integer)
- SWFTEXTFIELD_ALIGN_LEFT (integer)
- SWFTEXTFIELD_ALIGN_RIGHT (integer)
- SWFTEXTFIELD_ALIGN_CENTER (integer)
- SWFTEXTFIELD_ALIGN_JUSTIFY (integer)
- SWFACTION_ONLOAD (integer)
- SWFACTION_ENTERFRAME (integer)
- SWFACTION_UNLOAD (integer)
- SWFACTION_MOUSEMOVE (integer)
- SWFACTION_MOUSEDOWN (integer)
- SWFACTION_MOUSEUP (integer)
- SWFACTION_KEYDOWN (integer)
- SWFACTION_KEYUP (integer)
- SWFACTION_DATA (integer)
Predefined Classes
The classes below are defined by this extension, and will only be available when the extension has either been compiled into PHP or dynamically loaded at runtime.
Ming introduces 13 new objects in PHP, all with matching methods and attributes. To use them, you need to know about objects.
- swfshape
- swffill
- swfgradient
- swfbitmap
- swftext
- swftextfield
- swffont
- swfdisplayitem
- swfmovie
- swfbutton
- swfaction
- swfmorph
- swfsprite
- Table of Contents
- ming_setcubicthreshold -- Set cubic threshold (?)
- ming_setscale -- Set scale (?)
- ming_useswfversion -- Use SWF version (?)
- SWFAction -- Creates a new Action.
- SWFBitmap->getHeight -- Returns the bitmap's height.
- SWFBitmap->getWidth -- Returns the bitmap's width.
- SWFBitmap -- Loads Bitmap object
- swfbutton_keypress -- Returns the action flag for keyPress(char)
- SWFbutton->addAction -- Adds an action
- SWFbutton->addShape -- Adds a shape to a button
- SWFbutton->setAction -- Sets the action
- SWFbutton->setdown -- Alias for addShape(shape, SWFBUTTON_DOWN))
- SWFbutton->setHit -- Alias for addShape(shape, SWFBUTTON_HIT)
- SWFbutton->setOver -- Alias for addShape(shape, SWFBUTTON_OVER)
- SWFbutton->setUp -- Alias for addShape(shape, SWFBUTTON_UP)
- SWFbutton -- Creates a new Button.
- SWFDisplayItem->addColor -- Adds the given color to this item's color transform.
- SWFDisplayItem->move -- Moves object in relative coordinates.
- SWFDisplayItem->moveTo -- Moves object in global coordinates.
- SWFDisplayItem->multColor -- Multiplies the item's color transform.
- SWFDisplayItem->remove -- Removes the object from the movie
- SWFDisplayItem->Rotate -- Rotates in relative coordinates.
- SWFDisplayItem->rotateTo -- Rotates the object in global coordinates.
- SWFDisplayItem->scale -- Scales the object in relative coordinates.
- SWFDisplayItem->scaleTo -- Scales the object in global coordinates.
- SWFDisplayItem->setDepth -- Sets z-order
- SWFDisplayItem->setName -- Sets the object's name
- SWFDisplayItem->setRatio -- Sets the object's ratio.
- SWFDisplayItem->skewX -- Sets the X-skew.
- SWFDisplayItem->skewXTo -- Sets the X-skew.
- SWFDisplayItem->skewY -- Sets the Y-skew.
- SWFDisplayItem->skewYTo -- Sets the Y-skew.
- SWFDisplayItem -- Creates a new displayitem object.
- SWFFill->moveTo -- Moves fill origin
- SWFFill->rotateTo -- Sets fill's rotation
- SWFFill->scaleTo -- Sets fill's scale
- SWFFill->skewXTo -- Sets fill x-skew
- SWFFill->skewYTo -- Sets fill y-skew
- SWFFill -- Loads SWFFill object
- swffont->getwidth -- Returns the string's width
- SWFFont -- Loads a font definition
- SWFGradient->addEntry -- Adds an entry to the gradient list.
- SWFGradient -- Creates a gradient object
- SWFMorph->getshape1 -- Gets a handle to the starting shape
- SWFMorph->getshape2 -- Gets a handle to the ending shape
- SWFMorph -- Creates a new SWFMorph object.
- SWFMovie->add -- Adds any type of data to a movie.
- SWFMovie->nextframe -- Moves to the next frame of the animation.
- SWFMovie->output -- Dumps your lovingly prepared movie out.
- swfmovie->remove -- Removes the object instance from the display list.
- SWFMovie->save -- Saves your movie in a file.
- SWFMovie->setbackground -- Sets the background color.
- SWFMovie->setdimension -- Sets the movie's width and height.
- SWFMovie->setframes -- Sets the total number of frames in the animation.
- SWFMovie->setrate -- Sets the animation's frame rate.
- SWFMovie->streammp3 -- Streams a MP3 file.
- SWFMovie -- Creates a new movie object, representing an SWF version 4 movie.
- SWFShape->addFill -- Adds a solid fill to the shape.
- SWFShape->drawCurve -- Draws a curve (relative).
- SWFShape->drawCurveTo -- Draws a curve.
- SWFShape->drawLine -- Draws a line (relative).
- SWFShape->drawLineTo -- Draws a line.
- SWFShape->movePen -- Moves the shape's pen (relative).
- SWFShape->movePenTo -- Moves the shape's pen.
- SWFShape->setLeftFill -- Sets left rasterizing color.
- SWFShape->setLine -- Sets the shape's line style.
- SWFShape->setRightFill -- Sets right rasterizing color.
- SWFShape -- Creates a new shape object.
- swfsprite->add -- Adds an object to a sprite
- SWFSprite->nextframe -- Moves to the next frame of the animation.
- SWFSprite->remove -- Removes an object to a sprite
- SWFSprite->setframes -- Sets the total number of frames in the animation.
- SWFSprite -- Creates a movie clip (a sprite)
- SWFText->addString -- Draws a string
- SWFText->getWidth -- Computes string's width
- SWFText->moveTo -- Moves the pen
- SWFText->setColor -- Sets the current font color
- SWFText->setFont -- Sets the current font
- SWFText->setHeight -- Sets the current font height
- SWFText->setSpacing -- Sets the current font spacing
- SWFText -- Creates a new SWFText object.
- SWFTextField->addstring -- Concatenates the given string to the text field
- SWFTextField->align -- Sets the text field alignment
- SWFTextField->setbounds -- Sets the text field width and height
- SWFTextField->setcolor -- Sets the color of the text field.
- SWFTextField->setFont -- Sets the text field font
- SWFTextField->setHeight -- Sets the font height of this text field font.
- SWFTextField->setindentation -- Sets the indentation of the first line.
- SWFTextField->setLeftMargin -- Sets the left margin width of the text field.
- SWFTextField->setLineSpacing -- Sets the line spacing of the text field.
- SWFTextField->setMargins -- Sets the margins width of the text field.
- SWFTextField->setname -- Sets the variable name
- SWFTextField->setrightMargin -- Sets the right margin width of the text field.
- SWFTextField -- Creates a text field object