If you’re a Captivate user, you’re probably aware that there are a number of Captivate variables that you can access from Flash. In other words, you load up a Captivate SWF inside a Flash movie and can then access some information about that Captivate movie including, for example, the number of slides, the current slide as well as being able to control the Captivate movie to some extent.
The problem I’ve come across is that I need a way to monitor how much of the Captivate movie has already downloaded and, most importantly, when it’s finished. This is because most of the variables (eg total number of slides) do not become available until that point. You can’t use a MovieLoader within the Flash movie (which must be Actionscript 2) because you’re actually embedding the small skin file Captivate generates rather than the full movie so knowing when that preloads is of no use at all.
Having banged my head against a brick wall, I’ve come across the following variable embedded in the Captivate movie which you can use to monitor the download progress.
_root.captivate.cpSkinLoader_mc.loading_mc.loading_sub_mc.percent_txt
…where captivate is the name of the movieclip in your Flash movie. percent_txt is a string containing a number plus a percent sign. So, all you need to do is check to see when it equals “100%”. What a relief, now I can get on…
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