QuickTime Developer Series

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Summary of QuickTime Plug-in Parameters

The QuickTime plug-in accepts the following parameters. Many of them are discussed in detail in the previous section, Some Particularly Cool Features.

  •   ALLOWEMBEDTAGOVERRIDES="True" | "False" (default is False )
    If True , plug-in parameters can be overridden by subsequent commands. See Passing Plug-in Data in URLs.
  •   AUTOHREF="True" | "False" (default is False )
    If True , causes any URL specified in the HREF parameter to load immediately, without waiting for a mouse click.
  •   AUTOPLAY="True" | "False" | "@HH:MM:SS:FF"
    (default is user-selected)
    Sets the movie to automatically start when the Web page loads, or to not start automatically, or to start only when download reaches a specified point in the movie timeline.

New for QuickTime 5.01, AUTOPLAY can accept a timecode, and the movie will autoplay only when the download reaches that point in the timeline. Use this to prevent "false starts" over the Internet. The syntax is

AUTOPLAY="@HH:MM:SS:FF"

where HH = hours, MM = minutes, SS = seconds, and FF = 30ths of a second. Versions of QuickTime prior to 5.01 will not autoplay if a timecode is used.

    Important  The timecode is expressed as HH:MM:SS:FF , not HH:MM:SS.FF (the separator is a colon, not a decimal point). This is different from the timecode displayed by QuickTime Player's Info window, which uses the decimal point.

  •   BGCOLOR= "# rrggbb " | " ColorName "
     If the rectangle specified by HEIGHT and WIDTH is larger than the movie, this sets the background color for the rectangle. You can specify the color as a hexadecimal triplet of red, green, and blue values.

QuickTime 4 and later also accepts names in place of some RGB values:

    Color name

    RGB value

    BLACK

    #000000

    GREEN

    #008000

    SILVER

    #C0C0C0

    LIME

    #00FF00

    GRAY

    #808080

    OLIVE

    #808000

    WHITE

    #FFFFFF

    YELLOW

    #FFFF00

    MAROON

    #800000

    NAVY

    #000080

    RED

    #FF0000

    BLUE

    #0000FF

    PURPLE

    #800080

    TEAL

    #008080

    FUCHSIA

    #FF00FF

    AQUA

    #00FFFF

    Note  QuickTime attempts to interpret any other color name as a hexadecimal number, so "ORANGE," for example, is equivalent to #000006 .

  •   CONTROLLER "True" | "False"
     Include a controller with the movie (or not). Default is True unless the movie is a .swf (Flash animation) file or a VR movie (a panorama or object movie).
  •   CORRECTION="None" | "Full" (VR only, default is Full )
    Shows a VR panorama with no correction for warping (fastest) or provides full correction for horizontal and vertical warping.

    • Note  The CORRECTION value "Partial" is no longer supported and maps to "Full" in QuickTime 4 and later.

  •   DONTFLATTENWHENSAVING
     If specified, the plug-in does not make copies of data that is included in the movie by reference. If the movie is on a Web server and references external media, this prevents viewers from saving a working copy of the movie using the plug-in. If a movie contains internal references, such as the same audio clip referenced hundreds of times, setting this flag prevents the movie from swelling up like a tick when saved.
  •   ENABLEJAVASCRIPT="True" | "False" (default is "False" )
    If you want to control a QuickTime movie using JavaScript functions, you need to enable JavaScript for that movie by setting ENABLEJAVASCRIPT="True" . For details, see QuickTime and JavaScript.
  •   ENDTIME=" Time " ( Hours:Minutes:Seconds:Thirtieths )
     If set, causes the movie to stop playing at the specified point in the movie. The user will not be able to play the movie beyond the specified point. See also: STARTTIME . Note that the separator between Seconds and Thirtieths is a colon, not a decimal point.
  •   FOV=" Angle " (VR only)
    Sets the initial vertical field of view in degrees (and therefore sets the zoom) for a VR movie. The valid range for " Angle " is dependent on the movie.

    • Example 

    FOV="22.25"

  •   GOTO n
     See QTNEXT .
  •   HOTSPOT n =" Url " TARGET n =" FrameName " (VR only)
    Links the specified VR hot spot to a URL. The TARGET parameter is optional. See TARGET.
  •   HREF=" Url "
    • Clicking in the display area of the movie loads the specified URL. The URL can be a Web page, a QuickTime movie, or a JavaScript function. You can use this in conjunction with the TARGET parameter to cause the URL to load in another frame or window, in the QuickTime plug-in itself, or in the QuickTime Player application. See TARGET . See also AUTOHREF .

    Note  If you pass a relative URL in the HREF parameter, it must be relative to the currently loaded movie, not relative to the current Web page.

  •   KIOSKMODE="True" | "False"
     If true, the plug-in does not allow the user to save a copy of the movie.
  •   LOOP="True" | "False" | "Palindrome" (default is False )
    If True , the movie loops endlessly. If Palindrome , the movie loops back and forth, first playing forward, then backward.
  •   MOVIEID=" n " (integer value)
    Assigns an integer ID to the movie. This permits the movie to be targeted by wired actions in another movie. Similar to MOVIENAME , but MOVIEID allows the movie to be targeted from a movie that doesn't know this movie's name. A number is also easy to create as the result of a calculation.
  •   MOVIENAME=" Name "
     Assigns a name to a movie. This permits the movie to be targeted by wired actions in another movie. For example, one movie can act as a controller for other movies, starting them, stopping them, skipping to a particular time, activating certain tracks, and so on.

    • Note  MOVIENAME is not the same as the NAME parameter. Use NAME to target an embedded movie by name from a JavaScript function; use MOVIENAME to target wired sprite actions between movies.

  •   NODE=" n " (VR only)
    Specifies the initial node for a multinode VR scene.
  •   PAN=" Angle " (VR only)
    Sets the initial pan angle, in degrees, for a VR movie. The valid range depends on the movie and is 0-360 f or full cylinders or cubes.
  •   PLAYEVERYFRAME= "True" | "False" (default is False , except for .swf )
    If True , the plug-in does not drop frames, even if it gets behind. The movie may play at a slower than normal rate, but it plays every frame. The sound is muted when PLAYEVERYFRAME is True .
  •   QTNEXT n = "< url > T< Target >" ( n = 1-255) or "GOTO x " ( x = 0-255)
    Specifies a list of movies to play, with an optional target. The target can be a frame, a window, <myself> , or <quicktimeplayer> . Both < url > and T< Target > must be enclosed by angle brackets. If a target is specified, the target and the URL together must be surrounded by quotes. Multiple QTNEXT n statements can be included in a single <EMBED> tag. The value of n is an integer from 1 to 255. Each QTNEXT n executes in numerical order. The GOTO x statement causes a branch to the matching QTNEXT n . To branch to the original movie named in the SRC or QTSRC parameter, specify GOTO0 (Gee-Oh-Tee-Oh-Zero).

    • Note  If you use a relative URL in a QTNEXT parameter, it must be relative to the currently loaded movie, not relative to the current Web page or relative to the first movie. Each URL in a series is relative to the previous URL.

  •   QTSRC=" url "
    Causes the plug-in to ignore the URL specified by the SRC parameter and to play the file specified by " url " . Useful for playing nonmovie files with the QuickTime plug-in and for specifying rtsp:// URLs. You can use the QTSRCCHOKESPEED parameter to limit the HTTP or FTP bandwidth used by a file specified with QTSRC . Note that the browser still downloads the file specified in the SRC parameter, but the plug-in ignores it.
  •   QTSRCCHOKESPEED=" MaxSpeed " (in bits per second) or "movierate"
     Specifies the maximum HTTP or FTP bandwidth used to download a file specified in the QTSRC parameter. Useful to limit server load when a large movie is downloaded by viewers with fast Internet connections. Also useful for reserving bandwidth for RTP streaming when loading a movie over HTTP that contains both streaming and nonstreaming tracks.

    Note  As of this writing (QuickTime 5.02), QTSRCCHOKESPEED limits the download speed of data only in self-contained movies. Any data contained in external files, including alternate or reference movies, is unaffected.

  •   QTSRCDONTUSEBROWSER="True" | "False" (default is False )
    If True , the URL specified in the QTSRC parameter is loaded using QuickTime's internal methods, instead of using the browser to fetch the file. This prevents the browser from caching the file, which speeds access to local movies and can help prevent copying movies over the Web. Currently, URLs using RTSP:// or data:// protocols default to QuickTime, and other protocols default to the browser.

    • Note  As of this writing (QuickTime 5.02), QTSRCDONTUSEBROWSER affects download of only the actual movie specified in QTSRC . Any data contained in external files, including alternate or reference movies, may be loaded through the browser.

  •   SCALE="ToFit" | "Aspect" | " n " (default is 1)
    Scales movie to fit the rectangle allocated in the <EMBED> tag, or scales to the best fit while keeping the movie's aspect ratio, or scales by a factor of n . For example, to play a movie at double its normal size, set SCALE="2" ; to play a movie at half size, set scale="0.5" .
  •   SAVEEMBEDTAGS="True" | "False" (default is False )
    Tells the plug-in to apply the current <EMBED> tag parameter values to a new movie. This causes a movie specified in an HREF , HOTSPOT , or QTNEXT parameter to be played using the current plug-in settings. This overrides any setting embedded in the specified movie by applications such as Plug-in Helper. If this parameter is False , some current parameters may still be inherited, and others may be reset to their defaults when the new movie loads.
  •   STARTTIME=" Time " ( Hours:Minutes:Seconds:Thirtieths )
    If set, causes the movie to start playing at the specified offset into the movie's timeline. See also ENDTIME. The user will not be able to play parts of the movie prior to this point in the timeline. Note that the separator between seconds and thirtieths is a colon, not a decimal point.
  •   TARGET[ n ]=" FrameName " (or "myself" , "quicktimeplayer" , or "webbrowser")
     Causes the URL associated with a HOTSPOT or HREF to load in the named frame. If you match a TARGET with a HOTSPOT , append the same value n to TARGET that you used to identify the hot spot. If set to myself , the URL replaces the current movie. If set to quicktimeplayer , the URL loads in the QuickTime Player application. If set to webbrowser , the URL loads in the default browser window, launching the default browser if necessary. See also HOTSPOT , HREF , TARGETCACHE.
  •   TARGETCACHE="True" | "False"
    If set to True , a URL loaded using the TARGET parameter is stored in cache.
  •   TILT=" Angle " (VR only)
    Sets the initial vertical tilt angle, in degrees, for a VR movie. The valid range is dependent on the movie, but is typically -42.5 to +42.5 for a cylinder.
  •   URLSUBSTITUTE n ="< String >:< SubstituteURL >"
     Replaces every instance of String with SubstituteURL inside any HREF tracks, sprite action URLs, or VR hotspot URLs. Both String and SubstituteURL must be surrounded by angle brackets, and the two must be separated by a colon. The value n may be any integer from 1 to 999 and may be omitted if only one URLSUBSTITUTE parameter is specified. Use this parameter to repurpose QuickTime movies with embedded URLs without editing the movies.
  •   VOLUME=" Percent " (0-300)
    Sets audio volume from 0 to 300% of the user's sound setting. Values greater than 100 may cause distortion and clipping.
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