SWFObject 1.4.1 update

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I’ve just updated SWFObject to v1.4.1. This update is a very small update that fixes a very annoying bug that will only affect people who are using Flash Media Server, or presumably some other method of playing streaming data. If you aren’t using Flash Media Server, or don’t know what that is, you probably don’t need this update, as that’s the only change with this new version.

It was updated to address a bug in Internet Explorer when using innerHTML to embed swf files. Since everyone will be using innerHTML (or Javascript in some way) to embed their swf files, I suspect this will be a bigger issue as time goes on. So if you see the bug, just grab the latest SWFObject and you should be fine.

27 thoughts on “SWFObject 1.4.1 update”

  1. I’m not sure, but we have same issue, when loaded sound (MP3) was playing after we change SWF in HTML frame, until new SWF wasn’t fully loaded. But it was only on IE/FP8+. IE/FP7 seems to be free from this bug. We’ve workaround it in the same way.

  2. Now there is v1.4.1 to fix the annoying bug. So it would satisfied all those who are using innerHTML to embed their swf files.
    Thanks for informing that one has to grab the latest SWFObject!

  3. It may be me… but i can’t find any dload link … dload page still refers to 1.4
    By the way, i have to hank you with all my heart about this swfobject. It’s WONDERFUL.

  4. Dario, the download link still refers to 1.4, but the script inside is the updated one (1.4.1). I hope it helps.

    Geoff, thank You very much for all your efforts.

  5. Hey, just wanted to thank you for making this and putting it out there. You’ve made my life a little easier and I really appreciate it.

  6. Thanks for the info that one has to grab the lastest SWFObject to whenever we see this annoying bug. All the innerHTML users must be thanking u now.
    Nice effort from your side!

  7. Thanks for the post. The SWFObject seems to work but the tricks I use to put the focus onto the Flash movie don’t seem to work any more. How would you suggest doing this? I checked all your previous FAQs and there is no mention of focus.

  8. I’m running into a weird problem – my installation of SWFObject doesn’t want to work on IE 5.0 – the flashcontent div is not being replaced by the SWF file so I’ve just got a bit of text that is showing where my flash nav bar should be. And ideas on what could be going on? SWFObject is working fine on Firefox on Mac and PC, but IE, as always, remains a problem child for me.

  9. Raj: It should work fine – you can view the flashversion.html page to see what Flash Player version the script detects on your browser. You may need to run the Flash Player uninstaller and then reinstall it if you are running the IE5 standalone install. Sometimes things can get buggy when running those standalone versions.

  10. The script is great but the new update has not fixed the problem of memory overrun in line 114 of IE6. Another contributor avoided the problem by reverting to an older version of SWFObject (I guess when it was called FlashObject) but I cannot find an older version on the web. Any suggestions to sources would be greatly appreciated.

  11. Here comes v1.4.1 to fix the irritating bug.Thanx a lot for solving this problem as I am using innerHTML to embed their swf files. Thank u SWFObject!

  12. I just installed swfobject and am receiving an error in IE that reads “Out of memory At line 114″ every time i refresh the page. This only seems to happen if i have two flash objects on the one page, as with one object it is fine. I have ensured the div=id’s and so.write’s are unique but am stuck now…please help!

  14. Richie and John: I’ve never seen this issue happen myself, but make sure that all your ids and SWFObjects are unique/have unique ids.

  15. I’ve been using your script for a while now and I’ve been very please with the ease of integration as well as the barrage of features. Great script and thanks a million.

    Today, however, I noticed that things seem to have changed a bit in the world of IE. Now, it seems, instead of displaying my swfs, IE displays the alternate content every time (which is strange because I can assure you that flash is not only installed but updated to the latest 8 release). When I select the bypass the detection link the flash movie renders and plays just fine. So, it seems to me that now, swfObject is unable to detect flash in my current IE install. Any advice?

    Regards.

  16. Sorry for wasting your time Geoff, it turns out all my ID’s and objects were unique, but i had accidentally included the .js file twice. Never mind, eh? :)

  17. Geoff et al, thanks for a great tool! I also experienced the “Out Of Memory at Line 114″ message from IE as did Richie and John, and Richie discovered that the swfobject.js shouldn’t be called in multiple times. Can I suggest that this requirement be added to your swfobject FAQ, the third question on using SWFObject to embed more than one SWF on an HTML page? Maybe: A. Yes. Just give each SWF and each div or HTML element that will hold a SWF a unique Id. Also keep only the first call to the swfobject.js file () and delete all subsequent calls.

    Thanks so much, guys!

  18. Hi. I’m a visual web developer express user, and though I know of web server controls that can be used with flash that include detection I wondered if anyone knows if there has been any attempt to incorporate the swfobject/flashobject into a server control for use in ASP.net/visual studio/visual web developer?

  19. Has anyone else noticed odd behavior with Safari 2 and FireFox mac 1.5 when Flash is not installed? When I uninstall Flash, and go to any site that used SWFObject, the Flash still tries to load. In Safari I get the missing plug-in icon and a popup saying the page was unable to load a plug-in. In Firefox I get nothing, just blank canvas where the Flash should be.

    If I install an older version of Flash, and the page I hit requires a newer version, then it works fine. This only seems to occur when Flash is not installed at all.

    Now, when I go to our older test machine that has Safari 1.3.2 on it, and uninstall Flash, I get the expected redirect or “you need flash” message. I also get expected results testing in IE 6 and FF Win 1.5, with Flash Player uninstalled.

    I’ve checked this out on our own stuff, on SWFObject’s example pages, and on any Flash site I could find that uses SWFObject. In my own tests, I made sure I had SWFObject 1.4.1 installed. In Safari 2, version detection doesn’t work right when I uninstall Flash, but it works as expected in Safari 1, and on Windows browsers.

    Is this a bug in SWFObject? The fact that several different pages using SWFObject consistently give the same results depending on the browser, it sounds to me like there was some change that needed to be made when Safari 2 came out…can anyone shed some light on this?

  21. How are you uninstalling the Flash Player? Make sure you are using the Adobe uninstaller and not just removing files from the plug-ins folder.

  22. When using SWF Object to place a .SWF that loads external .SWFs into an .HTML page, the main .SWF does not load the external .SWFs . I tested the main .SWF in Flash (ctrl-enter) and everything worked; I published the raw .SWFs to my server and tested and everything worked fine. Does anyone know what this issue is and how to solve it?

    Many thanks

  25. I dont know if we are missing something but I am also suddenly having the issue with IE only displaying the alternate content even though the player is installed.

    I have checked this with player versions 6-9 with 100% success in FF 100% failure in IE. Seems really weird, as if an auto update to IE may have changed something, because I didnt change my script.

  26. Chris, bittersweet that someone else is seeing the issue. I’ve noticed this on a number of sites all across the web. Proof positive that this is a popular script. Anyone else having detection issues with IE all of a sudden?