Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing Institutional Web Management Workshop 10 th June 2006 Adrian Stevenson Internet Services, University of Manchester

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing What is SMIL? How do you create a SMIL presentation? Accessibility Non-standard SMIL Issues References

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing SMIL W3C Specification Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language …enables simple authoring of interactive audiovisual presentations SMIL presentations can integrate audio and video with images, text or many other media type Syntax and structure similar to HTML SMIL 2.1 released Dec 05 SMIL 1.0 released 1998 Examples –Customers, Suppliers and the Need for Partnerships – Stephen EmmottCustomers, Suppliers and the Need for Partnerships –State of the Web 2005– Molly HolzschlagState of the Web 2005

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing Creating a SMIL presentation Record audio Process audio Create the image files –Assuming based on a Powerpoint presentation Write SMIL code Add accessibility features Add other optional features

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing Recording Digital Recording device of some kind –Computer Sound card Microphone Software – Audacity, Steinberg Wavelab –Mp3 player with recording capability –Professional audio device Possible problems –Speaker moves about –High level of background noise –Interference

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing Audio Processing Slide change timings Editing Equalisation Amplification Pitch change Volume Compression Filtering –Noise reduction (Steinberg Cleanup) File Compression (typically to mp3)

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing Process Powerpoint slides Export from Powerpoint –Save as PNG – every slide –Can look a bit messy: – focus/events/workshops/trieste -2005/talk-2a/ focus/events/workshops/trieste -2005/talk-2a/ Process image files in graphics program such as Macromedia Fireworks

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing Write the SMIL Code SMIL tag and namespace, head and body section...optional section with all header markup......required section with all body markup...

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing section Defines appearance of the playback window Simple layout:

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing section Arrange the sequence and timing of elements. Two basic tags are: – plays media in simultaneously (in parallel) – plays media in sequence Eg: Example

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing More SMIL code ExampleExample [requires Real Player]

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing Accessibility alt and longdesc text attributes ….

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing Accessibility Captioning –Makes SMIL accessible to those with difficulty hearing or who are unable to hear –SMIL audio track improves accessibility for those with visual impairments –Requires a transcription of the spoken content (plus any important non- spoken sound), and associated a timestamp Add a textstream to the SMIL code: – Example

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing SMIL tag allows the player to select from multiple options E.g. different audio or text tracks based on users language preferences Seven test attributes including: –System-language –System-bit-rate selects the first item that matches the users system attributes –For selection based on connection speed, order the elements from highest to lowest speed

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing More SMIL Metadata Hyperlink elements Complex timing controls Slide transition effects –Fade-ins, Cross fades, Transparency Zoom Animation Pre-fetch

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing Non-standard SMIL Real Player Navigation –ExampleExample added to SMIL file Textstream.rt file: Menu Introduction Copyright and credits ……

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing Issues Technical Issues –File path problem –Users have different SMIL players (or no SMIL player) Mixed media problem –Difficult to capture complex elements of a presentation –No control over users audio and video settings –Large files sizes Non-Technical Issues –Time consuming –IPR

Combining the strengths of UMIST and The Victoria University of Manchester 15 th June 2006 Keep SMILing Some references W3C SMIL Page W3C Accessibility Features of SMIL Synchronized Multimedia On The Web - Larry Bouthillier SMIL Scripting for Quicktime MIL/index.html MIL/index.html SMIL del.icio.us