Reporting tool allowing embedded video.

[JimmyHoffa]

Hi all,

Does anyone know of any tool I can use, preferably with a designer like
iReport that allows me to design a PDF, which will need to included not
only images but also embeddeded video clips ?

I'm really struggling finding anything....

Thanks

 

[Andrew Thompson]

JimmyHoffa wrote:
....

Does anyone know of any tool I can use, preferably with a designer like
iReport that allows me to design a PDF, which will need to included not
only images but also embeddeded video clips ?

I thought this was some ludicrous idea spawned by you, until
I checked and found that Acrobat 6.0 now supports inclusion of
video (preferably AVI, apparently) into PDF files.

It does beg the general question, though..

Why embed an animated image, into a document format that
is designed to be *printed*? I am guessing those AVI's do not
come out too well on paper.

Andrew T.

 

[Jeffrey Schwab]

JimmyHoffa wrote:
....

I thought this was some ludicrous idea spawned by you, until
I checked and found that Acrobat 6.0 now supports inclusion of
video (preferably AVI, apparently) into PDF files.

It does beg the general question, though..

Why embed an animated image, into a document format that
is designed to be *printed*? I am guessing those AVI's do not
come out too well on paper.

PDFs are Portable. They're supposed to make the most of whatever medium
is displaying them, be it electronic or arboreal. Hyperlinks in TOCs
and indices are particularly useful, non-printable features of
well-designed electronic documents.

 

[JimmyHoffa]

Yes the functionality sure does exist, It doesnt seem to be exposed
in any of the PDF creation tools in the Java domain though..

 

[Andrew Thompson]

......
PDFs are Portable. They're supposed to make the most of whatever medium
is displaying them, be it electronic or arboreal.

They probably can, but I have never see a PDF that
adapts well to my screen shape or the 'content area'
that I am willing to devote to the document - it seems
the documents are always broken into pages that are
'A4' shaped..

Andrew T.

 

[Chris Uppal]

They probably can, but I have never see a PDF that
adapts well to my screen shape or the 'content area'
that I am willing to devote to the document - it seems
the documents are always broken into pages that are
'A4' shaped..

No, no, no. You misunderstand what Adobe are doing with PDF. The point of
having embedded JavaScript interpreters (and God knows what else) is to act as
a vector for viruses and other malware. They are not there to make Acrobat
more useful to publishers (except publishers of malware) or end-users.

With all the focus on browsers in the security community, it is becoming
increasingly difficult to sneak backdoors through their vigilance. Hence it
has been left to Adobe to pick up the baton...

-- chris

 

[Jeffrey Schwab]

They probably can, but I have never see a PDF that
adapts well to my screen shape or the 'content area'
that I am willing to devote to the document - it seems
the documents are always broken into pages that are
'A4' shaped..

A valid point. I don't know whether PDF supports page sizes that can
adapt at run-time a la web browser. Certainly, most people design PDFs
for printing. I don't expect to see a lot of embedded AVIs all of a
sudden, either. Maybe this is just feature creep.

 

[John W. Kennedy]

A valid point. I don't know whether PDF supports page sizes that can
adapt at run-time a la web browser.

Not normally, unless the new version does it, but there has been for
some time a special provision for PDAs.

 

[Jeffrey Schwab]

Not normally, unless the new version does it, but there has been for
some time a special provision for PDAs.

Interesting. I usually publish documents as HTML, so I use @media to
differentiate between print and screen; I wonder whether there's a media
type representing PDAs.

 

[Andrew Thompson]

Interesting. I usually publish documents as HTML, so I use @media to
differentiate between print and screen; I wonder whether there's a media
type representing PDAs.

Interesting question*, I did a quick consultation of the only
recommendations on HTML worth listening to, the W3C.
The answer is apparently 'handheld', according to this..
<http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS2/media.html#media-types>

* (shrugs) interesting to me, anyway.

Andrew T.

 

[Jeffrey Schwab]

Interesting question*, I did a quick consultation of the only
recommendations on HTML worth listening to, the W3C.
The answer is apparently 'handheld', according to this..
<http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-CSS2/media.html#media-types>

* (shrugs) interesting to me, anyway.

Thank you. That could help avoid a holy war: I always want to keep
pages simple enough to look good in (e.g.) lynx, or on cell phones,
while some folks I have worked with are convinced that any page without
Flash isn't worth visiting. It's good to know that there is (at least
nominally) a way to distinguish between electronic clients with
different capabilities.

 

[Andrew Thompson]

....
..That could help avoid a holy war: I always want to keep
pages simple enough to look good in (e.g.) lynx, or on cell phones,
while some folks I have worked with are convinced that any page without
Flash isn't worth visiting.

Ughh! My own ISP is in love with Flash.
Fortunately they also have the sense to include a 'no flash',
version of the pages that people like me can actually visit.
I have never seen a Flash ..animation, control or anything
that was worth the bandwidth/wait, or the risk of a Flash
security hole (I heard there were some classics).

After the comments earlier from Chris(?) re active content
in PDF's, I'm considering whether I really need the reader
for those, either - OTOH, I have a pretty *old* Acrobat reader,
so hopefully I'll be OK with that.

..It's good to know that there is (at least
nominally) a way to distinguish between electronic clients with
different capabilities.

I think HTML, and the very concept of designing content
that can be delivered & presented ..however the frig' the
end-user can best use it at that instant, is awesome.
With hyper-links as well, it's the best thing since the
printing press. Maybe better.

Andrew T.