Description:
Macromedia is on a mission to make Director the most used authoring tool for building exciting, interactive content not only for CD-ROM presentations but for the Web as well. The new version of Director, 8.0, is totally geared toward reaching that goal. This is not the first version of Director to offer integrated Web authoring features, but Macromedia has refined Director into a streamlined production environment capable of outputting to a variety of formats. Improved sound controls include behaviors linked to objects for building immersive audio tracks. This includes more precise audio control over multiple audio streams, including better management of looping tracks. Many file types can be imported, among them AIFF, WAV, SND, and MP3. The Property Inspector is a new window for editing properties of a sprite or other member. The window changes according to which element is currently selected and shows properties for that selected member. If more than one member is selected, the Inspector reveals only the common properties. Also new is Runtime Imaging, for what is essentially on-the-fly rendering of images. This results in rich and exciting graphics without the overhead of a large download. Developers also have control now over off-screen compositing, onscreen effects, and transitions. All of this is controllable through Lingo commands. New Web-specific features include Publish, a command for saving to streaming Shockwave files using HTML templates; and Loader movies, for creating small looping movies that play while the body of the Shockwave file is downloading. Also, Shockwave content can now be resized while maintaining its aspect ratio in a browser window. Numerous tweaks and enhancements make this release of Director an important tool for the interactive-content creator. If your interactive projects are now being delivered through more avenues than just CD-ROM, Director 8 can help pave the road. --Mike Caputo
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