Macromedia, Microsoft Expand Ties

Macromedia Inc. this week announced a new level of integration between its Flash Player and Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.5.

Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates this week demonstrated new functionality in Internet Explorer 5.5 that for the first time enables developers to manipulate rich media Macromedia Flash components on a Web page using custom Extensible Markup Language (XML) tags. This integration enables developers who are not familiar with the Macromedia Flash authoring environment to design pages and applications that have rich Macromedia Flash interfaces and update based on user interaction.

“Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.5 provides Macromedia developers with a great open platform on which to build real-world, high-end Internet applications,” said Tom Hale, senior vice president of product marketing for Macromedia. “By working closely with Microsoft, Macromedia enables our combined developer communities to better take advantage of the Internet Explorer platform with powerful rich media.”

“Microsoft built Internet Explorer 5.5 so that third parties can build specialized components to meet their business needs,” said Chris Jones, vice president of the Windows Client Team at Microsoft. “We are excited to have Macromedia showcasing the ways developers can extend our platform.”

Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.5 contains new features that will benefit Macromedia Flash developers including ViewLink and new rendering application programming interfaces (API). ViewLinking is part of the next-generation of Behaviors technology first introduced in Internet Explorer 5.0. ViewLinking and Behaviors enable developers to implement Macromedia Flash content using predefined XML tags to place and control rich-media content within all the other content on a Web page. The rendering engine in Internet Explorer 5.5 and a future version of the Macromedia Flash Player will allow HTML, Macromedia Flash (SWF), and other Web formats to be intermixed and layered within a Web page.

To help consumers get familiar with the technology, Macromedia has produced the Macromedia Flash Enterprise Kit for Internet Explorer 5.5. The kit provides examples and documentation on how to use Macromedia Flash with the new features in Internet Explorer 5.5 and is available now on the Macromedia Web site.

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