Framers Digest, Vol 25, Issue 4

[Sean Pollock]

The most recent versions of Frame/Acrobat supposedly allow you to embed a Flash animation in a PDF, though this might be specific to Adobe's upcoming communications suite. If this is true, you could theoretically create a Flash .swf that calls other .swf files on a server, provided you set sandbox settings for both. On the server side, you'd have to set up some script to cycle the banner ads. 
 
Obviously, this wouldn't update "every time the PDF is opened, every time a page is turned," but would probably refresh as often as the PDF-based .swf was set to call the server. You'd also have to consider what happens if the PDF reader has no Internet connection. Regarding the idea of sending an "HTTP request for an ad banner FROM the end-user machine IP, tagged such that it credits the PDF-hosting author (for payment)," Flash can pass information to another .swf, which could theorhetically pass it to another object such as a PERL or ASP script, but I'm not sure you can grab the IP. An easier way might be to give the .swf within the PDF a unique ID for each copy, which is then returned to the server after the PDF has been opened by the person reading it. 
 
I'm obviously not sure how all this works or whether it's even supported--Adobe may have its own security issues with a .swf embedded in the PDF (if the PDF isn't security enabled, I could see hackers adding potentially hazardous pages to your PDF--arghh).
 
Interesting idea for any Flash geeks out there, anyway :).
 
Sean Pollock
Siemens (UGS) PLM Software



> Date: Mon, 5 Nov 2007 08:48:00 -0700> From: david at davidartman.com> To: framers at lists.frameusers.com> Subject: RE: Framers Digest, Vol 25, Issue 4> > Hi, all; long time no post!> > I have an unusual question about PDF generation that I hope this list> can answer.> > For a gaming product (role-playing, not computer), we want to be able to> embed ad banners which are refreshed every time the PDF is opened, every> time a page is turned, in the footer of the book. Those refreshes would> pull the banners from a standard ad revolver (like Google Ads), thereby> generating an ad view with a unique IP (per user/reader), thereby> generating ad revenue to pay for the free PDF hosting (with maybe some> left over for the author).> > The first idea I had is much more limited: have the PDF distilled by the> server for each download, which would embed whatever ads are queued in> the ad revolver, BUT the ads would then be static and fixed PLUS the ad> request would always be from the server doing the distillation (i.e.> worth less revenue; possibly even none).> > The second idea is more "active," but it doesn't solve the sever-only ad> request problem: I thought of having the footer contain an embedded,> URL-referenced image on the server, which is refreshed (server-side)> after each HTTP request, thus changing the ad every page (good) but> which would result in the requests always being made from the same> server (bad to worthless).> > In summary: I need a way to embed active, URL-referenced content which> causes an HTTP request for an ad banner FROM the end-user machine IP,> tagged such that it credits the PDF-hosting author (for payment), EVERY> page turn (i.e. every page render in Reader).> > Impossible?> David Artman> > _______________________________________________> > > You are currently subscribed to Framers as spolloc1 at hotmail.com.> > Send list messages to framers at lists.frameusers.com.> > To unsubscribe send a blank email to > framers-unsubscribe at lists.frameusers.com> or visit http://lists.frameusers.com/mailman/options/framers/spolloc1%40hotmail.com> > Send administrative questions to listadmin at frameusers.com. Visit> http://www.frameusers.com/ for more resources and info.
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