I'm using Windows XP SP2 like millions of others. Microsoft released an update today, April 16, 2006 which will produce an annoying conflict for all Windows XP users and developers that use Flash programs of any kind. After the Microsoft update is installed on a computer, and a user goes to a Flash page, a small rectangular box opens just above the mouse cursor that says, "Press SPACEBAR or ENTER to activate and use this control".

I think this will be a real big deal for users and they will shy away from using anything that requires a Flash player if they have to goes through that each time.

I've tried this on several Windows XP systems and it produces the same problem and looked at several sites that use flash programs and require the user to use a Flash player and they all do that. This does NOT happen on PCs using the Windows 98 OS, but I have not tested it on systems using any other OSs. My guess is, it just affects Windows XP users as it is definitely the most recent Windows Update that is causing this.

Like for example, here is a URL to a Web site that I googled at random http://www.theflasharchive.com/. Click on any of the short Flash movies and when it opens, slide your mouse over the flash movie and you'll see the message box that says, "Press SPACEBAR or ENTER to activate and use this control". You will also see a dotted line around the flash movie which indicates that the focus is not on the movie and that when you click on the message box the dotted line goes away. Here is another link to a well known site, Dell http://www1.us.dell.com/content/topi...=us&l=en&s=gen, go here and slide your mouse over the flash image and you'll see the problem again.

In my personal opinion, if Microsoft or Macromedia or someone does not fix this, Flash programs are as good as dead, I don't believe users will put up with this annoying popup box and having to do an extra click of the mouse each time they run into something that is Flash produced. I think it is that big of a deal. Your opinions please


Rudy

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Rudy

This is incredibly annoying, not just for flash! Internally, we use a sharepoint site. I have some "content editors" that allow certain users to basically fill in a text box using a rich text editor - all this is coded into Sharepoint so I have no control over how it works. Yet now my users are getting this same annoying message! And some are unable to make edits to the text even after saying OK to the message.

So Microsoft makes this IE update - and Microsoft made Sharepoint - yet two Microsoft ideas are not working together.. go figure! I really hope they reconsider making this a permanant change. If anything, it should be an option that I can turn on or off.

Looks like microsoft was forced to do this because of a patent legal battle on the way Explorer embeds objects.
http://www.amarasoftware.com/flash-problem.htm


For a flash workaround.
http://www.flashkit.com/board/showthread.php?t=682713

There are several workarounds on google.
http://www.google.com/search?client=...UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

I just found this on Macromedia site about the Active X changes
http://www.macromedia.com/devnet/activecontent

It's all part of the knife the baby strategy. Flash is growing in popularity too quickly and not propriatary to windows systems. Try switching to the firefox browser with flash.