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Latest News:

03DEC98 - version 0.3.1 released
changes from 0.3.0:
-bugfixes only 26NOV98 - version 0.3.0 released
changes from 0.2.1:
-resizing "on the fly" allowed
-mimetypes bug fix

Introduction
Download
How to install
Using the player
FAQ
Copyright

Introduction
Where is it?
Using the widget
KXAnim class documentation

Introduction:

aKtion! is a video player based on xanim. It (xanim) supports many different file formats:

FLI animations.
FLC animations.
IFF animations.
GIF87a and GIF89a files.
GIF89a animation extension support.
DL animations. Formats 1, 2 and most of 3.
Amiga MovieSetter animations(For those Eric Schwartz fans).
Utah Raster Toolkit RLE images and anims.
AVI animations.
Quicktime Animations.
SGI Movie Format Files.

NOTE: You'll need to have xanim 2.70.7.0 properly installed in your machine to run aKtion!. If you don't have xanim click here.

Download:

Download aKtion! 0.3.1

How to install:

Uncompress the aktion.tgz file in the usual way (try KZip ;-)
Go into the /aktion directory.
Type "./configure"
Then "make"
And finally "make install"

That's all. Now, if the compilation process was fine, you'll see the aKtion! icon in the Multimedia menu.

Using the player:

Here is a little screenshot:

To start aKtion!, go into the "Multimedia" menu, and choose the "aKtion!" entry. You can also call it from the commnad line like:
aktion [filename] <enter>

Available keys:
ESC : leave the player
SPACE : play/pause
ENTER : open file
F1 : help
, (comma) : backward
. (dor) : forward
2 : volume down
3 : volume up

Frequently Asked Questions:

What means that "Unsupported video codec" error message?
This means that the player can't recognize the video format, or, most likely, that you don't have a recent xanim version or a "full featured" version of xanim. In some Linux (and probably others O.S.) distributions (as RedHat), xanim doesn't comes with all the video codecs in it due to some legal issues. How to fix this?. Read the next question.

How do I get the "full featured" version of xanim?
Go to the xanim homepage and follow the instructions on how to get the "cinepak", "indeo" and "creative" video codecs. Probably you'll need to recompile xanim.

Why sometimes (not always) aKtion! doesn't play the video sound?
Sometimes xanim "fights" with KDE in order to get the sound control. This specially happends if you have lots of system sounds activated. If KDE is playing the, let's say, "new window" sound when aKtion! starts, and aKtion! tries to automatically start playing the video, then xanim will see that the sound card is busy, and will refuse to play the video sound.
Solution: deactivate some system sounds. You can also deactivate aktion' "autoplay" feature. Or, when the sound is gone, you can press the stop button and then play again.

Copyright:

aKtion! is distributed under GPL (see the LICENSE file included in the distribution)

   This software may be freely copied, modified and redistributed without
   fee for non-commerical purposes provided that this copyright notice is
   preserved intact on all copies and modified copies.

   There is no warranty or other guarantee of fitness of this software.
   It is provided solely "as is". The author(s) disclaim(s) all
   responsibility and liability with respect to this software's usage
   or its effect upon hardware or computer systems.

KXAnim

Introduction:

The kxanim widget is a xanim wrapper to allow video playing on your apps.

Where is it?

You'll find the two files for the KXAnim widget into the /aktion/src directory in the distribution (no lib yet!). The files are:

kxanim.h
kxanim.cpp

The docs are in /aktion/src/doc (or just click the help button in the aKtion! player). Or just click here.

Using the widget:

KXAnim works like any other QT/KDE widget. In order to use it, you need to include two files in your project:

kxanim.h
kxanim.cpp

You must generate the kxanim.moc file using the MOC compiler (see the Qt documentation for more info).
Now you will need to declare the widget like:

KXAnim *myVideoWidget;

myVideoWidget = new KXAnim( this, "the name");
myVideoWidget->move(x,y);

Then you just need to connect some signals to the widget slots. You can also call those slots manually like:

myVideoWidget->play();

But before this don't forget to set the file to play:

myVideoWidget->setFile("videoFileName.avi");

Take a look at the full class documentation.

KXAnim class documentation:

Class documentation.

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Guillermo P. Marotte
Santa Fe - Argentina
g-marotte@usa.net