Adding Audio To A Web Page

Adding Audio To A Web Page
By Gary Ferrington

This collection covers the topic of adding sound to web pages. We begin with basic techniques and then explore the use of streaming software and technology.

Basics: Embedding Sound Files in Web Pages

Adding a Background Sound to Your Web Page.This page also explores the very basics of adding background sound to a web page using the <BGSOUND> tag, the <EMBED> tag, or the <META> tag. There are advantages and disadvantages to each technique.

Adding sound to your web page.This is a nicely written and illustrated page that explains sound and midi formats for web pages.

Bringing Sound into Your Web Pages. A tutorial that discusses hardware, software, copying and linking sound files, and making sound files automatically play. Three of the more common sound files for web pages are .wav, .mid or .midi, and au. One advantage to using a midi file is that midi files are much smaller and therefore it takes less time to download them. Midi files can only contain background (instrumental) music. Both au. files and .wav can contain any type of sounds (eg., vocal, background).

Hear Ye, Hear Ye A three part series on integrating audio with web pages. This is a more in-depth discussion about sound, sound editing programs, and the integration of audio into web page design. Web audio is moving past the lunatic fringe into the mainstream, with technologies such as Real Audio, which lets folks broadcast and receive talk shows, concerts, and recorded music over the Internet. Emerging audio file format standards such as MP3 catch headlines as folks prepare to use these resources on the Internet.

So You Want To Add Sound? Putting It On Your Page.This site gets you prepared to record a message, record something, and then prepare everything and upload it to your hosting service. Then add the code to your page to get it running.

Tips, Tricks, How-To, and Beyond: Adding sound into a web page.This tutorial was written in 1998 and focuses on the very basics of inserting sound into a web page. It explores the use of two tags for adding sound to your document, the <BGSOUND> tag <EMBED> tag.

The <BGSOUND> play the background sound from your page. That is when visitor visit your page, the sound will automatically play. The <EMBED> tag is slightly different, you can use its attribute to select playing sound when the page is loaded or give the users an option to click whether they would like to hear the sound.

Advanced Techniques: Streaming, Flash, and Dreamweaver

Adding Streaming Audio Files. Streaming media, such as RealAudio sound files are a great way to enhance to your Web site, but there are some specific items that are required in order to put them up and have them work correctly a.) server software that supports streaming media, and b.)file types that can be streamed.

Adding Professional Audio to Your Site.Just about anyone, for as little as $10.00 per month depending on the file size and bandwidth usage, can create, upload and link streaming audio. It truly is as simple as uploading your media file and linking it to your site. Anyone with an audio sound card and microphone can create their own professional audio. This site explains how.

Getting Started with Flash. A selection of tutorials and demonstrations related to the use of flash sound. A comprehensive site for those familiar with Flash.

Flash Sound Tutorials. This site includes the following tutorials:
Beginner (3 files to view)
Getting started with Flash for interactive audio
Advanced (13 files to view)
Advanced techniques for interactive Flash Audio
FLA files (0 files to view)
Raw .FLA files that can be used as examples of how to do interactive Flash Audio
FlashSound API (10 files to view)

Using Flash to add sound to a Web page. "The tutorials in this series use both Flash and Dreamweaver to add audio to a Web page. They each use one kind of audio, MP3 (Motion Picture Experts Group Audio), which is embedded in a SWF file in Flash and then played or controlled in Dreamweaver. Other audio formats (such as WAV for Windows or AIFF for Macintosh) can also be added to the SWF file. Sound files, which come in a variety of formats, are handled differently and inconsistently by different browsers and on different computers. For some measure of predictability and control, users can bring audio into Dreamweaver by first inserting it into a SWF file (created by Macromedia Flash). The SWF file will be played with the Flash plug-in, which comes with most browsers. Flash is a streaming technology, so audio files can start playing even before the entire file has been completely downloaded."

General Interest:

Audio Tutorials. Provides links to hundreds of tutorial sites covering most aspects of web based and interactive audio.

The Interactive Audio Special Interest Group. (IA-SIG) exists to allow developers of audio software, hardware, and content to freely exchange ideas about "interactive audio". The goal of the group is to improve the performance of interactive applications by influencing hardware and software design, as well as leveraging the combined skills of the audio community to make better tools.

The WebDeveloper.com Secret Guide to RealAudio. Provides insight into the use of RealAudio and the possibilities of integrating it into web site design.