Captivate tip: toggling the controller’s visibility

You may be familiar with the famous “Captivate variables” (see page 201 in PDF link), but did you know about “rdcmndHidePlaybar”? It isn’t mentioned by Adobe in their documentation, but it’s a handy one to know about.

You can toggle the Captivate playbar’s visibility by importing two Flash SWFs that each contain a single line of ActionScript.

Hiding the playbar

To hide the playbar, import a SWF containing the following line of ActionScript:

For Captivate projects using a ’skin’:

_root.cpSkinLoader_mc.rdcmndHidePlaybar = 1;

For Captivate projects without a skin OR using a skin with no border:

_root.rdcmndHidePlaybar = 1;

Showing the playbar

To show/restore the playbar, import a SWF containing the following line of ActionScript:
For Captivate projects using a ’skin’:

_root.cpSkinLoader_mc.rdcmndHidePlaybar = 0;

For Captivate projects without a skin OR using a skin with no border:

_root.rdcmndHidePlaybar = 0;

Tip: You can also control the Captivate SWF using JavaScript.

Thanks to Paul at RaisingAimee.co.uk for the Captivate variables info.

Related posts:

1. Introducing the pipwerks Captivate Controller JavaScript utility
2. Control a Captivate SWF using JavaScript: The basics
3. Unpublished Captivate variables
4. LegacyCaptivateLoader: dealing with pre-existing scripts in your Captivate SWF
5. Making Actionscript calls from Adobe Captivate