SMIL 2.0 — Interactive Multimedia on the Web

Lloyd Rutledge

Semantic Media Interfaces Group
CWI, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
W3C SYMM working group

Lynda Hardman, Jacco van Ossenbruggen: CWI
Dick Bulterman, Jack Jansen, Sjoerd Mullender: Oratrix
W3C SYMM working group

Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language (SMIL)

Main Points

Pronounced smile

Multimedia for the Web — for multimedia what HTML is for hypertext

Integration format for presentable mono-medium formats

Structure

SMIL 1.0 — W3C Recommendation (1998)

SMIL 2.0 "meta-language" W3C Recommendation (2001)

SMIL 2.0 family formats SMIL Profile, SMIL Basicand XHTML+SMIL still lingering ...

SMIL 2.1 recently released with minor additions

SMIL 3.0 could start soon

Main Themes

Powerful timing and synchronization

Adaptive to users and systems

Models a flexible but consistent presentation and user interface

SMIL Isn't

Flash — Flash is mono-medium animation on steriods

MPEG-{4 / 7 / 21} — MPEG looks at content and coding, and player architecture and a whole lot more, but is more media centric than web centric

D-HTML — D-HTML uses scripted definitions of local behaviors, without a notion of the presentation's context

SMIL 2.0 Profiles

What is a Profile?

A language for which a browser can be built

A combination of modules from the SMIL 2.0 "meta-language"

Possibly non-SMIL constructs with SMIL constructs

SMIL 2.0 Language Profile (SMIL Profile)

What is typically thought of as SMIL 2.0

Most of SMIL 2.0 features in one profile

SMIL 2.0 Basic Language Profile (SMIL Basic)

Intented for mobile devices

Assumes restricted processing ability

XHTML+SMIL

Applies timing to text-based display

XHMTL-based layout

SMIL 1.0

Backwards-compatable — can be played on SMIL Profile browsers

SMIL's "Success"

SMIL looses, Flash wins

The dominant desktop Web multimedia format is Flash, by far

Reason: big industry support, cheap and simple authoring

Consequences

Web multimedia is "owned" by Macromedia

Web multimedia is not adaptive or adaptable

Web multimedia is not integrated into the rest of the Web infrastructure

SMIL's quiet success

Unseen format for much of Real media

Very widespread use in MMS

Pretty widespread use in SVG

Important for the accessibility community, such as Talking Books

Constructs and syntax used in media toolkits

SMIL Implementors

Image 1

RealNetworks

RealOne for SMIL 2.0

Clear leader for SMIL players

Ambulant: current open source player up-to-date with 2.1 (and 3.0?)

Oratrix: GRiNS player and editor

Microsoft

Internet Explorer 5.5 and up plays XHMTL+SMIL

Adobe

Adobe's SVG Viewer supports SMIL animation in SVG

Mobile Industry

3GPP — Next generation mobile framework officially uses SMIL Basic

MMS — Uses SMIL Basic constructs

X-Smiles

Academic product uniting many XML formats in one browser

What's Next?

SMIL 2.0 Profile

Out for years, not used much

Academia exercise interest in development, as in Ambulant

Other long-standing SMIL languages

XHTML+SMIL will probably disappear

SVG grows in adoption (and in SMIL features integrated?)

Mobile use increases, such as with MMS

SMIL Ongoing Developments

SMIL 2.1 has just filled in some feature gaps

SMIL 3.0 may start soon to add new features

Timed Text uses SMIL to make books accessible

What We Need to Specify

Media

Adaptivity

Layout

Interaction

Timing

miniFiets 2.0 — The Layout

<!DOCTYPE smil PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD SMIL 2.0//EN"
                        "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-smil/SMIL20.dtd">
<smil xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2001/SMIL20/Language">
 <head>
  <layout>
   <topLayout title="Fiets Amsterdam Tour"
              backgroundColor="black"
 width="1010" height="665">
    <region regionName="splashScreen"  top="5" left="5" bottom="5" right="5"/>
    <region regionName="buildingImage" top="5" right="5" width="875" height="655"/>
    <region regionName="closedCaptioning" bottom="5" left="5" right="5" height="60"/>
    <region title="Thumbnail Bar" top="5" left="5" bottom="5" width="120">
     <region regionName="museumThumb"     fit="meet" height="90" top="65"/>
     <region regionName="weighhouseThumb" fit="meet" height="90" top="280"/>
     <region regionName="CWI-INSThumb"    fit="meet" height="90" top="495"/>
    </region>
   </topLayout>
  </layout>
  <transition id="fade1s" type="fade" dur="1s" />
 </head>
Color Key
Media
Layout
Timing
Interaction
Adaptivity

miniFiets 2.0 — The Greeting Section

<body>
 <seq>
  <par title="Greeting Section" end="greet.end+1s">
   <img src="FietsLogo.jpg" region="splashScreen" end="greet.end"
     transIn="fade1s" transOut="fade1s" alt="Logo for Fiets: a bicycle zone sign"
/>
   <par id="greet" begin="1s">
    <switch>
     <par systemlanguage="en"
>
      <audio src="welcome.wav"  region="buildingImage"
        alt="Welcome to Fiets, your self-guided tour of Amsterdam (spoken)" 
/>
      <text  src="welcome.html" region="closedCaptioning" systemcaptions="on"
        alt="Welcome to Fiets, your self-guided tour of Amsterdam (captions)"
/>
     </par>
     <par systemlanguage="nl"
>
      <audio src="welkom.wav"  region="buildingImage"
        alt="Welkom bij Fiets, uw eigen stadswandeling door Amsterdam (gesproken)"
/>
      <text  src="welkom.html" region="closedCaptioning" systemcaptions="on"
        alt="Welkom bij Fiets, uw eigen stadswandeling door Amsterdam (ondertiteling)"
/>
     </par>
    </switch>
   </par>
  </par>
Color Key
Media
Layout
Timing
Interaction
Adaptivity

miniFiets 2.0 — The Thumbnail Section

   <par title="Thumbnail Section" dur="indefinite">
    <par>
     <a href="#museum"     alt="Show the Rijksmuseum"
>
      <img src="museum.jpg"     region="museumThumb" alt="Rijksmuseum thumbnail"
/>
     </a>
     <a href="#weighhouse" alt="Show the Weighhouse"
>
      <img src="weighhouse.jpg" region="weighhouseThumb"
        alt="Weighhouse (Waag) thumbnail"
/>
     </a>
     <a href="#CWI-INS"    alt="Show the CWI-INS building"
>
      <img src="CWI-INS.jpg"    region="CWI-INSThumb"    alt="CWI-INS building thumbnail"
/>
     </a>
    </par>
    <excl dur="indefinite"
>
     <img src="museum.jpg"       id="museum"
          region="buildingImage" alt="Rijksmuseum"      />
     <img src="weighhouse.jpg"   id="weighhouse"
          region="buildingImage" alt="Weighhouse (Waag)"
/>
     <img src="CWI-INS.jpg"      id="CWI-INS"
          region="buildingImage" alt="CWI-INS building" />
    </excl>
   </par>
  </seq>
 </body>
</smil>
Color Key
Media
Layout
Timing
Interaction
Adaptivity

SMIL Structure

SMIL Document Classes

<!DOCTYPE smil PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD SMIL 2.0//EN"
  "http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-smil/SMIL20.dtd">
<smil xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2001/SMIL20/Language">

<!DOCTYPE svg PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD SVG 1.0//EN"
  "http://www.w3.org/TR/2001/REC-SVG-20010904/DTD/svg10.dtd"
<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML+SMIL //EN"
  "http://www.w3.org/2001/SMIL20/WD/xhtmlplussmil.dtd"
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"
      xmlns:smil="http://www.w3.org/2001/SMIL20">

The <smil> Element

Contains all of a native SMIL document

The <head> Element

Layout and meta-information, as in HTML

The <body> Element

The content and linking (as in HTML), and timing

Integration — <ref>

Media Object Elements

The Waag is a medieval buiding in Amsterdam SVG Animation The Waag is a medieval buiding in Amsterdam. It was originally a gate into the city through the city wall. Later it became a weighhouse for goods being brought
<text> <image> <video> <audio> <animation> <textstream>

Brush Media — Draw a rectangle on the screen

The <brush> Element

The color= Attribute

Mostly replicable with <region>

Integration — URIs

The src= attribute holds a URI locating the media

Local file system pathname URIs

relative and absolute

Remove URIs

protocol, server, path

xml:base=

base for relative URIs

inherited down subtree

Integration — Modes and Types

Media Typing

The mimetype Construct

Communicating mimetypes through HTTP

Filename suffixes

The type= Attribute

Captured vs. Structured Media

General Types

Photographic Images

JPEG, GIF, RealPix, PNG

Video

MPEG, RealVideo

Audio

WAV, RealAudio

Graphics and Animation

GIF, SVG

Text

HTML, Timed Text?

Containing Boxes — Box Elements

Presentation Windows

The <topLayout> Element — General-purpose Window

The <root-layout> Element — The Main or Only Window

The <region> Element

Each media object instance contains a region reference:

allows author to know where object will be played

<video src="anchor.mpg" region="V-main"/>

The region is defined by:

A regionName= or id= attribute for each region is required

Region positioning attributes

Length values are percentage values or pixels

The unit "px" may be omitted

Image 14

Containing Boxes — fit=

Image 16

Containing Boxes — z-index=

When regions overlap, the z-index attribute determines which image appears on top

z-index= determines the stacking order

highest integer stacks on top

Stack level tie-breakers

most recently started is on top

Stacking context is inherited through nested regions

Stack levels are inherited by default

Timelines — Composition

<seq> (sequence) — each child starts when previous ends 1 2

<par> (parallel) — all children start together 1 2

<par>'s and <seq>'s can be nested

endsync=

(1)<par> can end when the ="first" element to finish ends

<par endsync="first">
 <text src="leader_title.html" region="m_title" dur="5s"/>
 <video id="v1" src="cnn.mpg" region="V-Main" begin="1.4s"/>
 <audio src="cnn.aiff" region="music" begin="id(v1)(0.5s)"/>
</par>
Image 34

(2) <par> can end when the referenced element ends: id( Id-value )

(3) <par> can end when the ="last" element to finish ends (default)

Timelines — Time Boundaries

begin= — in terms of default begin

end= — in terms of default begin

dur=explicit duration overrides implicit

repeatDur= — loop for specified period

repeatCount= — loop specified number of times

="indefinite" — nothing from element or its content triggers this time boundary

Timelines — Which Time?

Durations

Intrinsic Image 18

Explicit — dur= clock-value, "indefinite"

Simple Image 19

Active Image 20

Perceived

Activation/Termination Types of time on example time bar

Resolved times

Unresolved times

Definite times

Indefinite times

Linking — <a> and href=

The <a> Element

Contains media that is link trigger

The href= Attribute

URI value refers to link destination

Linking within SMIL Presentations

The href="# idref " Attribute Assignment

Moving back and forth along the timeline (instead of scrolling)

Linking — Playstates

Play Spaces for the Link Destination

The show= Attribute

The external= Attribute — open with external program

The target= Attribute — region or other display space to show in

Play States

The sourcePlaystate= Attribute

The destinationPlaystate= Attribute

Linking — Sound

The sourceLevel= Attribute

The destinationLevel= Attribute

Selectivity — Principles

Each element must pass a "playability" test

Those not selected are ignored and not played

Example: captions not played if user does not desire them

Selectivity — System Test Attributes

System Test Attributes

Standard collection of conditions to test for for selectivity

Test attributes can be combined

Adaptation to User

The systemLanguage= Attribute

The systemCaptions= Attribute

The systemOverdubOrSubtitle= Attribute

The systemAudioDesc= Attribute

Adaptation to Hardware

The systemBitrate= Attribute

The systemCPU= Attribute

The systemScreenSize= Attribute

The systemScreenDepth= Attribute

Adaptation to Software

The systemOperatingSystem = Attribute

The systemComponent= Attribute

The systemRequired= Attribute

Selectivity — <switch>

At most one of the children of a switch element is played

The first acceptable element is chosen

Thus, ordering should be more preferred first

Last child can be always-accepted default

Acceptability based on anything the browser wants

Example: versions for different languages

Transitions — Fades and Wipes

The <transition> Element

In document head

Defines one transition for use in presentation

Types of Transitions

The type= Attribute — Which of the fixed set of transition types to use

The subtype= Attribute

Some transition types have subtypes

Such as type ="barWipe" with subtypes ="leftToRight" and ="topToBottom"

Transitions — Alteration

Controlling the Transition

The direction= Attribute — ="forward" (default) or ="reverse"

The fadeColor= Attribute — color value for what is faded from/to

The startProgress= and endProgress= Attributes

How far through default transition to start/end

Transition Modifiers

The horzRepeat= and vertRepeat= Attributes

Repeating the transition in each direction

The borderColor= and borderWidth= Attributes

Changing the appearance of wipe borders

Transitions — <transitionFilter>

Selecting a Transition for the Presented Element

The transIn= and transOut= Attributes — ID of Transition to Use

Inline Transitions — Transitions Defined in the Presentation Body

The <transitionFilter> Element

Had transition-defining attributes

Applies to it's parent, by default

The targetElement= Attribute

ID of element other than parent to apply this transition to

The mode= Attribute

The parent/target element transitions ="in" or ="out"

Beyond Boxes — Hierarchical Regions

Image 15

Beyond Boxes — Registration Alignment

Sub-regions — Precise Image Positioning within Regions

regPoint= and regAlign= Alignment

regAlign values

Beyond Boxes — Opening and Closing, Sound

Opening and Closing Regions and Windows

Active Regions and Windows

The showBackground= Attribute for Regions

The "always" and "whenActive" values

The open= Attribute — Opening Windows

The "onStart" and "whenActive" values

The close= Attribute — Closing Windows

The "onRequest" and "whenNotActive" values

The soundLevel= attribute

Percentage value, purely relative

Animation — Targets

Animation Elements

The <animate> Element — change an attribute value over time

The <animateMotion> Element — move an object across the screen

The <animateColor> Element — change an object's color

The <set> Element — assign an attribute a value for a period of time

Specifying the Animation Target

The href= or targetElement= Attribute — ID element with attribute to animate

The attributeName= Attribute

The attributeType= Attribute — ="XML", ="CSS", or ="auto"matically determine which

Animation — Values

Listing the Animation Values

The from= and to= Attributes — starting and ending values of attribute in animation

The by= Attribute — incremental value change

The values= Attribute — list of values the attribute goes through

Animation — Functions

Defining the Animation Function

The calcMode= Attribute

="discrete", ="linear" or ="paced"

The accumulate= Attribute

Does repeating animation build on top of previous iterations?

The additive= Attribute

="sum" with the assigned value or ="replace" it?

The origin= Attribute

Position <animateMotion> starts from

Spline Animation

The path= Attribute

SVG path syntax for specifying a curve

The keyTimes= Attribute

A time offset for each value

The keySplines= Attribute

A curve for smooth value changing between each value

Exclusion — <excl>

No more than one child can play at any one time

One child starting will cause any playing siblings to stop

Analogous to radio buttons

1 2 3 — Links to or event triggers of <excl> children

1 2 3 — Children of <excl>

Context timing continues unchanged

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0

Exclusion — <priorityClass>

Determines what happens when one child starts while other plays

Priority Class Values

The ="stop" value

The ="pause" value

The ="defer" value

The ="never" value

Priority Class Attributes

The peers= Attribute

The lower= Attribute

The higher= Attribute

The pauseDisplay Attribute

The ="disable" value

The ="hide" value

The ="show" value

Exclusion — Time Graphs

Temporal exclusion brings up beyond single time line

Time graph?

Time blob?

Children of <excl> can change while <par> siblings of <excl> keep on playing along their timelines

Enables linking in context

Example: background music keeps playing while images switched

Sync between parallel components only known at run-time

Customization — Custom Test Attributes

Principles

Anyone can define adaptive test attributes for use in SMIL

Won't be recognized by all browsers

Potential examples — knowledge level, audience profile, length of time

The <customAttributes> Element

Located in the document head

Contains all <customTest> test definitions

The <customTest> Element

Definition of one custom test for use in the document body

The customTest= Attribute

IDs of all <customTest> test this body element must pass

The uid= Attribute

URI of global definition of custom test

The defaultState= attribute

The override= Attribute

Can user override assignment to body element(s)

Customization — <prefetch>

Control, timing, and adaptation of pre-loading media before its presentation

Helps whole presentations progress with fewer hitches

The <prefetch> Element

Schedules the prefetching of a particular media item

src= attribute determines this item

The mediaSize= Attribute

How much of media item's data to prefetch

The mediaTime= Attribute

How much of media item's time to prefetch

The bandwidth= Attribute

How much of the presentation's bandwitch to use for this prefetch

Alteration — Fragmentation

Spatial

coords= attribute (similar to HTML image maps)

The shape= and nohref= attributes

Temporal

The clipBegin= and clipEnd= attributes — clip with measured moments

The “marker=” Substring — clip with named moments

Temporal subparts use the begin= and end= Attributes

Nominal

Media Marker Timing — Synchronization with Named Media Portions

The “.marker()” Substring for begin= and end= Attributes

Object Linking — Linking from Named Media Portions

The fragment= Attribute for <area> Elements

XPointer for SMIL URIs in general

Alteration — <param>

The <param> Element — Passing One Parameter to the Media Presenter

The name= Attribute — the parameter's name

The value= Attribute

The valueType= Attribute

="data", URI ="ref" or media ="object" element elsewhere in presentation

The erase= Attribute — when to end display after active period ends

="whenDone" — when the element ends

="never" — after element ends, until replaced on display surface

The mediaRepeat= Attribute

="preserve" (default) or ="strip" repeat intrinsic in media

Example — strip animated GIF repeat so SMIL can repeat it instead

The sensitivity= Attribute

Can user interaction pass through this display to underlying media?

Alteration — Time Manipulation

The speed= Attribute

What proportion of the intrinsic speed should the media be played back at?

Acceleration and Deceleration

Duration of affected element remains the same

The accelerate= Attribute

What proportion of playback is accelerated, starting still at beginning

The decelerate= Attribute

What proportion of playback is decelerated to standstill at end

Run-rate Interval in between may be sped up to maintain overall duration

The autoReverse= Attribute

Media plays in reserse after playing forward

Doubles simple duration of element

Any repeating applies after reversing

CSS — CSS in native SMIL

CSS Code for SMIL Layout

The type= Attribute

Scope of CSS vs scope of SMIL Layout

Non-modularized CSS induces too much overhead

Conceptual limitations of CSS

Multiple top-level windows and independence of objects across layout windows is a problem

CSS — Text-flow

Significance of XML-defined order and nesting

SMIL — timing, typically sequential

HTML — spatial placement, left-to-right, wrap-around, top-down

Meaning of Internal Linking

SMIL — temporal seek to point in timeline

HTML — spatial scroll to top of object

Much use of "implicit" height and width

SMIL layout has only absolute positioning

CSS positioning is often complex processing of previous components

CSS — XHTML+SMIL

CSS for Media-based SMIL

XHTML+SMIL and SVG

Combining Time-based with Space-based

One, the other, or both?

Time Containers for Non-native SMIL

The timeContainer= Attribute

Makes any element a time container, such as a <p> in XHTML+SMIL

="par", ="seq", ="excl" or ="none"

The timeAction= Attribute

What aspect of the element is affected by timing

="intrinsic", ="display", ="visibility", ="style", ="class" or ="none"

Beyond Timelines — Fill and Restart

Time Slot Filling

Elements can be active longer than their media

Ended media play "echoes" in its still active element

Non-timed media (text, images) ends immediately

The fill= and fillDefault= attributes

="remove", ="freeze", ="hold" or ="transition"

="auto", ="inherit" or ="default"

Restart Timing

The restart= Attribute — Can element start again from beginning if playing?

="always", ="whenNotActive" or ="never"

or ="default" — use restartDefault= attribute

The restartDefault= Attribute

="always", ="whenNotActive" or ="never"

or ="inherit" — get from parent

Beyond Timelines — Synchronization Behavior

The syncBehavior= Attribute

="locked" — for lip synchronization

="canSlip" — for background music

="independent" of seeks on parent

The syncTolerance= Attribute

How much time media can fall out of sync by

The syncMaster= Attribute

One element is "conductor" for whole container

Beyond Timelines — min= and max=

MinMax Timing — Constraining the Active Duration

Keeps the presentation from waiting to long for delayed media

The min= Attribute — Minimum for active duration

Element must last at least a certain amount of time

The max= Attribute — Maximum for active duration

Element must end after a certain amount of time

User Events — Principles

User Interaction as Unpredictable Events in Time

SMIL Link Elements are Forward-reaching Links

The actuate="auto" assignment

firing the link when element starts, regardless of interaction

SMIL Inline Synchronization Attributes are Backward-reaching Links

User Events — Keyboard Interaction

Order of links to focus by consecutive tab key clicks

The tabindex= attribute for the <a> and <area> elements

What key click focusses this link

The accesskey= Attribute for the <a> and <area> elements

The “.accesskey()” Substring for begin= and end= Attributes

User Events — DOM Events

The “.event()” Substring

Any event for an element (id before the '.') can be put in the parantheses

Non-Interactive Events

begin and end

Interactive Events

click, mouseover, mouseout

Forward-reaching Links vs Backward-reaching Event-based Timing

Foreward: An element states what starts when it is clicked

<a id="source" href="#destination">

Backward: An element is set to begin when another is clicked

<par id="destination" begin="source.click">

Accessibility — Core Attributes

id=, title=, alt=, longdesc=, class=, xml:base=, xml:lang=

Attributes on media object elements

The alt= Attribute — contains alternative text

The longdesc= Attribute

supplement to alt, but longer and should include descriptions of areas

The readIndex= Attribute — Order to read aloud for sight-impaired

XML Attributes for Adaptation

The title= Attribute

The xml:lang= Attribute

Accessibility — Metadata

<meta> element defines properties of a document

The name= attribute is the property and the content= attribute gives the value

<meta name="title" content="Web News, 15th June 1998"/>
<meta name="base" content="http://www.cwi.nl/SMIL/webnews/"/>

The list of properties (values of name attribute) is open-ended

The <metadata> Element — RDF content

Accessibility — Principles

W3C Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI)

Guidelines for accessible (text-based) Web documents

Meaningful values for attributes like alt=, title=, abstract= and longdesc=

Meaningful content of link triggers (<a> element)

How to apply these to a fixed timeline?

Temporal Adaptation

Handling delays of download and processing

Explicit and implicit time

Temporal hierarchy of parallel and sequential composites

sets points in presentation progression for stronger sychronization

Layout Adaptation in SMIL

SMIL documents can adapt to devices with different screen sizes

layout relative to the dimensions of the player's viewport

alternative layout strategies

Switch on layout and region

Allow assigning test attributes to SMIL layout and region elements

Examples

make room for subtitles

rearrange for varying screen size