Scratch

Found a glitch in Scratch's Flash player?

Please report it here!
We need your help making sure the flash player works well, since soon we'll be moving to Scratch 2.0.

Please be sure and include:

1. A link to the project showing the problem (or the name of the project if you don't know how to make a link)

2. Any directions we will need to see the problem.  Example:  Jump off the top platform and the guy freezes...

3. Which browser you are using.  Example:  Chrome, IE9, FireFox

Thanks for your help 

Some things that we already know about that we aren't planning on fixing:

Stamping with a Ghosted Sprite
The way ghosted stamps has changed - please see Sparks project here for more details and a work-around if this broke your project.

Play Note and Play Drum sounds
All the instruments in the Play Note and Play Drum had to be replaced and will sound somewhat different.  The instrument numbers should map back to a sound that is pretty similar - but there will be differences.

Anti-aliasing
Sharp edges on artwork will be blended by dithering the pixels to slightly different shades.  Some people like this look - others not so much.  It's an artistic design choice.

Also be aware that the Flash player scales when you zoom in and out in your browser, which can distort the graphics slightly. If the text is hard to read or the graphics look strange, make sure that your browser is set to view the page at actual size.

Timing issues
The Flash player is a completely different set of code than Scratch 1.4.  So some operations are going to run faster and some might run slower.  This can result in changes to the timing of a Scratch project.  There's not a lot we can do about that - you might have to make some scripting changes to get the same timing.

Some things that we know about that we are planning on fixing but haven't fixed yet:

Hidden Sprites sensing the Mouse
Currently, the <touching mouse pointer> block is not sensing when the sprite is hidden.  This has been added to the bug list to be fixed.

Draggable Sprites also being affected by Movement blocks
We've found a couple of cases where a sprite has been unlocked to make it draggable - but there are also movement blocks active while it is being dragged.  The result is some weird movement behavior.  This has been added to the bug list to be fixed.

Variable values with trailing non-number characters
In Scratch 1.4, you can use a variable in a math calculation, even if it has characters other than numbers at the end of it (like "320 feet").  The extra characters are ignored.  Currently, the Flash player is not being so forgiving and is setting those variables to zero during the calculation.  This has been added to the bug list to be fixed.

The Stop All block doesn't stop sounds that are playing
If you have a sound playing and the Stop All block runs - the sound does not stop.  This has been added to the bug list to be fixed.

Scratch Player not Loading/Flash not Installed
There are three possible problems: (1) the Scratch player is slow to load over a slow connection, (2) you don't have Adobe Flash, or (3) you do have Adobe Flash, but it is disabled or "blocked".

If (1) is your problem, then be patient. It can take two minutes or more for the Flash player to download over a slow connection. After that, it should stay in your browser's cache for a while (24 hours, I think), so it should start faster after the first time.

To see if your problem is (2) or (3),visit:

    http://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/find-version-flash-player.html

If you don't have Flash, that page will tell you how to install it. If you do have Flash and it says you don't, Flash may be blocked or disabled. See:

    http://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/installation-problems-flash-player-windows.html

Some other browser also have settings for disabling/enabling Flash. If you have trouble installing or enabling Flash, one possible solution is to use the Chrome browser, which has the latest Flash built in.

Edit by Lightnin: This post is under my name but Paddle2See did pretty much all the  work, making this a clear and succinct summary of all the issues. So: Credit to Paddle2See!

Last edited by johnadmin (2012-10-24 09:16:55)