689531 - Add-on animation snippet implementation (EN only)

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Snippets Graveyard :: HTML5, defect, P1)

Description

[Dan Horner]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.7; rv:7.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/7.0
Build ID: 20110916091512

Steps to reproduce:

Can we introduce a new snippet targeted at EN language users for the Firefox channel (i.e. not Aurora or Beta).

Text (from Matej) should read: "Enhance, customize and make Firefox your own with add-ons. Find out how."

Animation, which I would like to appear in a lightbox following snippet click is here: http://web.me.com/danhorner/Site/Blank_files/FF%20576%20h264%20v6.webm.zip

For the snippet graphic, can we use the add-on box icon.

Comment 1

[Dan Horner]

Hey Laura - please can you provide an implementation milestone date for this snippet? Thanks

Comment 2

[Laura Forrest]

Hey Michael - Can you take a look at the above? Essentially this functional snippet would play a mini movie and consist of two states:

1. Normal snippet layout - no tweaks needed
2. Upon click, the snippet box should expand (to about the size of the Runfield box, or perhaps larger) and the video above should start to play; with sound default on. 

The user should remain on about:home through this process. 

Question for you: Is this technically feasible given the file above? Or will compression be needed?

Timing: Would be nice to have within the next two weeks (by 10/18). Is this possible?

Comment 3

[Dan Horner]

Michael / Laura - can I add one more requirement here; can we throw in a tracked, clickable link at the end of the movie to drive users to http://addons.mozilla.org?

Let me know if this is possible. Not a breaker if not, but certainly a very nice to have.

Comment 4

[Laura Forrest]

Hey Chris or Mike - This snippet is also a priority for Q4. Is there a dev that can help out here? 

Timing: would like during the first part of the quarter. Since we're already pushing up against the 10/18 timeframe what would you suggest?

Comment 5

[Chris More [:cmore]]

Laura: A soon as we get a complete list of engagement priorities, we are going to assign people to projects for Q4. We have people temporarily penciled in, but most are assigned to more projects then what is possible. I have a meeting with engagement today to discuss the priorities and I hope that we have enough information to plan the rest of the quarter. This project is not a major project and it will be planned accordingly as soon as we hear from engagement. Thanks!

Comment 6

[Osmose [:osmose, :mkelly]]

Can someone attach or link to the aforementioned add-on box icon?

Comment 7

[Osmose [:osmose, :mkelly]]

A demo of this snippet is available on staging: point your snippets addon to https://snippets.stage.mozilla.com and set your name to 'popout'.

The snippet is still missing an icon; let me know where to find a copy of it and I'll add it in.

The video itself is also too large, currently clocking in at 9mb; it won't be downloaded until the user clicks on the snippet, but we should really aim for something like .5mb if possible, considering the amount of traffic a snippet gets. The video is being scaled to 560x315 pixels, so reducing the video to that size would be a great start. I don't know much about video encoding, though, so we'd need someone else to downsize and compress the video.

The link at the end is also missing, but there's a few ways we could do that that I can think of:

1. Have the link appear below the video after it finishes playing.
2. Have the url at the end of the video be clickable; this may not feel natural to users, and only seems to work well if the controls on the video are disabled.
3. Have the text message above the video change into a link either once the video starts playing or when it is finished.

Let me know which you prefer, or if you want another effect.

Comment 8

[Michael Morgan [:morgamic]]

Rainer or Spencer can help with this.  Usually we host stuff on video.mozilla.org which copies over to a CDN.  So I'd recommend:
1. Getting Rainer or Spencer to reduce the overall size of the video to the desired dimensions
2. placing the video on the video server (as we have done before)
3. updating the snippet code to a) use the smaller video content b) point to the right place

Comment 9

[Laura Forrest]

I still have to check using the snippet add-on but answers to other questions inline.

(In reply to Michael Kelly [:mkelly] from comment #7)
> A demo of this snippet is available on staging: point your snippets addon to
> https://snippets.stage.mozilla.com and set your name to 'popout'.
> 
> The snippet is still missing an icon; let me know where to find a copy of it
> and I'll add it in.

You can use this: https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-WVxNNMtVnUw/TcLk37GpBaI/AAAAAAAABfs/WhjjggmUu_Y/s50/40x50_Video3.jpg
 
> The video itself is also too large, currently clocking in at 9mb; it won't
> be downloaded until the user clicks on the snippet, but we should really aim
> for something like .5mb if possible, considering the amount of traffic a
> snippet gets. The video is being scaled to 560x315 pixels, so reducing the
> video to that size would be a great start. I don't know much about video
> encoding, though, so we'd need someone else to downsize and compress the
> video.

See Morgamics notes above. 

> The link at the end is also missing, but there's a few ways we could do that
> that I can think of:
> 
> 1. Have the link appear below the video after it finishes playing.
> 2. Have the url at the end of the video be clickable; this may not feel
> natural to users, and only seems to work well if the controls on the video
> are disabled.
> 3. Have the text message above the video change into a link either once the
> video starts playing or when it is finished.

Thanks for the ideas! 

I like option #3 - showing the link once the video starts playing, since that gives users the option to click without having to wait for the movie to end. 

> Let me know which you prefer, or if you want another effect.

Comment 10

[Dan Horner]

Hi Laura - for the snippet icon, I'd prefer to use the add-on image:

https://picasaweb.google.com/113705421631975388425/StartPageSnippetIcons?authkey=Gv1sRgCKSU07Gh2cbmeA&gsessionid=gnks1XC2EbFIPdA5xz8bIg#5603731182204354306

Comment 11

[Osmose [:osmose, :mkelly]]

The snippet on stage has been updated to what should be the final version. It links to the correct video, hosted on videos.mozilla.org and clocking in at 3.7 MB.

Two things:
1. What versions of Firefox will this be going out to? I'll need to test on them to ensure the video and animations work properly.
2. Should we change the text on the snippet to better indicate that it plays a video? Users with limited bandwidth may have issues with suddenly downloading a large file after clicking.

Comment 12

[Laura Forrest]

(In reply to Michael Kelly [:mkelly] from comment #11)
> The snippet on stage has been updated to what should be the final version.
> It links to the correct video, hosted on videos.mozilla.org and clocking in
> at 3.7 MB.
> 
> Two things:
> 1. What versions of Firefox will this be going out to? I'll need to test on
> them to ensure the video and animations work properly.

GA - en-US. Lots of traffic. :)

> 2. Should we change the text on the snippet to better indicate that it plays
> a video? Users with limited bandwidth may have issues with suddenly
> downloading a large file after clicking.

Not sure yet as I can't preview this. Attached is my snippet add-on settings - let me know if I'm doing it right. That thin never seems to work for me.

Comment 13

[Laura Forrest]

Attachment: Add-On Settings

Comment 14

[Dan Horner]

Hi Laura - please can you provide an update on implementation?

Comment 15

[Laura Forrest]

I've gotten this to preview alright and is ready to go live after QA. 

Raymond - have a look. This is a functional persona that should not interfere with Session Restore, the search box, or any other Fx functionality.

Comment 16

[Laura Forrest]

Hey Raymond - We'd like to launch this by EOW. Does that give you enough time to QA? Let me know if you have any questions, I know this is the first time you're QA-ing one of these functional snippets. Thanks!

Comment 17

[Laura Forrest]

Raymond - any updates here?

Comment 18

[raymond [:retornam] (inactive)]

]
(In reply to Laura Forrest from comment #17)
> Raymond - any updates here?

Hi sorry for the late response, my other projects are taking up a lot of my time. I'll try to get this done by tomorrow

Comment 19

[raymond [:retornam] (inactive)]

(In reply to Laura Forrest from comment #15)
> I've gotten this to preview alright and is ready to go live after QA. 
> 
> Raymond - have a look. This is a functional persona that should not
> interfere with Session Restore, the search box, or any other Fx
> functionality.

Video works es expected.

Comment 20

[Chris More [:cmore]]

Laura: When do you want to launch this snippet? We should probably wait until the network is healthy and stable for at least 24 hours.

Comment 21

[Dan Horner]

Hi Chris - as soon as possible please.

Comment 22

[Chris More [:cmore]]

Laura: Is this Snippet live yet on production?

Comment 23

[Osmose [:osmose, :mkelly]]

Stale campaign. I can't remember if we went live with this or not.