The Complete Animator

Software for your Enjoyment, Creativity, Productivity and Education

Iota Software Ltd - IotaFilm helper application

IotaFilm helper application for Web browsers

What it is

With this program installed as a "helper application" in Netscape or other browser, you can play back all the films on this site which were produced using The Complete Animator. It also serves as a stand-alone, freely-distributable player for any of our (or your!) animations.

Versions available

Win32 v0.02 BETA

This is a very early copy for Windows 95 and Windows NT 3.50 or later and lots of stuff in it doesn't work -- but we know everyone's desperate for this, so we've provided it anyway. Less buggy and more complete versions will follow shortly. The helper application works with Netscape and Microsoft Internet Explorer and should work with all the rest too.

Known bugs

  1. Pauses and fades don't work
  2. The window isn't quite the right size under NT <= 3.51 (it is under Win95 and NT 4.0)

Downloading IOTAFILM.EXE

The application comes as an 83K zip file. Once you've downloaded it, stick it in a directory of its own (e.g. C:\WIN32APP\IOTAFILM) and unzip it. You'll get three files: the player itself (IOTAFILM.EXE), IOTAFILM.DLL, and a README.TXT file (which you ought to read just in case). The EXE file is, of course, the one you should register as a helper application.

Standalone use

IOTAFILM.EXE can also be used from the command line to play animations. The syntax is simply 

    iotafilm andrew.tca
or whatever your animation file is called.

RiscOS v1.01

This is a full-featured playback application for RiscOS. Pauses, fades and sounds all work fine.

Downloading !IotaFilm

The application comes as an 51K Spark file.

Standalone use

!IotaFilm can also be used from the desktop to play animations. The syntax is simply 

    /<IotaFilm$Dir> andrew
or whatever your animation file is called. !IotaFilm will also load double-clicked animation files if no other application has claimed them.

Other versions

A Windows 3.1 (16-bit) version and an Acorn RiscOS version are under preparation and a Macintosh version may follow soon after.

Configuring your browser

The instructions here are for Netscape 1.1 for Windows, but others should be similar.

  1. From the Options menu, choose Preferences.
  2. From the Set Preferences On drop-down, choose Helper Applications.
  3. Click on New type...
  4. Choose a MIME type of video, and subtype of x-iota-film (other browsers may have these two choices rolled into one, as video/x-iota-film).
  5. If you like, you can give the correct file extension of .TCA in the Extensions icon (but this isn't recommended if you actually have The Complete Animator).
  6. In the Action group, click on Launch application and then Browse... and find and double-click on the IOTAFILM.EXE you installed above.
  7. That's it! Check out our films page to see if it's worked!


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