YouTube
You can easily add a YouTube video to your site on a specially designed YouTube page or pagelet. Like any other external web page, you could also add a page from YouTube as an External Page.
What's the difference? When you add YouTube as an External Page, your visitors will see and have access to all the functions of that particular page from YouTube--including all its tabs and links. So this is a good choice if you want to encourage them to explore related video or simply to play around in YouTube.
The YouTube page type, on the other hand, will display just one video window for the particular YouTube video you select (not all the elements surrounding the video on the YouTube page). So this page type is a good choice if you want to maintain more control over your visitor's attention.
(Note that since YouTube doesn't currently support downloading their videos, you can't use the Video page type to add video from YouTube.)
Adding a YouTube Page
If you have Preferences set to "Automatically read URLs from web browser," you can add a YouTube page very easily.
Quick method for adding a YouTube video to a site:
- Navigate to the YouTube video you want in Safari, Opera, Camino, Firefox, or OmniWeb.
- Use the "Pages" or "Pagelets" items in the toolbar or choose "Add Page" or "Add Pagelet" from the Site menu. Sandvox will insert the appropriate code and incorporate the video you've selected into the new page or pagelet.
If you want to save a YouTube video for adding later or if you don't want to have the page open while you're working, all you need to do is to copy the code for embedding video that YouTube provides for each of its videos.
Copying the embedding code for a YouTube video:
- Use the YouTube website to locate the video you require.
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Next to the video you should see this box:
- Copy all of the code in the box to the clipboard or another location where you can retrieve it later.
Next, you should create a YouTube page or pagelet. Keep in mind that pagelets are better suited to videos you plan to display in smaller sizes.
Adding a YouTube video using code you copied earlier:
Note that YouTube videos have the same size restrictions as other videos.
Settings
To edit a YouTube page:
- Select the page in the Site Outline.
- Open the Page Inspector. The top part contains general page attributes; the bottom contains settings specific to the YouTube page, as shown below.
To edit a Photo pagelet:
- Click the pagelet to select it.
- Open the Selection Inspector. The top part contains general page attributes; the bottom contains settings specific to the YouTube pagelet, as shown below.
Video Source
Paste the code for embedding the video (obtained from the YouTube site) here.
Size
Use the slider to choose the size at which the video will be displayed.
For pagelets, only the smallest size will be available.
The second largest size is 320 pixels wide, which is the most accurate (least distorted) way of viewing the video.
The third largest is the size at which the video is displayed on a YouTube page.
The largest is exactly double-sized pixels. This size is unavailable for pages that use a sidebar.
Colors
You can select two colors by clicking on the color swatches. A gradient shading between the two colors you select will be used to shade in the frame on the video controls at the bottom of the video and, if selected, the frame that appears around the rest of the video.
Show Border
Selecting this option displays a border all the way around the video.
Show Related Videos
If you select this option, Sandvox will automatically access information from YouTube about related videos. At the end of the video you've incorporated, your visitors will be given the opportunity to view these related videos, from inside your site.
YouTube icon
The YouTube icon at the bottom of the Inspector is a live link, in case you need to go back to the YouTube site while editing.
