
7
CHAPTER 1
About your installation
This chapter describes the installation directories and the files that are installed during the
Macromedia Flash Communication Server MX 1.5 installation process.
For information on how to install the server and the authoring extensions, see Installing Flash
Communication Server.
About client-side and server-side files
During installation, you determine where your client-side application files are installed. Server-
side application files are installed in a default location. You should understand the difference
between these files:
• Client-side application files are SWF and HTML files. The installer installs SWF and HTML
files for the Macromedia Flash Communication Server MX 1.5 sample applications in either
the web publishing directory of your choice or the installation directory. However, when you
begin developing applications, you can store the client-side files for your applications
anywhere.
• Server-side application files include script files (ASC files), stream files (such as FLVs), and
shared object files (FSOs) and must always remain on the server computer. By default, the
installer installs server-side files for the sample applications in C:\Program
Files\Macromedia\Flash Communication Server MX\applications in Windows, and /opt/
macromedia/fcs/applications on UNIX. (This directory is referred to as the applications
directory.) The location of the applications directory is written to the
<AppsDir> tag in the
Vhost.xml file. The server will therefore always look for server-side application files in the
location specified in
<AppsDir>.
When you begin developing applications, you must create a registered application directory for
your application in the applications directory with the name of the application and keep the
application’s server-side files there. For example, for your application called my_app, create a
my_app subdirectory in the applications directory and put the server-side files for my_app in
that subdirectory (.../applications/myapp).
During development, you can keep client-side and server-side application files together, if you
want. When you deploy applications on a public server, you'll need to separate client files from
your server-side source files. Your SWF and HTML files should be accessible through a web
server, if you’re using a web server. Your server-side ASC files, your audio/video FLV files, FSO
files, and your ActionScript FLA source files should not be accessible to a user browsing your
website.
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