FF3/Windows CSS z-index problem with YouTube player

Question

I'm stuck on what appears to be a CSS/z-index conflict with the YouTube player. In Firefox 3 under Windows XP, Take a look at this page: http://spokenword.org/program/21396 Click on the Collect button and note that the pop-up <div> appears under the YouTube player. On other browsers the <div> appears on top. It has a z-index value of 999999. I've tried setting the z-index of the <object> element containing the player to a lower value, but that didn't work. Any idea how to get the pop-up to appear over the player?

Answer 1

Try to add the wmode parameter to be opaque like this:

(Note that it's included in both a <param> tag and a wmode attribute on the <embed> tag.)

<object width='425' height='344'> 
    <param name='movie' value='http://www.youtube.com/v/Wj_JNwNbETA&hl=en&fs=1'> 
    <param name='type' value='application/x-shockwave-flash'> 
    <param name='allowfullscreen' value='true'> 
    <param name='allowscriptaccess' value='always'> 
    <param name="wmode" value="opaque" />
    <embed width='425' height='344'
            src='http://www.youtube.com/v/Wj_JNwNbETA&hl=en&fs=1'
            type='application/x-shockwave-flash'
            allowfullscreen='true'
            allowscriptaccess='always'
            wmode="opaque"
    ></embed> 
    </object> 

Answer 2

although the recommendation by CMS is valid, there is an important update. If you want to use 'iframe' instead of 'embed' , simply add ?wmode=transparent to your video link and that does the magic. I find this more simple and clean.

Update, Feb 2014

It's been a while and this may be outdated.

Somebody reported that now &wmode=transparent works instead.

Answer 3

i've found a pure JS function that fix it in all browsers!

there you go:

function fix_flash() {
    // loop through every embed tag on the site
    var embeds = document.getElementsByTagName('embed');
    for (i = 0; i < embeds.length; i++) {
        embed = embeds[i];
        var new_embed;
        // everything but Firefox & Konqueror
        if (embed.outerHTML) {
            var html = embed.outerHTML;
            // replace an existing wmode parameter
            if (html.match(/wmode\s*=\s*('|")[a-zA-Z]+('|")/i))
                new_embed = html.replace(/wmode\s*=\s*('|")window('|")/i, "wmode='transparent'");
            // add a new wmode parameter
            else
                new_embed = html.replace(/<embed\s/i, "<embed wmode='transparent' ");
            // replace the old embed object with the fixed version
            embed.insertAdjacentHTML('beforeBegin', new_embed);
            embed.parentNode.removeChild(embed);
        } else {
            // cloneNode is buggy in some versions of Safari & Opera, but works fine in FF
            new_embed = embed.cloneNode(true);
            if (!new_embed.getAttribute('wmode') || new_embed.getAttribute('wmode').toLowerCase() == 'window')
                new_embed.setAttribute('wmode', 'transparent');
            embed.parentNode.replaceChild(new_embed, embed);
        }
    }
    // loop through every object tag on the site
    var objects = document.getElementsByTagName('object');
    for (i = 0; i < objects.length; i++) {
        object = objects[i];
        var new_object;
        // object is an IE specific tag so we can use outerHTML here
        if (object.outerHTML) {
            var html = object.outerHTML;
            // replace an existing wmode parameter
            if (html.match(/<param\s+name\s*=\s*('|")wmode('|")\s+value\s*=\s*('|")[a-zA-Z]+('|")\s*\/?\>/i))
                new_object = html.replace(/<param\s+name\s*=\s*('|")wmode('|")\s+value\s*=\s*('|")window('|")\s*\/?\>/i, "<param name='wmode' value='transparent' />");
            // add a new wmode parameter
            else
                new_object = html.replace(/<\/object\>/i, "<param name='wmode' value='transparent' />\n</object>");
            // loop through each of the param tags
            var children = object.childNodes;
            for (j = 0; j < children.length; j++) {
                try {
                    if (children[j] != null) {
                        var theName = children[j].getAttribute('name');
                        if (theName != null && theName.match(/flashvars/i)) {
                            new_object = new_object.replace(/<param\s+name\s*=\s*('|")flashvars('|")\s+value\s*=\s*('|")[^'"]*('|")\s*\/?\>/i, "<param name='flashvars' value='" + children[j].getAttribute('value') + "' />");
                        }
                    }
                }
                catch (err) {
                }
            }
            // replace the old embed object with the fixed versiony
            object.insertAdjacentHTML('beforeBegin', new_object);
            object.parentNode.removeChild(object);
        }
    }
}

now you can just run in when the page loads with jQuery:

 $(document).ready(function () {
            fix_flash();    
 });

Answer 4

We use jQuery Flash plugin to convert YouTube links to Flash movies. In this case, wmode is passed as an option in order to get the YouTube video to appear underneath the jQuery Dialog we open:

$('a[href^="http://www.youtube.com"]').flash(
    { width: nnn, height: nnn, wmode: 'opaque' }
);

Answer 5

I've noticed that wmode="opaque" terribly affects on usage of CPU. Chrome make on my notebook 50% CPU usage (without opaque ~8%).
So be careful with this option.