This was a typical call/scenario we saw for some Xcelsius developers today:
Hello, I decided to open up a dashboard that I was recently working on and the canvas will not open up today. The Excel spreadsheet opens fine with all the data but the canvas will not. I decided to try and open up other dashboards that have worked just fine in the past and again the canvas will not open up.
Any ideas on what the problem may be and how I can get the canvas to open?
It looks like the new release of Flash (v20) causes issues with Xcelsius.
The good news first: Existing SWF generated files were able to still be viewed without any issues.
So what’s the problem?
The problem is one where you are unable to create a new dashboard, or preview an existing dashboard, because you are unable to open up the dashboard canvas within the Xcelsius designer and so you find yourself staring at this type of screen:
Turns out that Flash Player 20 had been automatically installed on the machines. The actual version of Flash was 20.0.0.267 which was automatically installed on 12/29/15.
Here’s what to do about it:
You can uninstall version 20.0.0.267 of Flash and download a working archived version from the following link: https://helpx.adobe.com/flash-player/kb/archived-flash-player-versions.html and then install it.
At the end of the install, make sure you uncheck the automated updates box and check the one where you will be prompted for any future Flash updates.
To turn off automatic Flash Player updates:
Open a .swf file and right click anywhere in the canvas or white area surrounding the dashboard. Click on the “Global Settings” option:
Select the Updates tab and click on the Change Update Settings button:
You may get prompted for a User Account Control message that asks “Do you want to allow the following program to make changes to this computer?” Click Yes.
There are three options: allow, notify me, and never check for updates. Below you can see that we are doing something not recommended but that’s because we want to have control of our environment. You be the judge and choose for yourself between “Notify me” and “Never check” for updates option.
And that’s it! If you choose “Never”, you can always go to the Adobe site to update to the latest version at a future date if the need arises.