The persistent player
How Quiet's floating video player works: it docks to a corner as readers scroll, follows them to the next page without restarting, and can be switched off in one setting.
On by default, and it needs no setup: publish a film and it works. This page explains what a reader experiences, and how to switch it off.
What a reader experiences
They open a film and press play. The video plays where it sits, at the top of the post.
They scroll down to read your notes. As the video reaches the top of the screen, it shrinks into a small player in the corner and keeps playing.
They follow a link to another page. The player stays where it is and the film keeps playing, without restarting.
They scroll back up on the film's own page and the player returns to its place.
The controls
The docked player has two buttons:
- Back to video returns the film to full size, scrolling back to it, or taking the reader back to its page if they have wandered off.
- Close mini-player stops the film and puts the player away.
Both are reachable with the keyboard, and the docked player never covers your footer: the page makes room for it while it is on screen.
It only turns on when it is needed
With nothing playing, every link on your site is an ordinary page load. The moment a film starts, Quiet starts handling links itself so playback can survive a navigation, and while it is doing that it quietly fetches a page in the background when a reader hovers or tabs onto a link, so the next page arrives quickly.
If any part of that cannot be done safely, Quiet falls back to a normal page load. A reader never ends up on a half-loaded page.
Turning it off
Go to Settings → Design & branding → Customize → Theme → Site wide.
Switch Persistent player off, and save.
Films still play, in place, on their own pages. What you lose is the corner player and the page-to-page playback, which also means every link becomes an ordinary page load again.
Worth trying both ways
The floating player suits a site where films are the point. On a writing site with the occasional video, switching it off makes the page behave in the most predictable way possible, which is its own kind of quality.
Reduced motion
A visitor whose device asks for reduced motion gets the same player with no animation: it appears in the corner rather than sliding, and the page jumps rather than scrolls when they press Back to video.
With JavaScript switched off
No floating player, and no play cue on the poster. Ghost's own video card stays playable in the body of the post, so the film is never unreachable.
Related
- The video channel, for how to publish a film.
- Site wide settings, for the switch itself.
The video channel
Set up Quiet's video channel at /videos/: films from YouTube, Vimeo or uploaded files, a player that keeps playing as readers scroll, members-only films, and channel links.
Post and page layouts
Four ways to open a post or page, each chosen with one internal tag: a portrait beside the title on either side, or the picture edge to edge or at text width. Plus the drop cap.