Chris Florio - ActionScript 3.0 For Adobe Flash Professional CS5 - Classroom in a Book [2010, PDF, ENG]

GETTING STARTED
About Classroom in a Book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 1
Prerequisites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
installing Flash . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ..2
Optimizing performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 2
Copying the lesson files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 2
How to use these lessons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Standard elements in the book . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Checking for updates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Flash Player version . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 5
Additional resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 5
Adobe certification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 7
INTRODUCTION TO ACTIONSCRIPT 3.0
A brief history of Flash and ActionScript . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Actionscript 3.0 for new programmers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
For users of Actionscript 1.0 and 2.0 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 11
Formats for playing back Flash and ActionScript 3.0 files . . . . 12
Flash CS5, Flash Builder 4, and Flex . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
ActionScript in the Flash Timeline vs. external
Actionscript files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 13
That's enough background for now ........................ .. 13
1 USING CODE SNIPPETS AND NAVIGATING THE FLASH TIMELINE
Lesson overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
1 Getting started . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
F Adding ActionScript using code snippets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 16
Placing code on the Flash ‘Fmeline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .20
Some suggestions to try on your own . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .28
2 WORKING WITH EVENTS AND FUNCTIONS
Lesson overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .30
Working with event-handling functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .32
Using code snippets to create navigation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .34
Creating event listeners . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .40
Some suggestions to try on your own . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .46
3 CREATING ANIMATION WITH ACTIONSCRIPT
Lesson overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48
Reviewing the starting file . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .50
Controlling movie clip properties with ActionScript . . . . . . . . .50
Creating animation using ActionScript tweens . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 57
Some suggestions to try on your own . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .62
4 CREATING ACTIONSCRIPT IN EXTERNAL FILES
Lesson overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .66
L Creating an ActionScript file . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .68
Creating instances of a class file in Flash . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .74
I Some suggestions to try on your own . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 81
5 USING ACTIONSCRIPT AND COMPONENTS TO LOAD CONTENT
Lesson overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .84
3 Creating a List component instance and setting
S I its parameters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .86
4+“ I Adding an instance of the UlLoader component . . . . . . . . . . . .88
Adding a CHANGE event listener to the List component. . . . . 89
Loading SWF files into a UlLoader component . . . . . . . . . . . . . .89
Creating the gallery file . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 91
Adding a scroll bar to the text field . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
Some suggestions to try on your own . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .98
6 CREATING PRELOADERS IN ACTIONSCRIPT 3.0
Lesson overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .100
Tools in the testing environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .102
E.Creating a text field and progress bar to track loading . . . . . .106
..........................and other