In his new book, Flash programming luminary Colin Moock covers everything there is to know about the Flash MX 2004's new language and methodologies for producing movies, animation, and applications on the Web. Moock takes readers through this important new territory with his trademark easy-to-understand style and expertise. Experienced Flash developers, and programmers coming from other languages, will love the sheer depth of Moock's coverage. Novice programmers will appreciate the low- jargon explanations of basic concepts that are glossed over in advanced programming books.

Colin Moock is an independent web guru with a passion for networked creativity and expression. He is author of the world-renowned guide to Flash programming, ActionScript for Flash MX: The Definitive Guide (O Reilly & Associates, 2003). A web professional since 1995, Moock runs one of the Web s most venerable Flash developer sites, http://www.moock.org. He spends most of his time pursuing his cardinal interest, multiuser application development, and working on Unity (http://www.moock.org/unity), moock.org s complete commercial framework for creating and deploying multiuser applications for Macromedia Flash.

Foreword

xi

Preface

xv

Part I. The ActionScript 2.0 Language

ActionScript 2.0 Overview

3

(10)

ActionScript 2.0 Features

3

(2)

Features Introduced by Flash Player 7

5

(1)

Flash MX 2004 Version 2 Components

6

(2)

ActionScript 1.0 and 2.0 in Flash Player 6 and 7

8

(4)

Let's Go OOP

12

(1)

Object-Oriented ActionScript

13

(11)

Procedural Programming and Object-Oriented Programming

13

(1)

Key Object-Oriented Programming Concepts

14

(5)

But How Do I Apply OOP?

19

(4)

On with the Show!

23

(1)

Datatypes and Type Checking

24

(35)

Why Static Typing?

30

(1)

Type Syntax

31

(5)

Compatible Types

36

(4)

Built-in Dynamic Classes

40

(1)

Circumventing Type Checking

41

(4)

Casting

45

(9)

Datatype Information for Built-in Classes

54

(1)

ActionScript 2.0 Type Checking Gotchas

55

(3)

Up Next: Creating Classes---Your Own Datatypes!

58

(1)

Classes

59

(65)

Defining Classes

59

(5)

Constructor Functions (Take 1)

64

(1)

Properties

65

(16)

Methods

81

(31)

Constructor Functions (Take 2)

112

(7)

Completing the Box Class

119

(4)

Putting Theory into Practice

123

(1)

Authoring an ActionScript 2.0 Class

124

(34)

Class Authoring Quick Start

124

(1)

Designing the ImageViewer Class

125

(4)

ImageViewer Implementation (Take 1)

129

(5)

Using ImageViewer in a Movie

134

(4)

ImageViewer Implementation (Take 2)

138

(8)

ImageViewer Implementation (Take 3)

146

(11)

Back to the Classroom

157

(1)

Inheritance

158

(57)

A Primer on Inheritance

158

(4)

Subclasses as Subtypes

162

(1)

An OOP Chat Example

163

(3)

Overriding Methods and Properties

166

(27)

Constructor Functions in Subclasses

193

(5)

Subclassing Built-in Classes

198

(3)

Augmenting Built-in Classes and Objects

201

(1)

The Theory of Inheritance

202

(11)

Abstract and Final Classes Not Supported

213

(1)

Let's Try Inheritance

214

(1)

Authoring an ActionScript 2.0 Subclass

215

(9)

Extending ImageViewer's Capabilities

215

(1)

The ImageViewerDeluxe Skeleton

216

(1)

Adding setPosition() and setSize() Methods

217

(1)

Autosizing the Image Viewer

218

(5)

Using ImageViewerDeluxe

223

(1)

Moving Right Along

223

(1)

Interfaces

224

(14)

The Case for Interfaces

224

(2)

Interfaces and Multidatatype Classes

226

(1)

Interface Syntax and Use

227

(5)

Multiple Type Inheritance with Interfaces

232

(4)

Up Next, Packages

236

(2)

Packages

238

(11)

Package Syntax

239

(5)

Defining Packages

244

(1)

Package Access and the Classpath

245

(3)

Simulating Packages in ActionScript 1.0

248

(1)

Just a Little More Theory

248

(1)

Exceptions

249

(34)

The Exception-Handling Cycle

250

(5)

Handling Multiple Types of Exceptions

255

(9)

Exception Bubbling

264

(4)

The finally Block

268

(3)

Nested Exceptions

271

(4)

Control Flow Changes in try/catch/finally

275

(2)

Limitations of Exception Handling in ActionScript 2.0

277

(3)

From Concepts to Code

280

(3)

Part II. Application Development

An OOP Application Framework

283

(8)

The Basic Directory Structure

284

(1)

The Flash Document (.fla file)

284

(1)

The Classes

285

(2)

The Document Timeline

287

(2)

The Exported Flash Movie (.swf file)

289

(1)

Projects in Flash MX Professional 2004

290

(1)

Let's See It in Action!

290

(1)

Using Components with ActionScript 2.0

291

(25)

Currency Converter Application Overview

291

(1)

Preparing the Flash Document

292

(3)

The CurrencyConverter Class

295

(13)

Handling Component Events

308

(7)

Components Complete

315

(1)

MovieClip Subclasses

316

(16)

The Duality of MovieClip Subclasses

317

(1)

Avatar: A MovieClip Subclass Example

318

(8)

Avatar: The Composition Version

326

(1)

Issues with Nested Assets

327

(3)

A Note on MovieClip Sub-subclasses

330

(1)

Curiouser and Curiouser

331

(1)

Distributing Class Libraries

332

(17)

Sharing Class Source Files

332

(6)

Sharing Classes Without Sharing Source Files

338

(8)

Solving Real OOP Problems

346

(3)

Part III. Design Pattern Examples in ActionScript 2.0

Introduction to Design Patterns

349

(3)

Bring on the Patterns

351

(1)

The Observer Design Pattern

352

(29)

Implementing Observer in ActionScript 2.0

354

(6)

Logger: A Complete Observer Example

360

(18)

Memory Management Issues with Observer

378

(2)

Beyond Observer

380

(1)

The Singleton Design Pattern

381

(5)

Implementing Singleton in ActionScript 2.0

381

(2)

The Singleton Pattern in the Logger Class

383

(1)

Singleton Versus Class Methods and Class Properties

384

(1)

A Warning Against Singletons as Globals

385

(1)

On to User Interfaces

385

(1)

The Model-View-Controller Design Pattern

386

(37)

The General Architecture of MVC

388

(4)

A Generalized MVC Implementation

392

(6)

An MVC Clock

398

(23)

Further Exploration

421

(2)

The Delegation Event Model

423

(58)

Structure and Participants

423

(4)

The Flow of Logic

427

(1)

Core Implementation

427

(5)

NightSky: A Delegation Event Model Example

432

(10)

Other Event Architectures in ActionScript

442

(1)

From Some Place to Some OtherPlace

443

(4)

Part IV. Appendixes

A. ActionScript 2.0 Language Quick Reference

447

(31)

B. Differences from ECMAScript Edition 4

478

(3)

Index

481

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