Flash :: Enumerating / Redefine Properties

Enumerating The Library?
If I have 400 logo images in the library sorted into 4 folders, is there any way I can use AS to programmatically load those images onto the stage with a nice, small, efficient function instead of referencing them all by absolute names?

The goal here is to create 4 movie clips, each of which loops through an animated slideshow of a unique set of logos. I don't think I can load the images from an external location because the .swf needs to be embedded in a PowerPoint presentation. Another requirement is that additional logos need to be added easily later on.

Under time constraints, I was forced to do this project the "wrong way" first, doing all of the slideshow animations manually on the movieclip timelines, which is very repetetive and inefficient and doesn't meet the ease-of-expansion requirement at all. But now that I have time, I want to go back and do it the right way with AS.

To me, the "right way" would be to create a dynamic, AS-driven movieclip that only needs one piece of information provided: the name of a folder. Its code would then enumerate every asset within that folder of the library and load it into an array, then execute an animation code loop for each item in the array. This way I could just import new logos into the library in the right folders and they would automatically be used the next time the movie is compiled. Additionally, doing the animation with AS should make it much easier to change the style of animation in just a few lines of code instead of hundreds of tweens on individual timelines all over the place.

Are my goals reasonable here? I don't have much of a background in Flash. The most I ever did was this bubblewrap game many many years ago, which used only 5 keyframes of the main timeline and a whole bunch of AS2 code. But that was easier because I only had about 6 to 10 unique images of bubbles to access via AS, so referencing them by name wasn't a problem. With hundreds of logos, it seems like it would be just as much work to get them all accessible by AS as it would to just animate them on the stage, unless I can load them from folders as I've described.

Any insight or (re)direction would be greatly appreciated!

Enumerating Movie Clips..
Hey guys,

Its been a while since ive posted in the help forum hehe and its been a while since i touched flash but i have a flash MX 2k4 Question....

Is there an easy way to enumerate Movie clips?
I want to be able to drop a few MC's in another MC and dyanmically loop thru all of those mc's to do something. I didnt know if macromedia had that functionality..

ex:

MainMC
>> SubMC1
>> SubMC2

I want to be able to just drop 5 or 500 mc's into the MC and have the code enumerate thru the ones that are there.

Anybody have any ideas?

Enumerating Object Attributes
hi all!

i'm working on a project and has fallen into this problem.
i have a php script witch queries the mysql database.
the result is given back to me as an array of objects (mysql_fetch_object);

in flash i have:

Code:
clsMySQL.onResult = function(result){
trace(result);
}
witch gives me: [object Object][object Object][and so on][object Object] in the output window

but if i use something like this:

Code:
clsMySQL.onResult = function(result){
trace(result[0].firstname);
trace(result[0].lastname);
}
i'll get: Joe Doe, and thanks to this i can go like this:

Code:
clsMySQL.onResult = function(result){
myPersons[0].firstname = result[0].firstname;
myPersons[0].lastname = result[0].lastname
}
this is great, but assuming i'll have a lot of different functions, that return many
different object types, i would have to create a responder for each of them, witch is what i want to avoid.

the question is: is there a way to enumerate the attributes (firstname, lastname...) of the object, so i could have only one responder? then i could
pass the object type (myPerson, myAccount...) to the responder, so the
"myPerson" and "first" in the code above could be replaced with whatever i want?

i hope i made my sefl clear. my english is not so good, as i want it to be
take care, and thanks for your time.

Enumerating Files (Checking If They Exist)
Hey,
I'm trying to make a sort-of dynamic photo album in flash, which checks for images in a directory. What I have so far will work for a fixed number of files, but I want something a little more flexible. To try to enumerate the files, I tried this:

ActionScript Code:
_root.onLoad
{
while(msg_true = 1)
{
fileExists=new LoadVars();
fileExists.onLoad=function(success)
{
//success is true if the file exists, false if it doesnt
if(success)
{
maxpic++;
numpic++;
}
else
{
msg_true = 0;
}
}
fileExists.load("images\image"+numpic+".jpg") //initiate the test
}
}
When I try to test the movie, it just hangs for a little bit, then Flash shows an error message which says the script is causing flash to run slowly.

What I want it to do is determine how many files there are in the directory so that I will be able to know which file is the last file.

Is there either some way to modify this script so that it will work, or is there another way of enumerating files without using PHP?

Thanks in advance,
Nicky

Can You Redefine A Function Once Declared?
on frame 1 i'm using this script:

function wait() { // waits a few seconds, then plays sound
mysound1 = new Sound();
mysound1.attachSound("mysound1");
mysound1.start(0, 999999);
clearInterval(waitInt);
}
waitInt = setInterval(wait,5000);
}

Works a treat, then on frame 2 i'm using this script:

function wait() { //waits a few seconds, then plays sound
mysound2 = new Sound();
mysound2.attachSound("mysound2");
mysound2.start(0, 999999);
clearInterval(waitInt);
}
waitInt = setInterval(wait,5000);
}

Except this time, after the short pause it starts to play mysound1 again - as if i've locked the definition of my function to that sound.. can anyone tell me how I need to alter my code in frame 2 to redefine it and play mysound2?

Redefine GetURL And Fscommand
Hi there,

I'm trying to build a little flash app that detects when a loaded movie uses getURL or fscommand. I'd like to try and kind of redefine these functions globally. I can redefine getURL on a MovieClip using:

MovieClip.prototype.getURL = function ....

but that only works when you use this.getURL on a button, not plain old global getURL.

Does anyone know how to override these global functions and redefine them?

Thanks for your help.

Mark.

GetURL Error... Can't Redefine Value
I've built a Flash movie that has several buttons in it linking to separate web pages. Two of the URLs need to be changed, so I changed them in the Actions Panel. However, when I export and test the movie after saving, the URLs repeatedly go to the old URL location, not the new one.

I've tried deleting the actions and reapplying them. I've tried deleting All ASO and Test Files. Is there a way to clear out Flash's file cache? Is Flash unable to handle a .php address? ?????? Our site launch is today and I am getting very frustrated. See code below...
_______________________________________________________________

Original Code (this link worked fine, but needed to be changed to code below...):
onRelease = function() {
getURL("

Redefine Variable After XML Is Loaded?
hey everyone. hopefully there is an easy solution for this... i'm basically an actionscript rookie and it's had me stumped for days. i've come REALLY close to what i want, but just can't get it that final step that i need. here is the situation:

i am using claudio's scrollbar to scroll an rss feed (compiled into an XML file). i have a variable h2 which is equal to the height of a box within the movie clip containing the scrolling content. the height of the box is equal to the maxscroll of the externally loading XML file. the box *does* resize properly (tested with trace), but only after the variable h2 is already defined... so variable contains the original size of the box and not the new size. how can i get the variable to update so that the entire external file can be seen with the scroller?

Do I Need To Redefine Instance In A Class?
hey
Lets say i have a circle [instance name = countyA]

and i have a separate actionscript file that sets it to true or false

public function showThink(county:MovieClip):void
{

county.visible=true;
}

when i test this with showThink(countyA);

i get Access of undefined property countyA.

Do i need to redefine this in my actionscript?

Redefine OnLoad Handler
Hi,

Why does this only work for _level0, not for toto? Or only if toto uses loadMovie? Thanks

Code:

MovieClip.prototype.onLoad = function() {
trace(this);
};
_root.createEmptyMovieClip("toto", 500);
stop();

Flash MX - Redefine Trace Function
Hi all,

I wish to replace the existing trace() function within FlashMX with a customised function that outputs these into a text box.

I want to retain the original trace functions in the code so I can turn it on and off.

I've tried movieclip.prototype.oldTrace=movieclip.prototype.t race etc to no avail.

Thanks.

Redefine The Center Of A Drawn Object
Is there any way to redefine the center (for scaling and rotation purposes) of a drawn object?

For example, if I draw a rectangle using graphics.drawRect(), is there any way I can redefine where the center point is so I can scale/rotate it from the middle and not the top-left corner?

Reusing/redefine URLRequest & Sound
im just starting out with as3, my first project is a mp3 player...

ActionScript Code:
ar musicURL:URLRequest = new URLRequest("music.mp3");var sndMusic:Sound = new Sound(musicURL);var channel1:SoundChannel = new SoundChannel();function stopClick(evt:Event):void {channel1.stop();}bStop.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, stopClick);function playmusicClick(evt:Event):void {channel1.stop();channel1 = sndMusic.play();}bMusicPlay.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, playmusicClick);//LOAD NEW MP3 INTO CHANNEL 1function playmusicClick2(evt:Event):void {<b>musicURL=URLRequest("music.mp3");sndMusic=Sound(musicURL);</b>channel1.stop();channel1 = sndMusic.play();}bMusicPlay2.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, playmusicClick2);

im having trouble reusing the URLRequest & Sound on channel1.
it works if i recreate the objects URL request and Sound
like this:

ActionScript Code:
function playmusicClick2(evt:Event):void {channel1.stop();var musicURL:URLRequest = new URLRequest("music2.mp3");var sndMusic:Sound = new Sound(musicURL);channel1 = sndMusic.play();}bMusicPlay2.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, playmusicClick2);

but is there a way to redefine and reuse the
musicURL and sndMusic without recreating them?

thanks for any help

Kill Or Redefine The (Hardcopy) Print Screen Button
Is it possible to either kill or redefine the Hardcopy Print Screen button when using Flash 5.

I would like this button to open another movie with different content.

Any ideas welcome!

Thanks

How Do I Trace The Properties Of An Object's Properties?
I forgot to put it in the title so I'll just place it here; I am using AS 2.0. I know that there are other ways to accomplish the goal that am after, but I was wondering if anyone knows of a way to access the properties of an object's properties?

Here is the code that I thought of, even though it doesn't work

var a:Object = new Object();
a.bproperty = 0; //lowerlevel properties
a.cproperty = 1; // lowerlevel properties
var d:Object = new Object();
d.e = a; // upper level properties

for(var i in d){
for(var j in d.i){
trace(i + " = higher level lower level= " +j);
}
}

I know that you can enter the following code to view the 'lower level' properties of d.e:

for(var i in d.e)

This really just boils down to how I am organizing the code(I have ideas on what do next, and i am 99% sure that I can get them to work), and if there is a way to dynamically access the properties of the objects properties, It will save me from creating yet another large block of code for my project. If you want to see the unfinished project, go to http://www.garrettchristopherson.com

Properties Of .swf?
What is the naming convention used for grabbing properties from the .swf file!?
ex. I'm trying to find the height of the .swf or the x, y co-ords...just not sure what name to use for the .swf

Take Off All The Properties In A .swf?
I've been doing flash for over a year now, but I've never found out how to take off all the properties in a .swf. I've seen the allowscale = "false" or what not, but I know there's more. How do I make it so that when they right click on the stage, that it will only show "settings, about macromedia flash 6".

Thanks for all your help,
-Kac

Help~ Getting Properties
Hi there,

I need in getting the name of an movie-clip with in an movie-clip and put it into a variable name....

this is what i have...
(1) an movie-clip; call Cricle
(2) within the movie-clip, i have another 3 objects; Blue_color, Red_color, Yellow_color...

And by clicking on a button beside, i can change the color....
After changing the color how can i get the name of the movie-clip???

thankz in adv....
-----------
J3ff

X-Y Properties
I am trying to build one of them slidey square thingies, yanno the kind? The ones where you slide the little squares around in an erm larger square trying to reassemble the picture..

There is one blank square of course and I am using this blank square's x and y to determine if and how the clicked picture square can slide.

ie.
If this._y = blanksquare._y(-100)
then set property this._y to blanksquare._y
and set the blanksquare._y to blanksquare._y(-100)

And I can't get it to happen.. anyone built one these things before or can point me to some help it would be appreciated...muchly..urghh.. This is gonna keep me awake I know it..

Properties Help
in mx actionscript, how can i change the properties of a 'movie clip' to a 'button' and vice versa?

Help.. Properties...
i am doing this school yearbook using flash. i have a main movie, and all the rest are sub swfs. the main movie is 800 * 600. and the sub movies are smaller than that. the problem is that i used actionscript in one of my movies that makes snow fall randomly in the movie, with respect to the sub movies' width and height or something else that i dont know. the problem is that when i load that sub movie into the main movie, the whole snow actionscript doesnt work anymore because of the different dimensions or something. is there any way i can make the submovie follow its own properties when loaded into the main movie? i am kinda new to this. hope i can get help asap coz deadline is this week. thanks..

Properties...
i am doing this school yearbook using flash. i have a main movie, and all the rest are sub swfs. the main movie is 800 * 600. and the sub movies are smaller than that. the problem is that i used actionscript in one of my movies that makes snow fall randomly in the movie, with respect to the sub movies' width and height or something else that i dont know. the problem is that when i load that sub movie into the main movie, the whole snow actionscript doesnt work anymore because of the different dimensions or something. is there any way i can make the submovie follow its own properties when loaded into the main movie? i am kinda new to this. hope i can get help asap coz deadline is this week. thanks..

Doc Properties
I have a document which is 350px by 350px. then I have an image which get smaller and larger depending on what value it is sent.

left._height = hgt;
left._width = wdt;

when it get larger then 350, the sides get cut off. is there any way to make the document properties get larger as the image gets larger?

i've tried something this, but i can't get it:
document._xscale = hgt;

Properties
hi,
I asked this question before but I think it was too confusing. I will try again:

I have a movie clip playing in a main timeline. I am controling the frame it plays with a slider (in the main timeline). What would cause the properties of the movie clip to reset without being told (visibility).

Perhaps this is still not worded well (?)...Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks

Thanks

ID Properties
Setting Flash ID in the HTML
I'm following a tutorial it which it says

"you must set both the name and ID properties of the Flash movie on you html page to "shootthemup"

I've managed to set the name of the file to shootthemup, but how tdo I set the ID properties in HTML?

Any help would be greatfully received.

Leroy

Set Properties To All Mc Except One
Hello,

I want to know how can I make that a button sets the visibiliy 0 to all the mc on the frame except one called "mc5". By the way what I have is this:

on (release) {
setProperty("mc5", _visible, "100");
}

Thanks in advance

_x & _y Properties
Hey,
same calendar as in
http://www.actionscript.org/forums/s...6&goto=newpost

But another issue.
I need the tooltip to move away from my stage's boundries, for this purpose I am giving it this "frame" action after defining xStageL and xStageR in the root:

_x = this._x;

this.onEnterFrame = function() {
if ((_parent._x - this._width / 2) <= _root.xStageL){
_x = (_x + this._width / 2);
}
if ((_parent._x + this._width / 2) >= _root.xStageR){
_x = (_x - this._width / 2);
}
}

But what I'm getting is the tooltip going in the new x direction indefinetely, not staying in the new x coord...

see attached files (and let me know if you have any answers for the other thread's questions)

thxhttp://www.actionscript.org/forums/s...6&goto=newpost

Properties - HELP
You know when you right-click a movie you get all the options like 'play' and 'loop' is there a way to disable that? I've seen some movies only have a couple of the options, rather than all the others that are usually there.

Oh, hi, I'm new btw!

Properties, Properties, Properties,
hey there..
I'm so stuck and sick of this one,
I made a function to scale and move my mc, I
want to make a folding paper interface.
then I had to skew it so I put a skew function in it
to skew the mc to the left or right.
The first issue is, now nothing works
Don't know what I'm doing wrong.
Second issue, there's isn't an ease
in the skew.

I don't know where to begin so
I thought maybe you folks could help a little !

thanks

[i] Properties ?
Hello,

Does anyone know why I can't access the _x property of buttonArray[i]._x. Here is my code:

-------------------------------------------------------------
layoutNav = function() {
buttonArray = new Array("aLogo_mc", "bLogo_mc", "cLogo_mc");
buttonsY = 10;
for (var i=0; i < buttonArray.length; i++) {
this.attachMovie(buttonArray[i], buttonArray[i], 10 + i);
buttonArray[i]._x = 10;
buttonArray[i]._y = buttonsY;
buttonArray[i].onRelease = function() {
kickFeed();
}
buttonsY += 28;
}
}
-------------------------------------------------------------

Thanks,
Stephen.

Set Properties - Get Properties
Hey Guys,

Just been playing around with the tutorials, on the Set properties/Get properties. Everything is all cool, except the "instance name" aspect. I dnt really understand that too well.

Is it possible to change an Mc Name dynamically?
If you look at my FLA when you hit the top left red button you will get a trace of the mcName as "square".

Now if you input a new mc Name on the right hand side, you will see it change on the left hand side. But i want to know why it doesnt remain as the new mc Name, it still goes back to square.

Any suggestions would be great thankyou.

Properties Bar
Ok a few minutes ago I was happily attempting to use Mac. Flash MX 04 and as I went to open the Actions menu thing it brings up the infamous illigal operation or somthing and basicly the program has had a stroke and needs to close. I restart the program and then I notice no Properties Bar.. I goto 'Windows' and click the Properties bar and nothing happens... I try again and again and same result then I try the shortcut (Ctrl+F3) agan nothing. I try to restart the program and it still dosen't come up so finaly my computer freezes (an internet explorer window froze the computer, unrelated incident I think) so I restart the computer. Upon loging back in and loading up the program I notice that it still won't come up. My only other option is reinstalling the program unless somone here has any ideas.

Any help in any way shape or form is apriciated.

Uni

Getting Properties From .jpg's
Hello,

Is it possible to read width and height properties from jpg images loaded into flash trough the loadMovie function?

Thanks

Tab Properties?
ok, i've been looking in my references for a while and i still can't find it.

You know that yellow box that surrounds the movie clip when you tab it? how do i get rid of that? thanks for your help!

Swf Movie Properties
I want to upload my high dynamic menu-swf; next problem

HOW TO SET THE BACKGROUND of the swf to transparant? I like to use this menu into a frame.....I load it into the HTML page (dreamweaver) but of course you can see the contours because it is white background.I can of course use another layer and show the background ther ....but I am afraight for big download sizes!

I like to set the background of the frame in Dreamweaver to the same background....

Kind regards

Evaluating Properties
hi,

i'm making a symbol rotate by using the setproperty function on a 3 frame loop. When a button is pressed, it goes to the start of these 3 frames.

The first frame (5) has the following action script:
Set Variable: "rotation" = GetProperty ( "/menu",_rotation )

The second frame (6) has:
Set Property ("/menu", Rotation) = rotation+5

And the third (7) has the evaluating statement that's not working:
If (GetProperty ( "/menu", _rotation ) eq 45)
Go to and Stop (1)
Else
Go to and Play (5)
End If

When it goes to frame 5, it restarts the animation, when it goes to frame 1, it stops the symbol in the last position it was in.

The problem is, the evaluating script doesn't work so it just keeps on rotating it indefinitely. I'm using this script i saw in an open source movie, adapted slightly and used for a different purpose. Can anybody help?

thanks in advacnce.

Setting Properties
Is this:

for (var i = 0; i<10; i++) {
duplicateMovieClip ("line", "line"+i, i);
setProperty ("line1", _x, 50);
setProperty ("line1", _y, 50);
setProperty ("line2", _x, 150);
setProperty ("line2", _y, 250);
etc etc etc...
}

How Do I Animate Properties?
I'm just learning actionscript so if _level0. or a slash is involved / , please use . and _root. as it will be less confusing to me.

Function Properties
From: Bruce Conway
ibconway@home.com
Any help on this would be appreciated.

I shudder to post this being a mere beginner, but I'm currently lacking good books and the online help for Flash is useless on this topic. I'm looking at Moock's code for Multiple Choice Quiz version 2. In short, what is a function property and how do you declare one? Apparently answer.currentAnswer is a function property. It's the very first mention of currentAnswer.
I'm confused about the syntax, i.e. answer.currentAnswer,
which to me means: to declare a function property for the function called 'functionName':

function functionName (parameters) {
functionName.propertyName; //property declared?
}
----------------------------Moock's Code here--------------
// function to register the user's answers
function answer (choice) {
// track the current answer with a function property
answer.currentAnswer++;
// record the user's answer
set ("q"+answer.currentAnswer+"answer", choice);
// go to the next question or the quiz end
if (answer.currentAnswer == numQuestions) {
gotoAndStop ("quizEnd");
} else {
gotoAndStop ("q"+ (answer.currentAnswer + 1));
}
}

Button Properties
Hi.

There are 4 button properties. I have a Button and when I go over it with my mouse I want a few things in it to change GRADUALLY. The problem is that there is only 1 frame for the "over" option. I dont want a line to instantly move when i go over my button. I want the line to gradually move. So, how can I add more frames to the over property?

Cheers!

Button Properties
how do i get a button so tjhat it doesnt change the pointer when my mouse goes into it??? a simple but puzzling question

thanks in advance

Phenia`

Set Properties Question
I'm trying to load an external SWF which is sized at 800x600 and center it into a new movie sized at 1000x600. Here's the AS I'm using:

loadMovieNum ("quail.swf", 1);
setProperty ("", _x, "500");
setProperty ("", _y, "300");

The SWF loads, but it is positioned at the upper left hand corner. I've tried variations on x and y values, including an attempting at scaling it down as well. But every time it loads it looks the same, no matter what I do. Can someone tell me what I'm doing wrong? Thanks.

[Edited by mikeyzinaz on 01-13-2002 at 04:39 PM]

Seting Properties
Hi!

I have a question:

I want to set the _x(X Position) and _y(Y Position) properties to a MC from an external txt file.

The txt file has got these variables:
&xmovie=100
&ymovie=100

I load these variables into the swf and i set the _x and _y properties to the MC like that:

setProperty ("movie", _x, xmovie);
setProperty ("movie", _y, ymovie);

Nothing happens, only if i write the values into the variables in the swf file.

So, the question is:
How can i set these properties to a MC from an external txt file values.

Thanks in advance,
Hugo Silva

Sound Properties
hi flashers...I posted this to the sound forum as well, but it's a little unpopulated...

I'm wanting to do something similar to the loop movies they have here on flashkit: use the properties of a wavform in a sound to dynamically animate my movie (see http://www.flashkit.com/loops/Ethnic...an/more2.shtml for an example. Basically, i'm wanting to use peaks in a waveform of a soundwave to duplicate a movie clip...any idea how they did that? What properties of sound are they using to generate the bar sizes? Any and all help would be appreciated...