0.8 Events, triggers, and effects

Table of contents

• Preface
  • General
  • Viewing tip
    • Figures
    • Listings
  • Supplemental material
• General background information
• Preview
• Discussion and sample code
  • The program named Effects04
  • The program named Effects05
• Run the programs
• Resources
• Complete program listings
• Miscellaneous

Preface

General

This tutorial lesson is part of a series of lessons dedicated to object-oriented programming (OOP) with ActionScript.

Several ways to create and launch ActionScript programs

There are several ways to create and launch programs written in the ActionScript programming language. Most of the lessons in this series willuse Adobe Flex as the launch pad for the sample ActionScript programs.

An earlier lesson titled The Default Application Container provided information on how to get started programming with Adobe's Flex Builder 3. (See Baldwin's Flex programming website .) You should study that lesson before embarking on the lessons in this series.

Some understanding of Flex MXML will be required

I also recommend that you study all of the lessons on Baldwin's Flex programming website in parallel with your study of these ActionScript lessons. Eventually you will probably need to understand both ActionScript and Flex andthe relationships that exist between them in order to become a successful ActionScript programmer.

Will emphasize ActionScript code

It is often possible to use either ActionScript code or Flex MXML code toachieve the same result. Insofar as this series of lessons is concerned, the emphasis will be on ActionScript code even in those cases where Flex MXMLcode may be a suitable alternative.

Viewing tip

I recommend that you open another copy of this document in a separate browser window and use the following links to easily find and view the figuresand listings while you are reading about them.

Figures

• Figure 1 . Program output at startup for Effects04.
• Figure 2 . Program output after clicking the button.
• Figure 3 . Program output at startup for Effects05.
• Figure 4 . Program output after clicking the bottom button.
• Figure 5 . The WipeRight effect.
• Figure 6 . The Rotate effect.
• Figure 7 . The Glow effect.
• Figure 8 . Three effects in parallel.

Listings

• Listing 1 . The MXML file used for both programs.
• Listing 2 . Beginning of the Driver class for Effects04.
• Listing 3 . Beginning of the constructor for Effects04.
• Listing 4 . Configuring the Glow effect.
• Listing 5 . Beginning of the Driver class for Effects05.
• Listing 6 . Beginning of the constructor for the Effects05.
• Listing 7 . Configure an Iris effect for the bottom button.
• Listing 8 . Configure three different effects targeted to the bottom button.
• Listing 9 . A click event handler on the bottom button.
• Listing 10 . An EFFECT_END handler for the Iris effect.
• Listing 11 . A click event handler for the top button.
• Listing 12 . Beginning of the Show event handler registered on the bottom button.
• Listing 13 . Code to play the Rotate effect.
• Listing 14 . Code to play the Glow effect.
• Listing 15 . Code to play three effects in parallel.
• Listing 16 . TheMXML file used for both programs.
• Listing 17 . TheDriver class for Effects04.
• Listing 18 . TheDriver class for Effects05.