I made a Flash project in FlashDevelop to create an Ad.
The Preloader is setup by making use of the Additional Compiler argument:
-frame=NameOfLabel,NameOfMainClass
My main class is simply called "Main", at the top / default package level.
So frame #1, being the Preloader portion of the SWF, has:
Very few bitmaps, vector-graphics and text (to stay under 50kb);
A YouTube video player in the center (does not count in the filesize limit);
The frame #2 has everything else (the Main class basically embeds all it's dependencies). This includes:
Assets from precompiled SWF (Bitmaps, Symbols, Fonts, XML data);
All classes imported (this is recursive for every classes importing other classes);
Now my big problem is, my client requested the "replay" functionality long after I've completed 99.9% of the project.
I have the project more-or-less broken into different states (Intro, Ready, SlideMenu, etc.), but I'm not sure how I can easily reset the Flash movie back to the very beginning (where it was preloading and showing the YouTube video).
The easy solution would be to simply call an ExternalInterface JavaScript method that would refresh the Flash container, BUT I don't think I have control over what's going on the HTML / JavaScript side.
Is there an easy way to invoke a replay function from AS3?
Would not simply going back to frame 1 do the trick ?
The following seems to do the trick!
private function onReplayClick(e:MouseEvent):void {
var theStage:Stage = this.stage; //Temporarly store the stage.
//Kill any animations happening:
TweenMax.killAll(); //3rd party, may not be applicable for you :P
//Remove ALL containers / child DisplayObjects
SpriteUtils.recursiveRemove(theStage); //custom-made
// (this object is no longer attached to the stage at this point)
//Nullify any Singleton / Static variables:
Main.INST = null;
// Load the 'bytes' of the current SWF in a new Loader, then...
// add it to the stage
var swf:Loader = new Loader();
swf.loadBytes( theStage.loaderInfo.bytes );
theStage.addChild( swf );
}
By doing a deep recursive cleanup of the DisplayObjects, and any static variables (like Singleton instances), it leaves you with a blank stage.
After that, you can instantiate a new Loader that will load the SWF itself via the current LoaderInfo's bytes property.
Add the Loader to the Stage, and you're up and running again!
Related
I'm building an "interactive book" using Flash and Air for iOS, and have VERY little AS3 experience...
I had planned to load "pages" in as external SWFs then banish them with unloadAndStop - so that each time a user "turned the page" the SWF loaded in and the nested mini-games in those pages would play "fresh" for the first time. Well - apparently reloaded SWFs are a no-go for AIR and iOS.
I suppose I'm left with replacing those external SWFS with Internal MCs and using AddChild / RemoveChild - but that doesn't reset the variables so that the mini-games play fresh and I'm a little too green to know a better solution.
Is there any way to beef up RemoveChild so the MC loads "fresh" every time I put it on stage?
if you you added movie clip by time line, just rename its instance name from property panel, then new instance of MovieClip created in that frame.
if you want to add it by AS3, you must set a linkage for it first, a class name which would start by a letter (recommended capital letter)
and then :
var mc:MovieClip = new Game1();
addChild(mc);
when you removed it, to adding it again with refreshed properties (as you said)
you must do:
mc = new Game1(); // make a new instance of Game1
addChild(mc);
Edit
note: for saving performance, after calling removeChild freeze your movieclip and make it ready for garbaging by removing its eventListeners, dont scare :d
tke a look at this & this (i just find this refrences by fast searching but i now they are helpful)
I'm new to AS3, and am trying to understand how externally loaded SWFs work in AS3. Since Flash 4/5, it was common to have one main SWF file in a Flash web project, and then load other SWF files into it, often for various "sections" of a website or web project. In the main file, we'd have masks animating the container movieclip(in which external sections/SWF files were loaded) and have animations and transitions play as the section finished loading and the loaded content was displayed.
In AS3, I've used the Loader class to load and display the external file, my main problem is in communicating with the loaded content, call it's functions, or call root functions from it.
In AS2, we could use someMovieClip.loadMovie("ExternalContent.swf") and the ExternalContent file would load inside someMovieClip. You could access functions on the "External.swf" main timeline using someMovieClip.function();. And inside the "ExternalContent.swf", we could use _root.function() to access functions in the main file ExternalContent was being loaded into. Doing this in AS3 seems bizarre and neurotic, and I feel like I'm missing something fairly basic here.
//Loading in ExternalContent.swf into the sprite
//ExternalContent has a movieclip called "boxes" on it's main timeline
//boxes has a boxesPrompt() function in it's timeline.
var sprite:Sprite = new Sprite();
addChild(sprite);
var loader:Loader = new Loader();
loader.load(new URLRequest("ExternalContent.swf"));
loader.contentLoaderInfo.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE,onLoaded);
function onLoaded(event:Event):void
{
sprite.addChild(event.target.content);
sprite.boxes.boxesPrompt();
//Flash gives the following compiler error at the above
//Scene 1, Layer 'Layer 1', Frame 1, Line 21 1119: Access of possibly undefined property boxes through a reference with static type flash.display:Sprite.
//But when I comment out sprite.boxes.boxesPrompt() and use this, it works:
event.target.content.boxes.boxesPrompt()
}
The boxesPrompt() function inside the "ExternalContent.swf" just traces it's parent, grand-parent, and great grand-parent - trace(this.parent.parent.parent);. And when I call that function inside the onLoaded event-handler using "event.target.content.boxes.boxesPrompt()", it shows that the Boxes object(which was on the main timeline of External.SWF), has a parent movieclip, a grand-parent sprite, and a great grand-parent object mainTimeline.
I thought re-parenting the loaded content into the sprite would allow me to access the loaded content as easily as loadMovie() used to be - accessing loaded content like it was present directly inside the clip it was loaded in. But that doesn't work at all.
So to rephrase, my question is:
How do I communicate from the main "loader" SWF file, with the content that's loaded in. I don't want to communicate using event.target.content.{etc} because then I'd only be able to address the loaded content inside the Loader's event.complete event handler.
How do I "re-parent" loaded content, so I can place it inside some movieclip/sprite on the main timeline of the loader file, rather than using some really long convoluted way.
How to communicate from inside the loaded content, to the main/loader file. Previously, we'd use _root.functionName() to do stuff like play some animation transitioning from the current externally loaded "section" to another section. How'd I go about doing that.
AS2 & AS3 is vastly different. But you will have to swallow the fact that AS3 has been developed as an improvement over AS2. So any transition you make, is also for the better.
For eg : The _root in AS2 allowed global objects & variables to accessed & changed anywhere, which is a bad practice & leads to non maintainable code in a project.
Having said that, let me address your questions:
If you are able to get access to the loaded content with
event.target.content... you should save it inside a,say class
variable & may access it later elsewhere in the class.
You must understand that you will be able to access the content only
after loading it, so have to wait for it to complete anyway &
event.complete handler is probably your best bet.
I doubt if you can pick random content from a loaded swf & re-parent it into the current swf.As explained you might not have a long convoluted way.
Accessing the parent could be done in many ways. You can use .parent or actually call a function from the parent swf passing its reference to the child.
var sprite;
addChild(sprite);
var loader:Loader = new Loader();
loader.load(new URLRequest("ExternalContent.swf"));
loader.contentLoaderInfo.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE,onLoaded);
function onLoaded(event:Event):void
{
sprite = event.target.content;
//This should work
sprite.boxes.boxesPrompt();
}
See this example for more info.
I am importing several external files using the Loader-class, and one of them is an swf-file. When doing so (I had done it successfully before, so did not expect any issues), I ran into all sorts of errors, and finally Flash crashed.
I put down a trace in the constructor function, and it didn't trace just once, but kept on tracing, suggesting that the constructor was stuck on loop. I guess the loading of too many of the same swf is what causes flash to eventually crash.
Here is my code (the swf im loading is now a simple test-file which contains an image and no code):
private var slides:Loader = new Loader();
public function DocumentClass()
{
trace(1)
slides.load(new URLRequest("Resources/Slides.swf"));
slides.contentLoaderInfo.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, SlidesComplete);
}
public function SlidesComplete(evt:Event):void
{
slides.contentLoaderInfo.removeEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, SlidesComplete);
addChild(slides);
}
This traces "11111111111..." and everything dies in the end.
HELP!
Try putting a stop() action at the top of the swf you load in (either in actionscript, or on the timeline). It's possible that the swf is being loaded in and is running a play and running on loop in the mean time (hence your code running over and over).
I would do a progress watch until the swf is fully loaded, then jump to your display frame:
Create a section for loading (your choice if you want to use a preloader)
Create another section (set of keyframes) for loaded content. I use keyframes because it's easy, but you could also wait to instantiate classes until loading is complete.
Below is a snippet I occasional build from:
// stop the playhead from moving ahead
stop(); // you can also use gotoAndStop("loading"); if you want
function loaderProgressHandler(event:Event):void {
// switch the framehead to main which will show your content
if(event.bytesLoaded >= event.bytesTotal) {
event.target.removeEventListener(Event.PROGRESS, this.loaderProgressHandler);
this.gotoAndStop("main");
}
}
this.loaderInfo.addEventListener(Event.PROGRESS, this.loaderProgressHandler);
Hope that helps!
I was just stuck on this same problem.
In my case it turned out that the problem was down to the swf having the same document class name as the swf that was loading it.
eg. Main.as was loading another swf that also had its document class called Main.as - Changing this to anything else solved the infinite loop.
I have Loader object containing loaded swf. I don't know how the shape of this swf looks like - it's not necessarily rectangular.
I want to add some light reflection on it. I need to mask this reflection with Loader, but in the same time I need this Loader to be visible.
I don't want to load swf twice, because it may contain some dynamic, script-generated content, which can produce different results in each Loader.
And that's quite a problem, isn't it? Any ideas?
Image: http://www.freeimagehosting.net/uploads/12e6b9cd63.jpg
you could add your instance of the loaded swf to the stage, and for the reflection use he same movieclip/sprite and draw it to a new BitmapData. do the transformations needed and then add to stage.
Or imagine the following situation, instead of having the swf that is loaded adding it's own graphics to library you could do this from the loading application, so for instance, give the instance name of MyDisplayObject to the movieclip in the loaded swf and export to actionscript. After you load the swf you could use the following code to access the library, so you can add this object number of times you need, in you case 2.
here is the code (from adobe live docs)
function initHandler(e:Event) {
var applicationDomain:ApplicationDomain = e.target.applicationDomain; // e.target is the loaderInfo object
var testClip:Class=applicationDomain.getDefinition("testClip") as Class;
var clip = new testClip();
addChild(clip);
var reflection = new testClip();
addChild(reflection);
reflection.y= 100;
}
Hope this get's you on the right track.
Give this scenario:
I have a cool graphic in Illustrator or Flash.
The graphic represents a figure, with various elements inside, shapes, lines, gradients, etc.
I export it to a swf file and I can view my nice graphic if I open it.
I have a (pure) as3 application, which loads swfs.
Then...
Can I manipulate the contents of the loaded swf. For example: Moving its contents, changing some elements inside, duplicating them. Deforming them with the transform matrix and things like that?
Can I, at least, read the contents and replicate them (the graphic data) inside the main application.
As far as I've been researching, I can only import the swf and use it as a whole display object, without any children, and I cannot modify it.
I want to, somehow, use the graphic information of the external swf to allow the main application deform it or use it to make new versions of the graphic.
No, sadly you can't retrieve or change compiled Graphics elements in detail, you can only use them as DisplayObjects and transform them through their public properties (scale, rotation, transform, etc...).
There is way of programmaticaly retrieve a single path coordinates by setting it as the "guide" of an object in the Flash IDE and within an onEnterFrame retrieve the object's position, but as you can imagine, its quite dirty.
You can replicate the clips by either setting them as classes within the loaded SWF (In Flash IDE: library>symbol>properties>export for AS) or using BitmapData to draw them as you please from the main movie.
Another solution would be to use a more open format, like SVG or FXG, but it can get quite complicated...
You can access loaded SWF's methods and properties if both are AVM2 movies.
var loader:Loader = new Loader();
loader.contentLoaderInfo.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, onLoadComplete);
private function onLoadComplete(e:Event):void
{
var content:Object = LoaderInfo(e.target).content;
//assuming there is a public someMethod() defined in
//the document class of the loaded SWF, you can call it as:
content.someMethod();
//you can access any property you wish
content.someObject.graphics.beginFill(0x00ff00);
content.someObject.graphics.drawCircle(10, 10, 10);
content.someObject.graphics.endFill();
}
SWF content can be readed by new function added to Flash Player 11.6 and AIR 3.6:
flash.display.Grapics.readGraphicsData()
http://help.adobe.com/en_US/FlashPlatform/reference/actionscript/3/flash/display/Graphics.html#readGraphicsData%28%29
Similar problem:
How to read data from shape/graphics object