actionscript for loop iterator to change movie clip name - actionscript-3

I have a bunch of movie clips I created in flash CS5 and are all placed within the stage. I control each one of them dynamically with code using ActionScript 3. However I want to control all of them at the same time using a for loop and just change the width of each element but its not working.
Here is my code:
for(var i:Number = 0; i < 100; i++)
{
leftBar+i.width = ( Math.round(channel.rightPeak * 1.1) ) + 60;
}
So I have 100 bars each called leftBar and their number. So the firstBar is leftBar1, then leftBar2 and so on. I cant get it to work however. I have tried "leftBar"+i and also leftBari but none of them seem to work.

The correct way to select each of those MovieClips in your loop is:
this["leftBar" + i]
New code:
// Note: We've changed the initial value of i to 1 because you mentioned that
// your first MovieClip was called 'leftBar1' rather than 'leftBar0'.
for(var i:int = 1; i <= 100; i++)
{
var current:MovieClip = this["leftBar" + i];
current.width = Math.round(channel.rightPeak * 1.1) + 60;
}
Basically you want to select the property leftBar0, leftBar1, etc from this using square brackets. It is the same as doing this:
this.leftBar0
And can also be used for any properties or methods of any other class:
// Example of Square Bracket notation.
var sprite:Sprite = new Sprite();
sprite["x"] = 10;
trace(sprite.x);
this["addChild"](sprite);

Related

problem accessing dynamic movieclips by name in adobe animate

I've done this a million time, but here it didn't work.
I have a game_mc inside a animate.fla. inside this clip I generate a view targetareas to place stones on it. ok, the TargetArea is a simple Movieclip inside my lib.
I can see everything, I can click on the area an get the propper name, I can get the names of the clips inside game_mc.
but I can't access it by using game_mc[clipname]
for (var i:int = 1; i<= 20; i++){
var targetArea:TargetArea = new TargetArea();
targetArea.txt.text = String(i);
var modu = ((i-1) %5);
targetArea.x = 100 + modu * 340;
var abs = int((i-1) / 5);
targetArea.name = "targetarea_" + String(i)+ "_mc";
targetArea.mouseChildren = false;
targetArea.y = 100 + (abs * 200) ;
game_mc.addChild(targetArea);
}
for(var x:int=0;x < game_mc.numChildren;x++) {
trace (game_mc.getChildAt(x).name);
}
for (var i:int = 1; i< 20; i++){
var targetName:String = "targetarea_" + i + "_mc"
trace( game_mc[targetName].x);
}
I think the name you assign your TargetArea instances isn't automatically converted
into a property of the DisplayObject you attach it to. As far as I remember though this
nonchalant way of accessing MovieClips using array access used to work prior to AS3.
The more elegant solution is to retrieve the child using getChildByName().
trace(game_mc.getChildByName(targetName).x);
Additionally, in case game_mc is an instance of MovieClip or a dynamic class you can make the TargetArea instances a property of it using:
game_mc[targetArea.name] = targetArea;
This way you can access them using game_mc[name].property afterwards.

AS3: determine positions of inserted instances of movie clip

if i insert multiple instances of movie clip with addChild method and "for" loop, how can i determine exact x, y position of instances in the scene? Either specific x y for each instance or placing the instances next to each other with specified space between them. Let's say 40px width squares with 20px space between them.
many thanks for any advices
This example show the squares in a row with 20px space between them:
var xSquare:Number = 10;
var ySquare:Number = 10;
var space:Number = 20;
for (var i:int = 0; i < 5; i++) {
var testSquare:Square = new Square();
addChild(testSquare);
testSquare.x = xSquare + testSquare.width * i + space * i ;
testSquare.y = ySquare;
}
Hope this is what you mean
While inserting your objects to stage, give all of them a name (obj0, obj1, obj2, etc). Next, you can simply use getChildByName('objX'). Is this what you need?

Actionscript 3 - Converting strings to command

I have four Movieclips inside four movieclip containers, and a filter called "myShadowFilter", like so:
option1BlueBox
is a movieclip inside
option1Container
and
option2Container
is a movieclip inside
option2BlueBox
and so on. I want to do this:
option1Container.option1BlueBox.filters = [myShadowFilter]; //line1
option2Container.option3BlueBox.filters = [myShadowFilter]; //line2
option3Container.option4BlueBox.filters = [myShadowFilter]; //line3
option4Container.option5BlueBox.filters = [myShadowFilter]; //line4
except with a loop, becuase I'm probably going to add more containers, each with a movie clip inside. A sudo-code of what I want to do is:
var containers:int = 1;
for (var i:int = 1; i<containers + 1, i++) {
'option' + i + 'Container.option' + i + 'BlueBox.filters = [myShadowFilter];';
}
Basically, I just want one loop which will run all the 4 commands. How do I make it work? It is giving me errors (as I expected) saying that there are syntax errors and colons are expected.
Use the Array access operator. For more details, see this.
var containers:int = 1;
for (var i:int = 1; i<containers + 1, i++) {
this['option' + i + 'Container']['option' + i + 'BlueBox'].filters = [myShadowFilter];
}
You could probably simplify this further by giving the blue box clip the same instance name (it only needs to be unique within the current scope). Then you could do something like this:
// Create an array of containers
var containers = [
option1Container,
option2Container,
option3Container,
option4Container
];
// Loop through each container and apply the filter
// to the blue box container clip
for (var i = 0; i < containers.length; i ++)
{
containers[i].option1BlueBox.filters = [myShadowFilter];
}

as3 accessing Children from dynamicly added moiveclip

I am adding moiveClips and putting their position accordingly. I am placing all the dynamically added clips in one new movie clip and then centering that on stage. As a test, I see I can control the alpha in the main container but I can not access the children. How can I assess each flagButton separately? There would be several in this loop example below.
var flagButton:MovieClip;
var flagArray:Array = new Array;
var flagDisplayButtons:MovieClip = new MovieClip();
function displayFlagButtons()
{
for( var i = 0; flagArray.length > i; i++)
{
var flagButton:MovieClip = new roundButton();
flagButton.x = (flagButton.width + 10) * i;
flagButton.y = stage.stageHeight - flagButton.height;
addChild(flagButton);
flagDisplayButtons.addChild(flagButton);
}
addChild(flagDisplayButtons);
// Works
flagDisplayButtons.x = stage.stageWidth/2 - flagDisplayButtons.width/2;
// Does not see flagButton
flagDisplayButtons.flagButton.alpha = .5;
}
GETS ERROR:
TypeError: Error #1010: A term is undefined and has no properties.
In your example code, you have created a bunch of button instances, and one by one you have added them to the display list of flagDisplayButtons. They are on that display list in the order that you placed them.
first instance is at index 0
second instance is at index 1
third instance is at index 2
and so on.
So if you want to access the third button you added, you could do this :
var flagButton:RoundButton = flagDisplayButtons.getChildAt(2) as RoundButton;
Now that you have created variable to reference that button, you can do any of these :
flagButton.alpha = .5;
flagButton.x = 100;
flagButton.y = 200;
You need to use getChildAt or getChildByName to get the children of a DisplayObjectContainer
IE:
flagDisplayButtons.getChildAt(0).alpha = 0.5;

AS3 reference movieclip by .name property

Yay, another simple noobie as3 question.
How can I reference a movieclip by its ".name" ?
I tried searching for a solution, but I couldn't find anything. Basically I have a set of movieclips added to the stage using a loop, so the way I found to diferentiate them was by giving them a .name of "something" + the Loop's "i". So now they are named something like "something1", "something2", "something3", and so on.
Now, I need to send some to a specific frame. Usually I would do something like:
something1.gotoAndStop(2);
But "something1" isnt the instance name, just the ".name". I cant find a way to reference it.
you want to use getChildByName("name") more info
import flash.display.MovieClip;
// create boxes
for(var i:int = 0 ; i < 4; i++){
var box:MovieClip = new myBox(); // myBox is a symbol in the library (export for actionscript is checked and class name is myBox
box.name = "box_" + i;
box.x = i * 100;
this.addChild(box);
}
// call one of the boxes
var targetBox:MovieClip = this.getChildByName("box_2") as MovieClip;
targetBox.gotoAndStop(2);
Accessing things by name is very prone to errors. It's not a good habit to get into if you're a newbie. I think a safer way to do this would be to store references to the things you're creating in the loop, for example in an array, and reference them by their indexes.
Example:
var boxes:Array = [];
const NUM_BOXES:int = 4;
const SPACING:int = 100;
// create boxes
for(var i:int = 0 ; i < NUM_BOXES:; i++){
var box:MovieClip = new MovieClip();
// You can still do this, but only as a label, don't rely on it for finding the box later!
box.name = "box_" + i;
box.x = i * SPACING;
addChild(box);
// store the box for lookup later.
boxes.push(box); // or boxes[i] = box;
}
// talk to the third box
const RESET_FRAME:int = 2;
var targetBox:MovieClip = boxes[2] as MovieClip;
targetBox.gotoAndStop(RESET_FRAME);
Note, I've also replaced many of the loose numbers with constants and vars which will also help your compiler notice errors.
You can use the parent to get the child by name. If the parent is the stage:
var something1:MovieClip = stage.getChildByName("something1");
something1.gotoAndStop(2);