AS3 load variables from a txt file which has && formatting - actionscript-3

Question

I'm trying to load a txt file of variables into my AS3 project. The problem I have though seems to be down to the fact that the txt file (which is pre formatted and cannot be changed) is formatted using double amphersands... e.g.
&name=mark&
&address=here&
&tel=12345&
I'm using the following code to load the txt file
myLoader.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, onLoaded, false, 0, true);
myLoader.dataFormat = URLLoaderDataFormat.VARIABLES;
urlRqSend = new URLRequest(addressToTxt.txt);
public function onLoaded(e:Event):void {
trace(myLoader.data);
}
Using URLLoaderDataFormat.VARIABLES generates the following error:
Error: Error #2101: The String passed to URLVariables.decode() must be a URL-encoded query string containing name/value pairs.
If I use URLLoaderDataFormat.TEXT I can load the data successfully but I'm not able (or don't know how to) access the variables.
Would anyone have any ideas or work arounds to this please.
Thanks,
Mark

Answer 1

I had that kind of problem some time ago.
I suggest you to load first as a text, remove those line breaks, the extra amphersands and parse manually:
var textVariables:String;
var objectVariables:Object = new Object();
...
myLoader.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, onLoaded, false, 0, true);
myLoader.dataFormat = URLLoaderDataFormat.TEXT;
urlRqSend = new URLRequest(addressToTxt.txt);
public function onLoaded(e:Event):void {
textVariables = myLoader.data;
textVariables = textVariables.split("\n").join("").split("\r").join(""); // removing line breaks
textVariables = textVariables.split("&&").join("&"); // removing extra amphersands
var params:Array = textVariables.split('&');
for(var i:int=0, index=-1; i < params.length; i++)
{
var keyValuePair:String = params[i];
if((index = keyValuePair.indexOf("=")) > 0)
{
var key:String = keyValuePair.substring(0,index);
var value:String = keyValuePair.substring(index+1);
objectVariables[key] = value;
trace("[", key ,"] = ", value);
}
}
}
I wrote that code directly here, I don't have any AS3 editor here, so, maybe you'll find errors.

Answer 2

If you have data in String and it has a structure just like you wrote, you can do a workaround:
dataInString = dataInString.split("\n").join("").split("\r").join(""); // removing EOL
dataInString = dataInString.slice(0,-1); // removing last "&"
dataInString = dataInString.slice(0,1); // removing first "&"
var array:Array = dataInString.split("&&");
var myVariables:Object = new Object();
for each(var item:String in array) {
var pair:Array = item.split("=");
myVariables[pair[0]] = pair[1];
}
That should make you an object with proper variables.