Category: Actionscript 2

Adobe Captivate: Should I publish in ActionScript 2 or ActionScript 3?

Posted on April 22, 2011November 21, 2013 by ellen

Captivate 5 removed the need to answer this question: it only publishes in ActionScript 3 format, and correspondingly limits the compatibility of the published SWF file in certain situations as described below.

But if you are using Captivate v. 4 or earlier, you may still be wondering which to choose.

ActionScript 2: Nested button events

Posted on December 30, 2009 by ellen

Sometimes it’s helpful to have a quick reminder of how button events work within nested clips in ActionScript 2.

[ TRY DEMO ]

A button nested inside another button OR inside a MovieClip that has buttonEvents assigned to it will not work. (Button events include: onRollOver, onRollOut, onDragOver, onDragOut, onPress, onRelease and onReleaseOutside).

This is due to the way Flash captures events: the first parent instance with a button event handler assigned to it is the one that is listened to. None of its child objects will be listened for unless you use a workaround.

Hide the playbar in a Presenter presentation

Posted on October 16, 2009 by ellen

One of our content experts wanted to use Powerpoint to create an interactive presentation. Although Captivate would probably be the ideal choice, she only owns Adobe Presenter, so I suggested she use that to convert the Powerpoint for the web.

The problem is that Presenter, by default, shows a navbar on the side and a playbar below the presentation. In this case, allowing linear movement would break the logical flow of the interactive module. This project is more of a decision-support tool, and less a linear learning module where the user must view every page. To make a module like this function correctly using Adobe Presenter, follow these steps:

Before entering Presenter, add navigation buttons or hyperlinked images to your Powerpoint slides that allow user interaction to choose the path through the module. Many slides will probably just need a “Next” button, but certain slides will function as decision points where your users will choose which path to follow. You may have to draw out a flow chart to do this correctly if there are a lot of slides and decision points.
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Flash movie works under “Test Movie” but not when published.

Posted on December 25, 2008 by ellen

If your flash file works correctly when you test the movie in Flash, but not once it is published, check your Publish Settings. While modifying a flashcard example application I downloaded from Flashkit.com, I noticed

Using trace function to print out all properties of an object in Flash

Posted on July 18, 2007 by ellen

The trace() function in flash is used much like alert() in Javascript. You can use it to print the contents of a variable or the result of an expression. For example var theNumber = 2

Accessing the main timeline from a loaded SWF on another level.

Posted on April 16, 2004 by ellen

I have a flash file which loads an external SWF (call it external.swf) into the main timeline, on level 10. In this case, using _root or _parent to call the symbols on the main timeline will not work, since _root or _parent would refer to items on _level10.

The main timeline also contains a movie clip called “swapColors_mc” with two frames called “red” and green”.

To control the color change of swapColors_mc by clicking a button in external.swf once it is loaded, open “external.fla” (the original flash file from which external.swf is created) and add this actionscrip to the button:

on (release) { _level0.swapColors_mc.gotoAndPlay("green"); }