Import statement *not* required?

Question

Can someone explain this to me? I was following along a
simple AS3 example (in the design video workshop) where a "Power
Button" has some MouseEven CLICK event handling applied to it with
a trace statement as the resulting handled function. Really simple
basic example. The import statement is import
flash.events.MouseEvent.
How come removing the import statement does not produce an
error?
Reference:
import flash.events.MouseEvent;
myButton.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, myButtonClicked);
function myButtonClicked(event:MouseEvent):void {
trace('do Something');
}

Answer 1

midimidi,
> So to be clear...if the AS is on the main timeline,
import statements
> are not needed, and if the AS is external and imported,
import
> statements are needed.
That's a general rule of thumb, but not 100% applicable.
> Are there any other exceptions to that, or does that go
for all AS3
> classes?
There are exceptions, and the easiest way to find them is to
leave out
your import statements and plug away ... sooner or later,
you'll get a
compiler error, and then you'll know. :)
>> It did strike me *** odd though, an imported .as
file uses the same
>> publish settings as code on the timeline. So why
treat them differently?
FLA files have publish settings, but AS files don't. They're
just text
files. I hear what you're saying ... they end up getting
compiled along
with / into the some FLA anyway -- and that FLA does have
classpaths
listed -- but those same AS files might be compiled in Flex
Builder 2 or
some 3rd party compiler. It would probably make good sense to
require the
import statement for inline FLA code, but not everyone is a
hardcore
programmer, and Adobe knows it. Nothing is *hurt* by using
import in FLAs,
but for folks who just want to do light programming, the
convenience of not
having to use it is nice.
David Stiller
Adobe Community Expert
Dev blog,
http://www.quip.net/blog/
"Luck is the residue of good design."