Reversing a symbols timeline

Question

Hi there,
I need to activate a timeline event on a symbol with a button press on another object, then when the button is pressed again, reverse the timeline event. This will have something sliding in and out of the stage.
If the animation is placed right at 0.00 and there's nothing else, then this code works OK:
if (sym.getPosition() == 0)
    sym.play();
else
    sym.playReverse();
However there is other animation that plays automatically on page load, then a trigger stops all animation. The animation I need to trigger is a couple of seconds later bracketed by labels 'start' and 'stop'. So I need to code the button A to get the symbol B and animate from 'start' to 'stop' and then wait. Then on a further press to animate from 'stop' to 'start'. But I'm damned if I can get anything to work.
Any ideas, anyone?

Answer 1

Hi Salieri_purple,
Let's define a growingUp symbol with autoplay property set to true which grows up a rectangle from bottom to top of the stage in 5s.
In Stage > document.compositionReady event handler, let's define a JavaScript object containing
• a boolean property reverse initialized to false ;
• a function to switch the direction based on the direction and the current cursor x value e.pageX (e is the event object passed as a parameter ; stage width : 400) :
ANIMA =
  reverse: false,
  switchDirection: function( e)
    var symAnima = sym.getSymbol('growingUp');
    if (ANIMA.reverse && e.pageX <200)
      symAnima.play();
      ANIMA.reverse = false;
    else if (!ANIMA.reverse && e.pageX >200)
      symAnima.playReverse();
      ANIMA.reverse = true;   
Stage > mousemove event handler
ANIMA.switchDirection( e);
The example file is downloadable here : https://app.box.com/s/ivqjhao17m4jbg4ldf9q
Gil