I want to break free (from the timeline) - A coding "parody"?

Question

This thread is a continuation to this one:
http://forums.adobe.com/message/2761406#2761406
which is a continuation of the original thread:
http://forums.adobe.com/message/2701706#2701706
Andrei, I'll keep following your lead...
ps: this is a serious thread!

Answer 1

Hello Andrei!
After taking a look at that other thread with the guy who talked about Document Classes and checking over the internet how to use "export for actionscript" inside Flash and use the exported object as an external class, I thought: I can do that!
So I tried to put everything we had on the portfolio.fla inside a movieClip to export it as an external class. Well, nothing seemed to work and while trying to export the movie clip for actionscript, Flash crashed all the time.
Not happy, I decided to start it all over and the first thing I created was an "arrow" on stage (future buttons) and exported to start working with the document class.
Then I started with two vars and added them to the stage...
var left_btn : Arrow = new Arrow();
var right_btn : Arrow = new Arrow();
addChild(left_btn);
addChild(right_btn);
And it worked! They showed up on stage!
So I went back to Flash to do the same with my two dynamic text fields (title and subs). Then I thought: what if I try to create those text fields all in AS3? So I ended up reading this page (following your tip): http://www.adobe.com/livedocs/flash/9.0/ActionScriptLangRefV3/flash/text/TextField.html
And I read this:
All dynamic and input text fields in a SWF file are instances of the
TextField class.
Andrei, you're going to kill me... you tried to explain me this but, for the very first time I understood that when we write "var title : TextField = new TextField();" is the SAME THING as when we go inside Flash, create a dynamic text field and instantiate it as "title". Also, when we only type "var title : TextField;", I think I can understand that as if we were keeping a TextField named title inside our Library. We're not using it, but it's there to be used anytime.
With that in mind, everything about document classes started to make more sense.
I decided to jump ahead "again" and try to build our new DocClass that will work with our Slide class.
Since it's just a "test", I'm not working with the "subtitles" yet, only with the "titles". I'm not using tweens neither (I don't have idea about how to implement that).
After hours and hours of work, I thought it should be working now but it's not... The title and buttons are working fine, but the images won't show up! I must be missing something! Anyway, I think I'm almost there! I traced all our DocClass as it is and it pass through it without erros, but our Slide class should be working... I don't get any errors, just the trace of the IOError function inside Slide class...
This is what I have:
The Slide class:
package {
     import flash.display.Loader;
     import flash.display.Sprite;
     import flash.events.Event;
     import flash.events.IOErrorEvent;
     import flash.events.ProgressEvent;
     import flash.net.URLRequest;
     public class Slide extends Sprite {
          public var url : String;
          public var loader : Loader = new Loader();
          public function Slide(url : String = null, startLoad : Boolean = true) {
               this.url = url;
               if(url && startLoad) load();
          public function load() : void {
               loader.contentLoaderInfo.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, onLoadComplete);
               loader.contentLoaderInfo.addEventListener(IOErrorEvent.IO_ERROR, onIOError);
               loader.contentLoaderInfo.addEventListener(ProgressEvent.PROGRESS, onLoadProgress);
               loader.load(new URLRequest(url));
          private function onLoadComplete(e : Event) : void {
               removeListeners();
               addChild(loader);
          private function onIOError(e : IOErrorEvent) : void {
               trace("onIOError"); //IT'S RETURNING THIS TO THE OUTPUT...
               removeListeners();
          private function onLoadProgress(e : ProgressEvent) : void {
               trace("loaded ", e.bytesLoaded, " of ", e.bytesTotal);
          private function removeListeners() : void {
               loader.contentLoaderInfo.removeEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, onLoadComplete);
               loader.contentLoaderInfo.removeEventListener(IOErrorEvent.IO_ERROR, onIOError);
               loader.contentLoaderInfo.removeEventListener(ProgressEvent.PROGRESS, onLoadProgress);
And the DocClass
package {
     import flash.events.MouseEvent;
     import flash.display.MovieClip;
     import flash.events.Event;
     import flash.events.IOErrorEvent;
     import flash.events.ProgressEvent;
     import flash.net.URLLoader;
     import flash.net.URLRequest;
     import flash.text.TextField;
     import flash.text.TextFieldAutoSize;
     import flash.text.TextFormat;
     import flash.text.TextFormatAlign;
     public class DocClass extends MovieClip {
          private var left_btn : Arrow = new Arrow();
          private var right_btn : Arrow = new Arrow();
          private var title : TextField;
          public var titleText : String = "HERE GOES THE TITLE";
          private var stageWidth : uint = 730;
          private var xmlURL : String = "pfolio/portfolio.xml";
          private var XMLLoader : URLLoader;
          public var slides : Array = [];
          private var numSlides : int = 0;
          private var currentSlide : int = 0;
          public function DocClass() {
               addArrows();
               loadXML(xmlURL);
               configTitle();
               setTextConfig();
               setText(titleText);
          private function addArrows() : void {
               left_btn.buttonMode = true;
               left_btn.x = 30;
               left_btn.y = 140;
               left_btn.rotation = 180;
               right_btn.buttonMode = true;
               right_btn.x = 700;
               right_btn.y = 140;
               addChild(left_btn);
               addChild(right_btn);
               left_btn.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, nextImg);
               right_btn.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, nextImg);
          private function nextImg(e : MouseEvent) : void {
               if (e.currentTarget == right_btn) {
                    currentSlide = currentSlide < slides.length - 1 ? currentSlide + 1 : currentSlide;
               } else {
                    currentSlide = currentSlide > 0 ? currentSlide - 1 : 0;
               showSlide(currentSlide);
          private function loadXML(dataURL : String) : void {
               trace("Requesting data...");
               XMLLoader = new URLLoader();
               XMLLoader.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, processXML);
               XMLLoader.addEventListener(IOErrorEvent.IO_ERROR, errorXML);
               XMLLoader.addEventListener(ProgressEvent.PROGRESS, loadingXML);
               XMLLoader.load(new URLRequest(dataURL));
          private function processXML(e : Event) : void {
               trace("Data is now being processed...");
               var XMLData : XML = new XML(XMLLoader.data);
               removeDataListeners();
               XMLLoader = null;
               var slidesData : XMLList = XMLData.slide;
               numSlides = slidesData.length();
               for (var i : int = 0;i < numSlides;i++) {
                    var slide = new Slide(slidesData[i].images, true);
                    trace("A new slide will be pushed...");
                    slides.push({
                         slide: slide, title: slidesData[i].title });
               showSlide(0);
          public function showSlide(slideIndex : int) : void {
               trace("showSlide method triggered...");
               var slide : Slide = slides[slideIndex].slide;
               slide.x = 50;
               addChildAt(slide, 0);
               title.text = slides[slideIndex].title;
               for (var i : int = 0;i < numSlides;i++) {
                    slide = slides[i].slide;
                    if (i != slideIndex && contains(slide)) {
                         removeChild(slide);
          private function configTitle() : void {
               title = new TextField();
               title.autoSize = TextFieldAutoSize.CENTER;
               title.background = true;
               title.border = true;
               var format : TextFormat = new TextFormat();
               format.font = "Arial";
               format.color = 0x000000;
               format.size = 11;
               format.bold = true;
               format.align = TextFormatAlign.CENTER;
               title.defaultTextFormat = format;
               addChild(title);
          private function setTextConfig() : void {
               title.x = stageWidth / 2;
               title.y = 265;
          public function setText(str : String) : void {
               title.text = str;
          private function errorXML(e : IOErrorEvent) : void {
               trace("Error while loading XML");
          private function loadingXML(e : ProgressEvent) : void {
               trace("Loading Data...");
          private function removeDataListeners() : void {
               trace("Removing Data Listeners...");
               XMLLoader.removeEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, processXML);
               XMLLoader.removeEventListener(IOErrorEvent.IO_ERROR, errorXML);
               XMLLoader.removeEventListener(ProgressEvent.PROGRESS, loadingXML);
The way how things are organized and the "package" thing still confuses me but again, I'm improving don't you think?