Making button generating code work in a loop

Question

I'm trying to generate instances of a movieclip from my
library onto the stage and give them all unique variable and
instance names so I can control them later and perform certain
actions based on the name of the button clicked. I can do it with
the following code but I wanted it to use a loop instead to be more
effecient. Can anyone help me make this code work in a loop?
Thanks!
(the working code)
var image1_mc:testButton;
var image2_mc:testButton;
var image3_mc:testButton;
var image4_mc:testButton;
image1_mc = new testButton ();
image1_mc.name = "image1_mc"; // assign instance name
image2_mc = new testButton ();
image2_mc.name = "image2_mc";
image3_mc = new testButton ();
image3_mc.name = "image3_mc";
image4_mc = new testButton ();
image4_mc.name = "image4_mc";
addChild (image1_mc);
addChild (image2_mc);
addChild (image3_mc);
addChild (image4_mc);
image2_mc.x = 50;
image3_mc.x = 100;
image4_mc.x = 150;
image1_mc.y = 500;
image2_mc.y = 500;
image3_mc.y = 500;
image4_mc.y = 500;
(Here's my attempt at a loop but it of course doesn't work
because I'm not sure it's even possible to use a variable to name a
variable :D )
for(var i:Number = 0; i < 4; i++)
var ("image"+(i+1)+"_mc"):testButton = new testButton();
addChild ("image"+(i+1)+"_mc");
"image"+(i+1)+"_mc".name = "image" +(i+1)+"_mc";
"image"+(i+1)+"_mc".x = i * 75;

Answer 1

Hi -- first of all, I might not do it the way you are doing
it, where every variable has a different name. Instead, you could
use an Array to hold all the buttons:
var images:Array = new Array;
for (i = 0; i < 4; i++) {
images
= new testButton();
images.name = "image" + i + "_mc";
this.addChild(images
(I didn't run this code so it may have syntax errors, but you
get the idea.)
If it is necessary to have the variable names you have in
your example, you might be able to use eval() to name your
variables in a loop -- but it looks like they took eval() out
between AS2 and AS3 :-(
Good luck,
Bob