Weird error without any error message

Question

I've been working on some actionscript 3 system. And all of a
sudden, it wouldn't execute anymore. When I pushed CTRL-Enter in
Flash CS3, a white screen would open up (instead of the normal
flash program) and no trace-output would be given.
Three hours later I found the cause of this weird problem.
It's (simplified) the line:
var value:Number = -(true ? 1 : 0); // This one doesn't work.
Put this line in your script, and your entire program won't
execute. And without any error message! I was wondering, why is
that? By the way, the following lines do work:
var a:Number = -(2*3+4); // Gives -10.
var b:Number = (true ? 1 : 0); // Gives 1.
var c:Number = -b; // Gives -1.
var d:Number = 0-(true ? 1 : 0); // Gives -1.
var e:Number = -((true ? 1 : -1) as Number);
So, my guess is that the code (true ? 1 : 0) gives some sort
of data type which is not a Number, and therefore doesn't except
minus signs. But that wouldn't explain why it doesn't even give an
error. So what IS wrong with it?

Answer 1

ok - well if these numbers are used to begin the execution of
a method in your file, it's likely that they are not firing up
because the syntax here is incorrect. in order to use this type of
conditional operator (which i do use quite often as well, handy
convenient ;) the structure should be:
var value:Number = (condition) ? 1 : 0;
'true' is not a 'condition' but a boolean result, so it
should not be evaluated in the way have been using it here -
however 'true' is 'true' so the result will always be 1 (the first
expression in the operator) - i'm not certain why you would need a
-0 result and if you are always wanting a 'negative' number then
use that number in the return expression, as in:
var value:Number = (condition) ? -1 : 0;