Object-Oriented Macromedia Flash MX

by Noel Jerke, William Drol, Darin Beard

Book Overview

This may be the only Flash book entirely devoted to object-oriented programming, especially for users and programmers of all skill levels. Readers looking to do more than load and publish the pre-built Flash MX templates, make sure that your work is reusable, need to understand a process for development, and want to learn solid programming techniques-this book is for them.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1590590147
• ISBN13: 9781590590140
• Release Date: June 2002
• Publisher: Apress
• Length: 504 Pages
• Weight: 2.21 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 7.4" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

Learning where to start...

I was in an ActionScript training class when the instructor mentioned object-oriented programming. He spent as much time explaining it as it takes to read this sentence. Somehow I know it was "the big picture" for success with ActionScript.As an ActionScript novice, it was important to me to learn the basics besides the "stop();" command. When you need to immerse yourself in a programming language, it is equally important to be shown the elements of building in that language as 3-dimensionally as possible. That's what William Drol does with this book. While he makes no assumptions about the user's skill level, he does assume that the programmer want to learn "the value of good planning and good coding". That's what I've learned from using this book.As a multimedia developer, planning is paramount. I believe this book will show you a way of thinking to help ease the planning process and make the discipline of coding easier. I look forward to working on future projects now in Flash MX, with the confidence of having Mr. Drol's book as a solid foundation and reference to guide me.

A Wonderful Concept Book

As a Flash teacher, I review a lot of books for potential classroom use. Many use ultra-friendly language to try to make scripting easy to swallow. Others are thorough technical references that make no excuses for leaving non-programmers in a haze of question marks. Others walk you step-by-step through the construction of some really boring projects.This is not a book for someone who wants to make first steps into actionScript, but if you're wondering how Flash "thinks" and want to get a bit deeper understanding of good programming practices and concepts, this book offers an excellent bridge. I have mostly a creative background and actionScript is really the first programming language to have captured my attention. If you're willing to sit down and work through the exercises, you'll find this book to be well-written and not-at-all dry. It presents some powerful insights into OOP that are useful in real-world design applications.For first steps and easy references, the visual quickstart guide and the Advanced Visual QuickPro guide are affordable and easy-to-use. If you are comfortable writing functions and using if statements, you're ready. Get into Object Oriented Flash MX and learn how Flash really works. It belongs in your Flash library.

Certified Flash Developer

I am a flash expert and have been doing flash for 4 years and have won awards, and I am certified too.I have read several books on OOP and UML,after reading this book, it really put it all into perspectiveand in context with flash, he lays down some theory then busts into real examples / tutorials and teaches you how to really apply OOP in flash, I was amazed at the clarity and power of the lessons. I was reluctant to buy this book at first because I have never heard of this author in the flash community, so I went to the book store and examined it for a while and decided to take a chance on it, and I am glad I did!!!He teaches you encapsulation, inheritance, polymorphism etc...how to extend classes, how to build a framework and services for your application etc...He definitely knows his stuff, it has changed my coding / architecture style drastically. A+++++++++++ 100%

Awesome Book

I've read countless books on ActionScripting and this one is by far the best. The author obviously has a talent for teaching that puts this book heads and shoulders above many other Flash ActionScript books that have received excellent reviews on this site. Get this book if you REALLY want to understand not only how to use ActionScripting but WHY you want to use it. I can't tell you how may Ah Ha! moments I've had reading it. Excellent!

Great Book that will save you time on your projects

This book is one of the best Flash books on the market. I have read well over 15 books on the subject and this ranks as one of the best. I was forced to read almost half of another un-named book to figure out how to convert an XML newsfeed into my Flash site at work. If I had only been able to read chapter 24 in this book first, I could have saved about a day's work! That function alone was well worth the price of the entire book! And yes, I had to use 'the hard way' described at the beginning of that chapter.The other projects in the book lead you through an easy-to-follow process, and each chapter adds on the previous one so by the end, you have many awesome, time-saving functions that you can RE-USE from project to project.One last thing, although I havent read through all the appendices, I found an in appendix B (Interacting with a Web Server) an easy method to bring my data into Flash. (he uses XML but it worked just as easily for me using PHP and MySQL) Thats what this book does, it breaks down (once thought difficult) processes into easy to do and easy to use functions. I recommend this book whole-heartedly.