Hi,

This section is meant for Frequently Asked Questions about Flash.  From time to time, Snib or I will post questions here that we find in the Flash forum.  Please be advised that you CAN NOT start new topics here or reply to any postings.  Also, please note that neither Snib nor myself are Wrox/Wiley employees.  We just volunteered to help create this FAQ section.  We hope you'll find this section useful.

Feel free to e-mail FAQ suggestions to either Snib or myself. We will include those FAQ submissions we think will be helpful for all Flash users

Thank you,

Ben Horne
Madison Area Technical College student
-------------------------
http://community.webshots.com/user/valerian114

Go there.  I have a lot of awesome photos that I rendered myself

"A Person Who Claims To Be A Flash Junkie Isn't Really A Flash Junkie Unless He Can Prove It"

__________________
Ben Horne
-------------------------
I don\'t want to sound like I haven\'t made any mistakes.  I\'m confident I have.

Most likely using FireFox and concocting my next Macromedia Flash project
Snibworks Forums Moderator

Welcome to the New Age

Q: Can I call JavaScript functions from Flash?

A: Yes.

To do this, assign a behavior to what you want to trigger the JavaScript function (i.e. a button click, reaching a certain frame).

Click the "Add Behavior" button (it has a blue '+' on it) on the Behaviors Panel (usually in the bottom-right). Choose Web -> Go to Web Page. Make sure "_self" is selected in the drop-down box and type this in the text box: "javascript:yourFunction()". Replace yourFunction() with the name of your JavaScript function.

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---Snib---
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<><

Q: I just imported a PSD file into Flash and it's appearing at very low resolution.  What can I do?

A: Convert your PSD files to JPG format while in Photoshop.  When this is done, you can then import the JPG file into Flash

Q: How can I create a typing effect with text in Flash?

A: First off, you need to break the text apart and distribute the letters to layers. With this done, specify a motion tween for each of the letters and have them appear one by one in each frame.

Ben Horne
Madison Area Technical College student

NOT a Wiley/Wrox Employee

-------------------------
http://community.webshots.com/user/valerian114

Go there.  I have a lot of awesome photos that I rendered myself

"A Person Who Claims To Be A Flash Junkie Isn't Really A Flash Junkie Unless He Can Prove It"

Q: Why am I getting an error message whenever I try to export a Flash movie to Quicktime?

A: The Quicktime Player does not support Macromedia Flash 6 movies.  You need to change the version of the Flash movie being published to version 5 or lower.  Also, please note that if your Flash movie has any functionality such as embedded video, you'd be better off publishing the Flash movie as an SWF file

Ben Horne
Madison Area Technical College student

NOT a Wiley/Wrox Employee

-------------------------
http://community.webshots.com/user/valerian114

Go there.  I have a lot of awesome photos that I rendered myself

"There are two kinds of people in the world: Those who claim to be Flash junkies and those who actually are Flash junkies"

Q: How can I bring a Flash page back to the top?

A: First off, I have not done this in Flash and frankly, I don't think it can be done in Flash.  I would recommend that you use Macromedia Dreamweaver or any other web-editing software of your choice.  Anyways, to accomplish this,  Make sure that the named anchor is at the very top of the page.  Then, what you need to do is insert a link at the bottom of the page and link it to the anchor that is at the top of the page.  


WARNING: If your Flash movie utilizes scrollbars to view any content, the named anchor strategy will not work

Ben Horne
Madison Area Technical College student

-------------------------
http://community.webshots.com/user/valerian114

"There are two kinds of people in the world: Those who claim to be Flash junkies and those who actually are Flash junkies"

Q. How do I detect a Flash plugin?

A. Here is a JavaScript-free way of detecting if the client has a Flash plugin:

Step 1: Create a new Flash movie. Make the size 18px by 18px, this being the smallest possible size.

Step 2: Click on the first frame and click on the “Add Behavior” button. Go to Web -> Go to Web Page.

Step 3: Enter the URL of your Flash-enabled page. Click OK.

Step 4: Publish the movie. Embed it in the body of the page you want to detect Flash on.

Step 5: In the <head> of the same page, add this line of HTML, replacing the given URL with your Flash-free page:
            <meta http-equiv=refresh content=4;url=noflashpage.html>

So your page should end up looking somewhat like this:
Here’s how it works:
When the Flash movie loads, it tries to redirect to the Flash-enabled page. If Flash is not enabled, the Flash movie is never run. The META tag waits 4 seconds (you can change this time to what you think is appropriate) before redirecting to the Flash-less page, giving the Flash movie time to load.


Snib

<><

Q: I have some music files that I would like to include in my Flash website. How can I make them downloadable

A: I would suggest that you should use a pop-up window. Reason being that if you insert a link to the file such as:

on(release)
   GoToUrl(mysong.mp3)


The file will only be streamed. In order to make the file downloadable, I would suggest using a pop-up window. Store all of your music files in that pop-up window. In the ActionScript code, you need to insert a function that will open the page in a new window.



Ben Horne
Madison Area Technical College - Truax
3550 Anderson Street
Madison, Wisconsin 53704-2599


-------------------------
http://community.webshots.com/user/valerian114

"There are two kinds of people in the world: Those who claim to be Flash junkies and those who actually are Flash junkies"

Q: I have an XML file that contains reference to images I want to use in a photo slideshow. Do I need to import the XML file into Flash or can I just reference it externally?

A: The easiest way to do this would be to use the following code to reference the XML:

slides_xml.load("slides.xml");

You do not need to import the XML document into Flash. However, in order for the XML to load successfully, the XML file MUST reside in the same directory as the Flash movie.





When the movie is played, the xml file will be loaded. The xml objects onLoad event can be used to detect when the document is fully loaded.

e.g.



ActionScript:

slides_xml = new XML();
slides_xml.ignoreWhite = true; // ignore whitespace in the xml document
slides_xml.onLoad = function() {
        // the xml is loaded, so now you can do whatever you want with it
};
slides_xml.load("slides.xml");



Ben Horne
Madison Area Technical College - Truax
3550 Anderson Street
Madison, Wisconsin 53704-2599


-------------------------
http://community.webshots.com/user/valerian114

"There are two kinds of people in the world: Those who claim to be Flash junkies and those who actually are Flash junkies"

Q: Where can I find some good resources regarding Flash?

A: There's a lot of good resources out on the internet that should give you some ideas. They are listed below.

http://www.flashkit.com (Registration is required in order to use the forums but it's completely free)
http://www.freeflashintros.com The Flash intros at this site are AWESOME, If you don't download any of them, they should at least give you some ideas for your own Flash intro

One book that I'd recommend that you check out if you're planning on designing a Flash website is Developing Web Sites with Macromedia Flash MX by Rickard Muller.

There's more to come so stay tuned!:D

Ben Horne
Madison Area Technical College - Truax
3550 Anderson Street
Madison, Wisconsin 53704-2599


-------------------------
http://community.webshots.com/user/valerian114

"There are two kinds of people in the world: Those who claim to be Flash junkies and those who actually are Flash junkies"