Flash 101 (part 5): Spiralling Out Of Control - Mousing Around (
Page 5 of 7 )
Next up,
actions.
Actions allow you to add interactivity to a Flash movie, by
executing specific commands in response to user actions. Flash comes with a
full-featured scripting language, ActionScript, which is very similar to
Javascript; you can either manually create scripts, or use Flash's built-in
Actions panel to insert actions through a point-and-click mode of
operation.
A number of pre-defined actions are available in Flash, which
are more than sufficient for basic requirements; you've already seen one of
them, the Get URL action, in last time's article. Typically, these actions are
triggered in response to either a mouse or keyboard event, or when a specific
frame is reached in the animation sequence.
When you specify an action
for a button, Flash automatically inserts an onMouseEvent handler to it - this
specifies whether the action is to be triggered when the mouse button is pressed
or released, when the mouse pointer rolls over the button or when it rolls
outside it, or when the user drags the pointer over the button. Additionally,
you can specify an action to be triggered when the user taps a specific key on
the keyboard.
For example, this code
snippet specifies that the Flash player stop playing the animation sequence when
the user releases the mouse button, or taps the X key on the keyboard.
on (release, keyPress "X") {
stop ();
}
In a similar manner, you can assign actions to a movie clip -
Flash automatically inserts an onClipEvent handler, which can trigger actions
based on mouse movement, keyboard entry, or at specific positions in the
clip.
Finally, you can also assign actions
to a specific keyframe in the clip by right-clicking the frame and selecting the
Actions command on the shortcut menu.
Note that you should use the
Control -> Test Movie command to test whether or not your actions are working
correctly.
This
article copyright Melonfire 2001. All
rights reserved.
