Webdevotion.be » actionscript 3

Screator: create your own wallpaper from Flash

Webdevotion — Wed, 15 Sep 2010 15:47:03 +0000

Well, just something I’ve been playing around with during the last couple of days: Screator. I guess an application says more than a thousand words, so just go ahead and try it. Ideas, nags or your creations in the comments please!

[flickr album=72157624962427464 num=5 size=Square]

Http://www.webdevotion.be/lab/screator/

Smoothing – the simple way

Webdevotion — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 14:50:20 +0000

Solved this little problem the simple way. One of the centralized file sharing applications we’re developing needed some form of branding at the bottom of the screens. The logo bar, 1400 px wide, needs to be resized when the user changes the resolution of the browserwindow.

Without smoothing, things turn ugly and pixelated. With smoothing turned on, everything keeps looking the way it should, even when resized.


    
	private function smoothImage ( img : Image ) : void
	{
		var bmp : Bitmap = img.content as Bitmap;
		bmp.smoothing = true;
	}

How to merge two images into one using Actionscript

Webdevotion — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 13:18:38 +0000

Well, it’s very easy, using BitmapData and Bitmap. This example makes things a bit more complex to show some principles. Hope you learn something out of it off course.
// we'll scale the first ( background ) image by 50% var s : Number = .5;


// create a matrix to make the scalilng of the bitmap possible

var scaleMatrix : Matrix = new Matrix();
// apply the scaling to the matrix

scaleMatrix.scale(s,s);
// create a bitmapdata object from an existing bitmap ( "bmp" in this case )

var scaledBitmap : BitmapData = new BitmapData(bmp.width*s,bmp.height*s,false,0);
// draw the content and scale it using the matrix

scaledBitmap.draw(bmp,scaleMatrix);
// we have an embedded asset called "flickr", a flickr logo in gif format

var icon : Bitmap = new flickr() as Bitmap;
// let's place it in the bottom right corner

var ix : Number = scaledBitmap.width-icon.width;

var ij : Number = scaledBitmap.height-icon.height;
// create a matrix for the position of the icon

// note the use of the ix and ij variables in the parameters

var positionMatrix : Matrix = new Matrix(1,0,0,1,ix,ij);
// draw the icon bmp to the bitmapdata

scaledBitmap.draw( icon, positionMatrix );
// add the new, merged, bitmap to your displaylist

var bmp : Bitmap = new Bitmap( scaledBitmap );

addChild( bmp );

// that's it!

PS: as per user comments I’ve also uploaded an example to use in the Flash IDE ( *.fla file ) – the above example assumes you’re using Flash Builder or another editor

I do have to say I don’t understand why people try to merge two bitmaps in Flash using the IDE. You could just as easily create a MovieClip with the two bitmaps on top of each other. Or am I missing something? Tell me in the comments!

Download the example *.fla file here: http://www.webdevotion.be/blog/wp-content/mergy.fla.zip

Binding between a DateField and a Button label at runtime

Webdevotion — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 06:08:13 +0000

When creating a runtime component to use as a popup I wanted to bind a DateField’s selectedDate property to a Button label. Because I never used bindings ( and a labelFunction ) using pure Actionscript before I had to come up with a solution.

This is what worked for me:

bt being a Button instance
df being a DateField instance
dateLabelFunction returns a formatted date as a string

BindingUtils.bindProperty( bt, "label", df, {name:"selectedDate",getter:function(df:DateField):String{return dateLabelFunction(df.selectedDate)}});

What we are doing here is:
- Bind bt.label to df.selectedDate ( that’s the name:”selectedDate” part )
- When retrieving the value of df.selectedDate use the ‘getter’ function
- The getter function returns a formatted date string

Snippet day: last comma becomes “and”

Webdevotion — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 08:25:40 +0000

This little snippet will replace the last comma in a string by the word ” and “. Making it more readable for the end user.

In other words: the string “Other examples are rats, mice,other rodents” will be converted into “Other examples are rats, mice and other rodents”.

var a : Array = ["rats","mice","other rodents"]; var s : String = a.toString(); // returns rats,mice,other rodents var r : RegExp = /,(?![^,]+,)/g; // the magical formula s = s.replace( r ," and "); // replace the last , with and trace( s ); // rats, mice and rodents

How to PUT xml to a REST interface with Basic Authentication

Webdevotion — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 12:36:31 +0000

Well, this thing got me going for a couple of hours before things worked out. Using HTTPService did not seem to be the way to go. Long story short: URLRequest to the rescue!

// basic authentication var encoder : Base64Encoder = new Base64Encoder(); encoder.encode(username + ":" password); // send xml var header1:URLRequestHeader = new URLRequestHeader("Content-Type", "application/xml"); // authenticate var header2:URLRequestHeader = new URLRequestHeader("Authorization", "Basic " + encoder.toString()); // accept xml as response var header3:URLRequestHeader = new URLRequestHeader("Accept","application/xml");


var request:URLRequest = new URLRequest( urlToRestAPI );

// mmm, maybe not necessary = allready in the headers

request.contentType = "application/xml";

// push the headers in the request

request.requestHeaders.push(header1);

request.requestHeaders.push(header2);

request.requestHeaders.push(header3);
// put your xml in a string: "
my summary
"

// generate an XML instance from the string

var xml : XML = new XML( s );

// put the xml in the request instance

request.data = xml;

// use PUT ( could depend on the API you are using, check the docs )

request.method = "PUT";

// use the loader to send the request

var loader : URLLoader = new URLLoader( null );

// wait for the complete event to do other amazing things

loader.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE,onTicketUpdated,false,0,true);

// fire in the hole!

loader.load( request );

// take a deep breath and wait a sec

// for the complete event to be triggered