Macromedia Flash MX 2004 and Macromedia Flash MX Professional 2004 are the professional standard authoring tools for producing high-impact web experiences. ActionScript is the language you use to add interactivity to a Flash applications, whether your applications are simple animated movies or more complex rich Internet applications.
You don’t have to use ActionScript to use Flash, but if you want to provide basic or complex user interactivity, work with objects other than those built into Flash (such as buttons and movie clips), or otherwise turn a SWF file into a more robust user experience, you’ll probably want to use ActionScript.
ActionScript is similar to the core JavaScript programming language. You don’t need to know JavaScript to use and learn ActionScript; however, if you know JavaScript, ActionScript will seem familiar.
This manual does not attempt to teach general programming. There are many resources that provide more information about general programming concepts and the JavaScript language.
- The European Computers Manufacturers Association (ECMA) document ECMA-262 is derived from JavaScript and serves as the international standard for the JavaScript language. ActionScript is based on the ECMA-262 specification. For more information, see www.ecmainternational. org/publications/standards/Ecma-262.htm)
- Netscape DevEdge Online has a JavaScript Developer Central site (http://developer.netscape.com/tech/javascript/index.phpl) that contains documentation and articles useful for understanding ActionScript. The most valuable resource is the Core JavaScript Guide.
- The Java Technology site has tutorials on object-oriented programming (http://java.sun.com/docs/books/tutorial/java/index.phpl) that are targeted for the Java language but are useful for understanding concepts that you can apply to ActionScript.
Some of the differences between ActionScript and JavaScript are described in the following list:
- ActionScript does not support browser-specific objects such as Document, Window, and Anchor.
- ActionScript does not completely support all the JavaScript built-in objects.
- ActionScript does not support some JavaScript syntax constructs, such as statement labels.
- In ActionScript, the eval() function can perform only variable references.
- ActionScript 2.0, the latest version of the ActionScript language, supports several features that are not in the ECMA-262 specification, such as classes and strong typing. Many of these features are modeled after the ECMAScript 4 Draft Proposal currently in development by ECMA TC39-TG1 (see www.mozilla.org/js/language/es4/index.phpl), the standards committee in charge of the evolution of the ECMA-262 specification.
- ActionScript does not support regular expressions using the RegExp object. However, Macromedia Central does support the RegExp object
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