What is New in ActionScript in Flash 8

What’s New in ActionScript in Flash 8

If you’ve been reading through the first two articles in this series, you’ll have seen the new features and changes to Flash Basic 8 and Flash Professional 8. In this article, I want to show you some of the changes to ActionScript in Flash 8. These include changes to the editor as well as changes to the language itself.

I’m going to cover the following areas:

  • Changes to the ActionScript editor
  • Changes to the Actions panel
  • Changes to the ActionScript language
  • Miscellaneous changes

This article doesn’t include example files but you may want to read it with Flash 8 open so you can familiarise yourself with the new features. If you haven’t yet bought Flash 8, you can download a trial version from the Macromedia web site.

We’ll start by looking at changes to the ActionScript editor panel.

This article is part of the new interactive e-book; Out of my mind: Flash 8 Power

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Overview

ActionScript editor

The ActionScript editor is used by both the Actions panel and the Script window when working with ActionScript. The Script window opens standalone ActionScript files.

The ActionScript editor controls the way that your code is coloured and provides options for working with code. In Flash 8, some additional options have been added including:

  • Display of hidden characters
  • Debug options in external .as files
  • Preference to reload modified script files

Displaying hidden characters

You can now view hidden characters in your code. This is an incredibly useful feature as it can help you track down problems that prevent your code from running. Many times, I’ve copied code from other places, only to find that it didn’t work correctly when tested the movie. There was no apparent reason but I’d accidentally copied hidden characters from the other location.

Open the Actions panel and choose the menu options button at the right. You’ll see the Hidden Characters option. You can also use the Ctrl-Shift-8 shortcut to turn on this option. The following screen shot shows the location of this option.

Sas Jacobs

Sas JacobsHello. I'm the Principal of Anything Is Possible, an Australian web development business specialising in web applications development and training. I'm interested in using Flash with dynamic content and I've presented at a number of International conferences on topics relating to applications development, XML and scripting components. I have recently released my second print book Beginning XML with DOM and Ajax to match the first one - Foundation XML for Flash. I have a business web site
and a personal web site.

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