Comments on: AS2 Component sizing via the parameters panel http://blog.flashgen.com/2006/04/12/as2-component-sizing-via-the-parameters-panel/ An infrequent look at developments in the world of the Flash Platform Sun, 06 Jul 2008 21:19:21 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5.1 By: Justin Levi http://blog.flashgen.com/2006/04/12/as2-component-sizing-via-the-parameters-panel/#comment-1719 Justin Levi Thu, 18 May 2006 16:25:07 +0000 http://blog.flashgen.com/2006/04/12/as2-component-sizing-via-the-parameters-panel/#comment-1719 I'm so glad you replied to my comment! I really was banging my head against the wall for quite some time trying to figure out a work around and came to the same conclusion that it just can't be done. I am going to submit this feature be added in the next release. Seems like it could be somewhat useful for component development. I’m so glad you replied to my comment! I really was banging my head against the wall for quite some time trying to figure out a work around and came to the same conclusion that it just can’t be done. I am going to submit this feature be added in the next release. Seems like it could be somewhat useful for component development.

]]> By: spender http://blog.flashgen.com/2006/04/12/as2-component-sizing-via-the-parameters-panel/#comment-470 spender Thu, 13 Apr 2006 14:14:12 +0000 http://blog.flashgen.com/2006/04/12/as2-component-sizing-via-the-parameters-panel/#comment-470 You might have noticed that the Flash IDE usually masks the area of the component at authortime. Anything outside the area that Flash thinks the component is in gets masked. Sometimes this mechanism fails (I've not found any pattern to this failure) and the authortime component can exceed the bounds of this mask. So, removing this mask would be part of the solution, but it would also allow components to "pollute" any part of the stage at design time. The big problem here is getting Flash to listen to the changes in the component. I've tried every possible avenue on this problem and concluded that it is impossible. Flash communicates to the component, but the component is unable to communicate to flash. For instance, there are times when changing one parameter might affect another. It would be nice to communicate this back to the params panel and potentially to other parts of the IDE (for size and positions), but is currently impossible. As a side issue, ever noticed that at authortime, components actually live on their own "stage" and no matter where the component is on the main stage, if you trace it's _x and _y, they are always 0,0. They also only have access to their own "private" library, not the library of the project they are placed in... this makes skinning in live preview completely impossible. It appears that MM have partially addressed this issue with the "skins" for the FLVPlayback component, but adapting this mechanism to any other purpose has proved fruitless. It is a completely unextensible mechnism ONLY for skinning the FLVPlayback. I think that due to MM's component implementation, changing the way these thing work would be much trickier than is seems at first glace. Components at authortime live in a sort of inpenetrable sandbox. It would be interesting to know exactly why MM chose this to be the case. You might have noticed that the Flash IDE usually masks the area of the component at authortime. Anything outside the area that Flash thinks the component is in gets masked. Sometimes this mechanism fails (I’ve not found any pattern to this failure) and the authortime component can exceed the bounds of this mask. So, removing this mask would be part of the solution, but it would also allow components to “pollute” any part of the stage at design time. The big problem here is getting Flash to listen to the changes in the component. I’ve tried every possible avenue on this problem and concluded that it is impossible. Flash communicates to the component, but the component is unable to communicate to flash. For instance, there are times when changing one parameter might affect another. It would be nice to communicate this back to the params panel and potentially to other parts of the IDE (for size and positions), but is currently impossible.

As a side issue, ever noticed that at authortime, components actually live on their own “stage” and no matter where the component is on the main stage, if you trace it’s _x and _y, they are always 0,0. They also only have access to their own “private” library, not the library of the project they are placed in… this makes skinning in live preview completely impossible. It appears that MM have partially addressed this issue with the “skins” for the FLVPlayback component, but adapting this mechanism to any other purpose has proved fruitless. It is a completely unextensible mechnism ONLY for skinning the FLVPlayback.

I think that due to MM’s component implementation, changing the way these thing work would be much trickier than is seems at first glace. Components at authortime live in a sort of inpenetrable sandbox. It would be interesting to know exactly why MM chose this to be the case.

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