What are the best practices for optimizing a transparant png image? What things can be done to make such a png file as small as possible without loosing to much of its quality? Best tools? Best Photoshop plugins? Other tips?
View 2 RepliesUsing CS5 AS2.I'm creating a website in flash (all the files will be in one directory/folder on SharePoint) and want to make sure that what seems to be working fine is best practice.I have an index.swf with many buttons which will take the user to landing pages/content/other swfs. On these different buttons I have the script [code]The movie transitions nicely to name.swf and on this page I have a button that returns the user to the index.swf on (release) {loadMovieNum("index.swf", 0);}Things move back to index.swf nicely and user can chose to go to another landing page.It looks like I'm on the right track, bc nothing is going awry? but want to check. Am I following best practices for moving from one swf to another within a website?
View 3 RepliesI'm working with a few .flv movie clips in my timeline based flash file. I've imported and embedded the files into movieclip symbols. My file is now sluggish and close to 10mgb.What's the best way to optimize the videos so my .fla and final .swf are as small as possible?
View 5 RepliesThis question was posted in response to the following article: [URL]..
View 4 RepliesI'm trying to lighten the load on the users' machine as much as possible. Which requires less resources: using Flash filters for Drop Shadow/Glow or creating vector shapes for the shadow/glow with the Modify > Shape > Soften Fill Edges command?
View 3 RepliesI got this horrible error, But then I found this solution.[URL]
View 1 RepliesI'm trying to use an irregularly shaped PNG as a mask but the mask is just coming out as a straight rectangle, not taking into account the transperancy of the image.
I've found many people complainng about this across the internet, and it is apperantly solvable, I just haven't been able to figure it out.
I've tried Trace Bitmap to vectorize the shape, since it's a single solid shape, but I'm getting weird results: [URL] I cant figure out why those lines are appearing across my mask. There's nothing there in the actual traced image, I've even ran the eraser over the affected sections to make sure.
I'm trying to disable the buttons I have on the stage within a function. I have found a way to use a "blocker" from other tutorials to do this. It works fine when I have an instance of the blocker placed on the stage, but I only want the buttons disabled part of the time. So I need to add the movieclip to the stage using actionscript and then remove it once the user has clicked a "reset" button which I have inside of another movieclip. You can download the .fla if needed at [URL] Here is the actionscript I have on the main timeline
[Code]...
Im using a lot of movieclips in an app.Its hitting the performance limits.Im using .png files in animated movieclips.Looking in the clip it says bitmap as type.. source...pngI used .png because i want the alpha background possibility.I then went into some of the movieclips and changed properties convert to bitmap (althoug technicly they already were according to flash)After this i feel the performance has slightly improved.Is this true or just in my mind & wishfull thinking.
View 3 RepliesI'm using this simple code to retrieve a value from a PHP script:
package
{
import flash.display.MovieClip;
[code]....
I've been working on a game the past few days where there is to be a LARGE amount of stored data. By a large amount, I'm talking something like 200+ entries of around 12 fields.The game is being designed with the intent of playing it online (per say), so I can't rely on storing specially made files on one's computer (Not that I think I could and do it in a way where players cannot modify it). I also do not want to rely on a stored XML file on the internet or on a database, because if the website that has this data goes down or if the person loses internet access, then the game becomes unplayable.So, I need to store this data in the game itself, but I am unfamiliar with the best way to go about doing this. I've normally worked with outside sources for data storage, as they were designed in closed environments (aka intranet) or the website that the SWF would be on would also be where the database used is stored. Neither apply to this game, as the game will likely be put up on Flash portals like Newgrounds.
View 17 RepliesWe have recently deployed Flash Media Streaming server 3.5.2 and Flash Media Encoder on a Windows 2003 machine. Do you guys know of any security best practices to follow for the FMS server deployment on a Windows machine, could you please point me to that resource.
View 2 RepliesWhat are, nowadays, the best practices for uploading a large file (which may cause a timeout) with ASP.NET Web Forms and/or MVC? Increase Server.ScriptTimeout (only for the specific POST request); Use some flash client-side uploader like swfupload ([URL]) or plupload ([URL]), but Flash uploads have some issues with proxies; Use some gmail-like javascript (like [URL]
View 2 RepliesWhen I create a website,I always end up with 2 preloaders... one to load the main swf (library items, etc...), and then a second preload takes place to load all the external images from XML.Is there a better way?I don't like the fact that there are two progress bars that run or a long pause in the beginning prior to the 2nd preloader. Please let me know if I'm missing something or if you follow any design patterns or best practices.I often run across sites that have one load and then images throughout the site load rather quickly.
View 0 RepliesI have a question about how best to remove display objects.removeChild(object);Given that there are no other reference to this object, does using removeChild alone make the object eligible for garbage collection, or does it also need to be given a null value as well?[code]In both these cases, I get the classic 1009 error. That leads me to believe that if you use removeChild, you don't also need to give the object a null value.?url...
View 2 RepliesI've been building Flash web sites for a long time now, as a freelance developer. I usually work alone, and so I'm the only one that touches the production work I do.Since I'm in this working position, I don't get a lot of exposure to other styles of flash production. I was wondering if any of you have examples of the best ways to produce high quality flash websites. I'm not talking about huge team projects, but small 40-50 work hour sites.[code]
View 2 RepliesLet me start off by stating that I am a novice developer, so please excuse the elementary nature of my question(s). I am currently working on a Flex Application, and am getting more and more confused about when to use server side scripting, and when to develop web services. For most of the functionality I am working on, I am taking various files from the user (client), uploading to the server for processing/conversion, then sending back to client in new format.
I am accomplishing most of this using asp.net generic handlers (ashx) files, but not very confident this is best practice. But at the same time, does making web services make any more sense? What would be considered best practice for this?
Are there any standard practices for Video encoding, streaming, etc?
View 1 RepliesI have a website that has a Flash banner. For devices that do not support Flash (like iPads) I want to display an image instead. What is the best practice to deal with this situation? Should this be handled from the front-end with JavaScript?Should this rather be handled from the back-end? (I am using Java on the back-end)
View 1 RepliesI have an application with about 20 models and controllers and am not using any particular framework. What is the best practice for using multiple remote objects in Flex performance-wise?
1) Method 1 - One per Component - Each component instantiates a RemoteObject for itself
2) Method 2 - Multiple in Application Root - Each controller is handled by a RemoteObject in the root
3) Method 3 - One in Application Root - Combine all controllers into one class and handle them with one RemoteObject
I'm guessing 3 will have the best performance but will be too messy to maintain and 1 would be the cleanest but would take a performance hit.
I'm building my first Flash application. It's a stand alone barcode scanner - the scanner is built-in to the monitor. Basically it has a welcome screen with a video, and at any time you can either scan a product to get product info, or touch the screen for more options (more info, more videos, etc.), respectively.I'm looking for articles, tutorials, etc. that can give me best practices and tips for efficiently designing and organizing it. For example, what's the best way to switch between screens, keep track of which screen is showing, etc.
I've looked all over the web and can't find an article or tutorial on this, and while my app is working, the code is looking pretty spaghetti-ish and I really would like to learn the best way to plan and organize a project like this.
I thought i'd start this thread to uncover peoples habits and practices when it comes to the simple operation of adding and removing elements on stage. I ask because there are so many alternatives, and I keep wondering what might be the best/most eficcient way of doing it. Let me explain by giving an example:
Your user has chosen to click that flashing button that says "Sign up for our mailing list" and you need to prompt the user for a valid e-mail address by presenting him/her with an alert box on top of everything else. Do you.[code]....
If I've got a getter method, say a(), that returns the private variable _a. Obviously from outside the class I call instanceOfClass.a. But from inside the class, should I use the getter or directly _a? Suppose I'm writing a method that uses _a: should I use _a or a? var b = a; or var b = _a? Maybe for performance reasons it's better to directly access _a? Or since there's a getter a(), it's a good practice using always and only the getter?
View 8 RepliesAnyone have any tips for good practice with using event listeners? I've gotten into the habit for checking for event listeners (hasEventListener()) prior to removing them, but no errors are thrown if you try to remove an event listener that does not exist, so should I even bother?
Also, I've often gotten into the habit of checking for a listener prior to adding it sometimes, just to make sure I'm not adding it twice (mostly due to slightly sloppy code when they're added/removed on an as-needed basis). But doing a quick test, it seems this is also not needed. It seems adding an event listener of the same type with the same handler twice overwrites the first:
Code:
stage.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_DOWN, downHandler);
stage.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_DOWN, downHandler);
// traces 'true'
trace(stage.hasEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_DOWN));
[Code]...
Since there's so much potential pollution within namespaces, particularly with the parser automatically declaring any MXML component with an id to be publicly-accessible using that ID I'm finding it dangerous to use just camelCase for MXML element ids. eg:
[Code]...
In Flash development, a lot of us did this for (automatically) declared stage instances like "mcMyTabBar" or "navMC" or "playPauseBTN". I'm looking for input from the Flex community about this. Am I just overthinking things? All of the related Style Guides and best practices documents I've read on the topic just say "use camelCase for ids, and make sure the id property is the first property". What's your take?
I have a bit of Flash experience, did a full featured movie player, other stuff in AS3 and got plenty of programming skills in other languages, BUT now I need to create a multi paged website. Quite easy, a few pages, some animations here and there, nothing fancy, got all the graphics.
But time is short on this one, so I need some advice about good practices (pack everything into one main MC or make separate swfs and load them in, etc.), where to begin, or what kind of book should I grab to make the job pretty.
i want to create some crazy sites with Flash i created the site in Photoshop and then i imported the psd into flash but i come in one post that i should optimizing the content before publishing on internet but how and why should i do that??
View 3 RepliesI have an as3 app which utilises an sqlite db to save metrics data. It is well known that as3 is single threaded, so when I save to this db, the Stage Video I am playing becomes jumpy! I have heard that saving db data in batches can speed up this process so I save in a loop:
for (var i:int=0; i < metricsObject.metricsComponentData.length; i++){
switch (metricsObject.metricsComponentData[i].mouseType) {
case MetricsCollator.MOUSE_OVER:
this._query_txt = "INSERT INTO " + this._tablePath[0] + " VALUES (null, " + this._sessionID +
[code]...
I have looked into pseudo threading examples but they all require a sprite or stage instance, the class I am executing this code in, is not a display class, I don't really want to pass an instance of the stage into this class.
It seems to me everytime I export a PSD design into flash the images come out a little pixelated. Granted I do use 72 dpi though I thought that was the webstandard. By using flash can I use higher dpi images? Or is there another method I should be using instead of the direct import to lirbary?
View 5 RepliesSome AS operations are more CPU intensive than others. What are good ways to compare operations so that I can see for myself how demanding something is? Are there built-in AS3 methods for tracing system use or CPU use? Are there non-flash tools that people use?
View 2 Replies