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In short, would be an intimidating introductionto Flash, but if you've got the basics of AcitonScript, this book will you give a very solid foundation to build upon. With no previous programing experience but basic Flash timeline coding this book got me hand-coding pure object-orientated as3.And it's usually a more accurate and faster reference than what I find via Google.
A book that purports to be for beginners should start with basic concepts and build up to more complex concepts, but this one doesn't. The VirtualZoo example built in pieces through the book would be easier to follow if the author simply introduced its final, intended behavior in 10 or 12 bullet points at the start. You have to get to page 153 to read about primitive data types.
The book is extremely detailed (good for a reference, bad for beginner tutorials), but leaves out at least one maddening chunk. The elements of its implementation in small pieces leave the reader wondering, "okay, how does this syntactical element support the overall application.". For example, the String class is hardly addressed at all.
This book starts with the concepts of packages and classes first, then works its way down to primitive data types and arrays. Nor is there an easy way for an experienced OO programmer to get the gist of the differences between ActionScript and other OO languages like C++. Finally, the author's preference for the cool GUI elements is clear, as he gives short shrift to the basic concepts.
Statements and operators are not covered until you get to page 172. This book is not for beginners at all.
It provides excellent information on sandboxes and security I did not know and does a good job of dealing with text fields from a programming perspective. This book is totally unlike other books on ActionScript, and that is both its strength and its weakness. Chapter One goes through all of Object Oriented Programming, including such arcana as page 22's "Access-control modifiers for instance variables." No one without programming experience can understand why or how this woud be useful or learn how to use it. As a reference, however, it's indispensible.
On the other hand, if you want to develop simple Flash programs and want to buy only one book, this isn't it. It won't teach you the simplest basics (putting stop(); on frame 1 of a movie clip) that you need for practical Flash programming. If you are a game developer or are writing a major application, you need this book. For the topics it covers, it goes into great depth.
None of the code sits on the timeline--this is ActionScript as a programming langusage, with packages, and stand-alone code files.On the positive side, this book really does explain the language as a language, so for us programmers, there's no need to wonder about syntax, language features, error handling, etc.--it's all here. In summary, I find this more of a reference book than a tutorial. First of all, the claim that this book could be used by someone with no knowledge of programming is laughable and misleading. So it does cover much of value in the Flash context, and that in more detail than other ActionScript books I've read.
timer, stage resizing, loading, and so on. If you haven't done programming, choose a different book.Other books begin with the Flash environment, and introduce bits of ActionScript on the timeline in an inductive manner: on (press) { amountPaid = Number(paid.text); amountOwed = Number(owed.text); }You'll see none of that in this book, except for Chapter 29, which introduces programming in the Flash environment. You'll learn how to create objects with their own events and listeners, about dynamic instance variables, about using try.catch.throw.finally error handling, and many other features unlikely to be covered in other books on ActionScript.Because ActionScript is specific to Flash (and Flex), the book does cover the events you'll care about: mouse activity, key presses, screen updating, ENTER_FRAME vs.
It's impossible to find the simplest things. The index is absolutely terrible, and the table of contents is no help at all. The only way you're going to find what you want is to scan or read the entire book. The content is good and rather thorough, but only if you're a cover-to-cover reader. If you're looking for a reference, this is not the book for you.
For example, the discussions around namespaces, dynamic variables, and the XML stuff just didn't do it for me. What an important subject (and I had no idea how important it was when I first read this).I can honestly say that had I not read this book before diving in, I would not have been near as far along in the learning process with AS3 as I am now.Buy this book. At the time, I was really only familiar with VB, VBA, and a small amount of C++ and Java.
The author is incredibly adept at making complicated things make a lot of sense. Keep this book. The second, specifically, is the discussion around garbage collection.
I read this book about a year ago and it provided a great basis for learning the language. The first is how basic it stays (for the most part). You'll use it over and over again.
Also, I had never worked with AS2, so this and Flash were both very new to me.At first, I did not understand/have use for some of the topics. However, after using AS3 vigorously for the past 6 months or so, I have needed those topics (badly) and this book works as an excellent reference guide.There are two things, however, that really make this book great.
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