Moving from Flash AS2 to Flash AS3: Button Press
Posted on 17 March 2008.
Lately, I’ve begun dedicating my time towards learning Actionscript 3.0. I’ve been told that Actionscript 3.0 is a bit tricky, but very powerful once you get the hang of it. However, when I came across a simple button press, I realized this wasn’t going to be a walk in the park.
The simple button press is probably one of the most used features for Flash users. With Actionscript 3.0, this has changed quite a bit. This is why this tutorial will directly focus on just that.
Getting Started with AS3: Button Press
The AS3 code below will show you how to add interactivity to a button using ActionScript 3.0. It will also give you a glimpse of how the structure of ActionScript 3.0 has changed the face of ActionScript…for the better.
AS3 Code
//imports the necessary AS events
import flash.events.Event
import flash.events.MouseEvent;
//attaching mouse events to the button on stage
rssButton.addEventListener(MouseEvent.CLICK, rssClick);
rssButton.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_OUT, rssMouseOut);
rssButton.addEventListener(MouseEvent.MOUSE_OVER, rssMouseOver);
rssButton.addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, onEnterFrames);
//Properly declaring variable
var box_color_play:Number;
//On mouse clicked function
function rssClick(event:MouseEvent):void {
eventNotice.text = "MOUSE CLICKED";
}
//On mouse out function
function rssMouseOut(event:MouseEvent):void {
eventNotice.text = "MOUSE OUT";
box_color_play = 0;
}
//On mouse over function
function rssMouseOver(event:MouseEvent):void {
eventNotice.text = "MOUSE OVER";
box_color_play = 1;
}
//Function in place used for on ENTER_FRAME event animation
function onEnterFrames(event:Event)
{
if ((rssButton.box_color.currentFrame != rssButton.box_color.totalFrames) || (rssButton.box_color.currentFrame != 0)) {
if (box_color_play == 1) {
rssButton.box_color.nextFrame();
}
if (box_color_play == 0) {
rssButton.box_color.prevFrame();
}
}
};
Additional Resources:
Video Tutorial brought to you by Justin Everett-Church
The tutorial will go into depth on how to go about creating an interactive button inside of Adobe Flash using Actionscript 3.0.
exactly what i was looking for.
thx
No problem.
Quality!!!!! nice work
in as3 wat is the code for gotoAndPlay and nextFrame because i can’t use the bone and 3d tool in as2
pls help me
Switching to AS3 today. Yep first thing I ran into.
That’s cool! I plan to continue this series of “Moving From AS2 to AS3″ very soon.
God bless you!
This is nearly exactly what I am looking for.
I need a button to link to a URL is this possible with this file?
our help is much appreciated.
Thanks.
@Jez: Yeah, this example uses that exact functionality.
thanks….btw how about multi button? if I have more than 1 button?
Great button and tutorial. One question, do new buttons not show the hand when you hover over them? anyway to get the hand back?
thanks
Never mind my last question. I figured it out.
// if you want a hand cursor
rssButton.buttonMode = true;
rssButton.useHandCursor = true;
Yeah, that is something that needs to turned on if desired.
Thanks for the post and thanks Jan! Saved me a lot of time.