User Guide

780 List component
See also
EventDispatcher.addEventListener()
List.dataProvider
Availability
Flash Player 6 (6.0.79.0).
Edition
Flash MX 2004.
Usage
listInstance.dataProvider
Description
Property; the data model for items viewed in a list. The value of this property can be an array
or any object that implements the DataProvider API. The default value is
[]. For more
information, see “DataProvider API” on page 317.
The List component, like other data-aware components, adds methods to the Array object’s
prototype so that they conform to the DataProvider API. Therefore, any array that exists at
the same time as a list automatically has all the methods (
addItem(), getItemAt(), and so
on) it needs to be the data model for the list, and can be used to broadcast model changes to
multiple components.
If the array contains objects, the
List.labelField or List.labelFunction properties are
accessed to determine what parts of the item to display. The default value is
"label", so if a
label field exists, it is chosen for display; if it doesn’t exist, a comma-separated list of all fields
is displayed.
Any instance that implements the DataProvider API can be a data provider for a List
component. This includes Flash Remoting recordsets, Firefly data sets, and so on.
Example
The following example uses an array of strings to populate the list:
my_list.dataProvider = ["Ground Shipping", "2nd Day Air", "Next Day Air"];
NOTE
If the array contains strings at each index, and not objects, the list is not able to sort the
items and maintain the selection state. Any sorting causes the selection to be lost.