User Guide

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CHAPTER 2
Creating an Application with
Components (Flash Professional Only)
Components are prebuilt Flash elements that you can use when creating Macromedia Flash
applications. Components include user interface controls, data access and connectivity
mechanisms, and media-related elements. Components save you work when building a Flash
application by providing you with elements and behavior that you would need to create from
scratch otherwise.
This chapter contains a tutorial that shows you how to build a Flash application using
components that are available in Macromedia Flash Professional 8. You will learn how to work
with components in the Flash authoring environment and also learn how to make them
interactive with ActionScript code.
About the Fix Your Mistake tutorial
This tutorial takes you through the steps to create a basic online shopping application for the
“Fix Your Mistake” gift service. This service helps a user select an appropriate gift to make
amends to someone whom the user has offended. The application filters a list of gifts to those
choices that match the severity of the users offense. From that list the user can add items to
the shopping cart and then proceed to the checkout page to provide billing, shipping, and
credit card information.
This chapter contains the following sections:
About the Fix Your Mistake tutorial . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Build the main page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23
Bind data components to display gift ideas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Display gift details . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Create the checkout screen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Test the application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Viewing the completed application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47