User Guide

== (equality) 121
Parameters
expression1,expression2
A number, string, Boolean value, variable, object, array,
or function.
Returns
A Boolean value.
Description
Operator (equality); tests two expressions for equality. The result is true if the expressions
are equal.
The definition of equal depends on the data type of the parameter:
• Numbers and Boolean values are compared by value and are considered equal if they have the
same value.
• String expressions are equal if they have the same number of characters and the characters
are identical.
• Variables representing objects, arrays, and functions are compared by reference. Two such
variables are equal if they refer to the same object, array, or function. Two separate arrays are
never considered equal, even if they have the same number of elements.
When comparing by value, if
expression1 and expression2 are different data types,
ActionScript will attempt to convert the data type of
expression2 to match that of
expression1. For more information, see “Automatic data typing” on page 24 and “Operator
precedence and associativity” on page 32.
Example
The following example uses the equality (==) operator with an if statement:
var a:String = "David", b:String = "David";
if (a == b) {
trace("David is David");
}
The following examples show the results of operations that compare mixed types:
var x:Number = 5;
var y:String = "5";
trace(x == y); // output: true
var x:String = "5";
var y:String = "66";
trace(x == y); // output: false
var x:String = "chris";
var y:String = "steve";
trace(x == y); // output: false