It’s been a while since I last looked at any books that offer the most basic of introductions to Flash. I’m talking about the kind of book any normal computer user with no development or design experience might pick up. As expected, this is a different world than the developer space in which I usually take an interest. Honestly, I was just curious how Flash, and especially ActionScript, are presented to the layman today. With a hardening of my defenses to the possible shock of an ActionScript-free world, I picked up Flash CS3: The Missing Manual.
As expected, the majority of the book focuses on the design-time tools that appear in Flash CS3. Just about every item in the menus and toolbars gets its own respective section, and I’m happy to say that I learned a bit about a couple things that I’ve never needed to use (and probably won’t in the future, but that’s a different story). Of note, a well-written introduction to the timeline and MovieClips gives the new user a strong advantage over some poor soul who dares to open the Flash authoring environment without reading anything beforehand. If the designer tools are all you need, then I can’t recommend a better source.
As the book neared the end of its chapters, I became worried that ActionScript wouldn’t make an appearance at all. Unfortunately, that’s nearly the truth. The majority of the ActionScript presented to the reader is created with Behaviors, and it’s almost all made with ugly on( event ) syntax. I discovered a world where my beloved ActionScript 3 gets mentioned in passing, and it certainly never gets time on stage (Pun intended. I’m a sucker for bad jokes). With such a quick intro, best practices go right out the window. I got the impression that the author only included the current coding chapters as a way to check off a box on a list of available features.
Overall, I’m disappointed in the slim introduction to the development side of Flash. While I understand the intended audience is someone who might have never touched a programming language, I believe that a brief chapter on basic syntax would have gone a long way to improving this section. Right now, I believe that Flash CS3: The Missing Manual is a take it or leave it choice for the beginning Flasher who expects to do a little coding. The descriptions of design-time features certainly give someone the skills they need to get started creating their graphical elements, but the development sections were slim enough that they might as well be useless. If you need to learn about all aspects of Flash, pick up this one for the design features but add another book to your cart to learn ActionScript.
I first learned ActionScript because it was like a “human” language. In English I would say, “Tom’s age is 30.” In ActionScript I would say “Tom.age = 30;” The transition from English to AS is simple.
As AS grew more powerful it also grew more complex and more difficult to manage. Adobe/Macromedia, seeking a solution, looked to “tried and true” programming methods (OOP, etc.). This is a fine and much-welcomed solution for people with a fairly extensive programming background. However, “any normal computer user with no development or design experience” is going to be “a little frustrated with the extra work these language changes make you do.”
The success and power of ActionScript wasn’t initially due to its speed or performance, it was due to the creative people who were granted access to the programming world through it’s simplicity. Adobe is probably wise to make AS3 more like a “real” programming language but in doing so they seem to be abandoning what initially made ActionScript great; its ability to provide regular people a bridge across the Programming gap.
Where’s that confounded bridge?
PiXELWiT, you may find your transition easier if you turn off strict mode. The compiler will allow you to do many more things that are considered bad practice, like “this.parent.parent.some.nested.clip” but you’ll feel more at home since AS1/2 allowed this sort of thing. Sounds like a perfect bridge to me.