//create connection

var myService:mx.remoting.NetServiceProxy;

//make an object that will handle the response

myService.getDate(mask.text);


this code is great… you set up a service (called myService in this example, it’s calling a cfc called ‘flashRemotingResponder’)

When flex2 came out, and all of the examples starting coming out with it, and how to use it with ColdFusion, there were a lot of remoting examples using mx:RemoteObject… something like the following<mx:RemoteObject source="com.SomeCFC" destination="ColdFusion" result="someResultHandler(event)" fault="someFaultHandler(event)"/>

This is just psuedo code, so don’t copy and paste it… but I myself got caught up in this… we’ve recently been trying to hire another flex developer… we’ve got projects to do, and so we’re considering doing some contracting, but the problem is, we need someone that knows coldfusion and flex, and that seems to be a Hot combo right now, and most of the developers that know both of those things well are getting paid fairly well, and full of work… the point is, you can still use the RemoteObject tag to call cfc’s remotely, and call services like you used to be able to in flashremoting. you use the ‘endpoint’ attribute in remoteObject.

<mx:RemoteObject id="remoteService"
source="com.test"
destination="ColdFusion" endpoint="http://127.0.0.1:8500/flex2gateway/"
result="onResult(event)"
fault="onFault(event)"/>

You use the source like you would as if the objects are local to the webroot, and use the endpoint to specify a remote domain. This may be common knowledge to everyone out there, but I simply just forgot about even trying it… I got so caught up with having coldfusion locally installed, and working with the cfc’s myself, I simply got close minded about it…

anyway, check out the post about it at the following link, it’s where I got my answer.
http://www.flashcomguru.com/index.cfm/2006/11/11/flex2remoting

Say you have a table called “customers” and you have a customerID as the primary key…

you now have a cross reference table that joins customers to certain products, it’s only a 1 to 1 relationship in our situation (not very real world with this example for customers/products, but it’s only an example), the database was made in flaw, so you want to do some clean up…

Your goal is to get rid of the cross reference table called “tblCustomerProduct” it has three columns, “customerID, productID, catID” you want to add the column “productID, and catID” to the “customers” table, and want to get rid of the cross reference table…

now you run your update, and it’s a simple sql statement rather than looping over it in coldfusion the db runs it in no time!

--psuedo code
update c
SET c.productID = o.productID,
c.catID = o.catID
FROM customers
JOIN tblCustomerProduct o
ON c.customerID = o.customerID

works good…

again this is just psuedo code and is a reminder to myself to remember how to do this simple task, I would have done in coldfusion before, now i can use this

APPLICATION   - SOURCE

• http://blog.flexexamples.com/2007/08/12/sorting-date-columns-in-a-datagrid/
• http://weblogs.macromedia.com/pent/archives/2004/12/sorting_by_date.cfm
• http://erikloehfelm.blogspot.com/2007/06/sorting-dates-in-flex-datagrid.html
• http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/webforums/forum/messageview.cfm?forumid=60&catid=585&threadid=1292936&enterthread=y
• http://www.5etdemi.com/blog/archives/2006/01/sorting-datagrid-columns-numerically/

that it is… a true statement in deed… just a note, but i havent even tried filtering on this… so forgive me if my solution wont work for it…

I kept battling this issue, and went back to one of the books i read “Adobe Flex 2 training from the source” and found an example in there, and built from it…

/////////////////////script block/////////// private function dateLabel(item:Object, column:DataGridColumn):String
{
return dateFormatter.format(item[column.dataField]);
}

/////////////////////script block///////////
<mx:DateFormatter id=“dateFormatter”/>

<mx:DataGrid dataProvider=“{acData}”>
<mx:columns>
<mx:DataGridColumn dataField=“name” />

<mx:DataGridColumn dataField=“dob”
labelFunction=“dateLabel”/>

</mx:columns>
</mx:DataGrid>

Please refer to the source links at the top and bottom of the entry for the real source… that code block is not safe to copy and paste and just work…. its just psuedocode.

If you notice I use a mx:DateFormatter id=”dateFormatter” and by default the format is ‘mm/dd/yyyy’ so we dont need to supply a format for this example…

and in the script block there is a very simple function that just formats the label of the date column… and returns a string… and my sorting is working fine for now… please feel free to comment if you see any downfalls in what I have done…

APPLICATION   - SOURCE

I spent my fair share of time, trying to get cfeclipse working with flexbuilder, and all was fine and dandy till they started coming out with updates and eclipse starting updating… everything grew… but flexbuilder is stuck in (soon to be)old times… and it really aggravates me that when you go to cfeclipse.org you can’t seem to find a place to download old versions…

I’ve found a couple of non helpful links that give me places to download older versions of cfeclipse… but just ended up in a run around.

I just decided to beef up my machine with more ram, and then downloaded Europa (newest version to date of eclipse 3.3.0) and then ran the cfeclipse update site, and everything started to work again….

When I downloaded the new version, i noticed cfeclipse tried to know what my variables were, and I couldnt tell exactly where it was pulling these variables from? was it the cfset tag? the cfparam? cfargument? cffunction? what was it?

I never use this feature because it’s just not quite there yet… it’s more of a distraction, and you have to press “esc” to get out of it, or grab ur mouse and click out of it… it’s just somewhat of a nuisance right now… so here is how to shut it off…

the only reason I had an Idea of what to look for is because i notices some new settings coming from older versions, I was easily able to recognize these differences unlike some of the other guys in the office who just started using eclipse after 3.3…

(click Window > Preferences > Cfeclipse > File Parser uncheck “Parse Variables as you type”)

now I kind of understand why it only picks up some variables… judging on the title of the checkbox, it parses them as you type, and doesn’t just pick them up from tags? maybe thats how it works, i’m not sure?

anyway… cfeclipse is awesome because at least you can check if you want all of this stuff or not… its so adverse and customizable! it’s great.

Thanks Mark Drew and everyone else who was prior and still is part of the cfeclipse team. thank you.

We are wrapping up with this great charting application at cfwebtools, and we get a call from a customer that says our data is wrong….

We listen to them, and debug, and for some reason we just can’t quite see the same thing he see’s… On top of that, no one else is having the problem, but the fact is that, he has showed us screen shots, he’s duplicated on Four pc’s of his own, and he’s talked to 10 friends telling us that our data is wrong, and that there is mismatched days in our chart.

The problem:

When he was bringing up the charting application, the charts showed up successfully, but when you ta
ke a closer look, and you know your stuff about Financial Charting applications, you know what your looking for, and you know it with GREAT detail. So this guy, tells us our data is wrong, and pretty much with all of his friends proved to us SOMETHING was going wrong, but we couldn’t duplicate it.

We tried trapping the data he was requesting when the request came in, we tried trapping it right before it went out… then we were using Kevin Langdon’s Service Capture to introspect the data that was coming in to flex.

The data is not that complicated, it looks like this:

Application – Source

Date: 2/20/08
Close: 31.53
Open: 30.61

Date: 2/19/08
Close: 30.93
Open: 30.94

but on his computer it looked like this:

Date: 2/19/08
Close: 31.53
Open: 30.61

Date: 2/18/08
Close: 30.93
Open: 30.94

EVERYTHING WAS SLID BACK BY ONE DAY.

the Date/Time objects were coming back from coldfusion, and it was returning coldfusion sql. They looked like this:
’2/20/08 00:00:00′
’2/19/08 00:00:00′
’2/18/08 00:00:00′

what was really happening is that, flash auto adjusts for your Timezone… so what was really happening is the data is getting turned into this in flash (if they come back to flash as date/time objects)

Pacific Standard Time

’2/19/08 22:00:00′
’2/18/08 22:00:00′
’2/17/08 22:00:00′

I’m sort of at a loss and i’m looking for help, there is one post that was more clear than the rest, but still doesnt solve my issue, it’s written by Ted Patrick of adobe. He states to use Universal Time, (UTC).

I have a problem with this!

I’m not the one creating the date times, nor do I get a chance to touch the data before it goes to my components… Of course I could obviously go in, to my result function of my remote object, or my command of cairngorm, and loop over the data, and adjust it all manually… BUT NOOOOO, I Don’t want to, what if i’m dealing with 40,000 records in a charting application (how bout we make it an even MILLION records, just to prove a point), then obviously the flash player has enough work to do on it’s own, without me looping through the data.

How do I query my database, and have it be a 00:00:00 time, and not have flash offset my date when it comes back to it?

For now, we manually change things in our query to add hours to the date time, but that is kind of sloppy…

Please check the example, and help me out if you can… Like I said I’m at a loss with this one.

Application – Source

There are a few ways to get your query data to valid xml…

You can go to cflib.org and get a udf called QueryToXML and that is supposed to convert your query to valid xml… I’ve never used this, and personally I like writing my own because it gives me more control… and I like to know how things work. There are a couple of things you can do when you write your own…

1. Use the cfxml tag 2. Write out the xml yourself with concatenating strings.

1. Code

<cffunction name=“getSomeXML” output=“false” access=“remote” returntype=“string”> <cfset var getInfo = “”>
<cfset var xmlDoc= “”>

<cfquery name=“getInfo” datasource=“#someDSN#”>
SELECT *
FROM tblArtists
</cfquery>

<cfxml variable=“xmlDoc”>
<artists>
<cfloop query=“getInfo”>
<cfoutput>
<artist name=“#Artist#” id=“#id”/>
</cfoutput>
</cfloop>
</artists>
</cfxml>

<cfreturn xmldoc>

</cffunction>

2. Write your own

<cffunction name=“getSomeXml” output=“false” access=“remote” returntype=“string”> <cfset var getInfo= “”>
<cfset var xmldoc = “”>
<cfquery name=“getInfo” datasource=“#someDSN#”>
SELECT *
FROM tblArtists
</cfquery>

<!— =========== HEADER OF THE XML =========== —>
<CFSET xmldoc = “<?xml version=”“1.0″” encoding=”“UTF-8″“?>
<artists>
“>
<cfloop query=“getAllMarkers”>
<cfoutput>

<cfset xmldoc = xmldoc & ”

<artist name=”“#Artist#”” id=”“#id”“/> “>
</cfoutput>
</cfloop>
<!— =========== FOOTER OF THE XML =========== —>
<cfset xmldoc = xmldoc & ”
</artists>
“>

<cfreturn xmldoc>
</cffunction>

Notice in #2, I used “”#data#”" (a pair of double quotes surrounding variables) this concatenates the data appropriately and you get your xml back…

Why use one over the other you say? You may need more flexibility so you may have to write the string out… otherwise I would definitely start with the CFXML version, it’s much easier to understand.

Once in flex declare your var

[Bindable]
public var treeCollection:XML; /*
this function is called from the RemoteObject result=“treeReceived(event)”
*/
private function treeReceived(event:ResultEvent):void {
treeCollection = new XML(event.result);
}
<mx:Tree id=“someTree” dataProvider=“{treeCollection}” showRoot=“false”/>

I hope this blog might help someone…

CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE EXAMPLE

<mx:List id=“myList” selectedIndex=“{customClass.someID}”>

that way i could have some values in that list, for example
price ranges:
100k – 200k
200k – 300k < this is selected for this house
300k – 400k

but in a different city i have

price ranges:
150k – 250k < this is selected for this house
250k – 400k
400k – 500k

so i’m binding to a custom class that i made, that grabs the current price range of the house… but whenever my dataprovider changes, the selected index is lost…

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE BAD EXAMPLE

it is expected, but i just don’t know how to fix it…. how do you set something selected in a component after you receive new data?

but i figured it out…

thanks to a post by ben forta… CLICK HERE FOR BEN’S POSTthe post wasn’t what i wanted or needed, but there is no fun when you don’t have to try….

so what you have to do is extend the List, or ComboBox components….

create a new component based on the list or combo box… and in that component put the following code…

<?xml version=“1.0″ encoding=“utf-8″?>
<mx:List xmlns:mx=“http://www.adobe.com/2006/mxml“>
<mx:Script>
<![CDATA[
private var tempSelectedIndex:Number = -1;
private var bDataProviderSet:Boolean = false;

// Trap dataProvider being set override public function set dataProvider(o:Object):void{
tempSelectedIndex = this.selectedIndex;
super.dataProvider = o;
// This may get called before dataProvider is set, so make sure not null and has entries if (o!=null && o.length){
// Got it, set flag bDataProviderSet = true;
}
this.selectedIndex = tempSelectedIndex;
}

]]>
</mx:Script>
</mx:List>

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE GOOD EXAMPLE

Just right click to view the source!

The first line is a Quoted date (“Tuesday, January 23, 2007″)… but as it gets read into coldfusion it is not a valid date… so what you have to do is convert it, using the “DateFormat()” function in coldfusion.

In the following example, I’ll go through the following steps.

1. Set a try/catch to handle unpredictable results
2. Getting the file from the current directory
3. Reading the file into CF as a variable
4. Creating a line break as a delimiter
5. Getting the first line of text
6. Stripping out the quotes
7. Converting the String into a date
8. Validating the date, and throwing a valid message
9. End the try/catch

CLICK HERE TO GET EXAMPLE TEXT FILE

CLICK HERE TO GET BAD EXAMPLE TEXT FILE

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE GOOD RESULTS

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE BAD RESULTS

1. Set a try/catch to handle unpredictable results

<!— create a try catch in case of the text file not having a valid date—>
<cftry>

2. Getting the file from the current directory

<!— set vars —>
<cfset msg = “”>
<cfset filePath = ExpandPath(“Example.txt”)>

3. Reading the file into CF as a variable

<!— read the file in as a variable —>
<cffile action=“read” file=“#filePath#” variable=“myFile”>

4. Creating a line break as a delimiter

<!— create the delimiter —>
<cfset line=chr(13)&chr(10)>

5. Getting the first line of text

<!— get the first line of the txt file —>
<cfset date = listGetAt(myFile,1,line)>

6. Stripping out the quotes

<!— get rid of the left and right characters… which are quotes(“) —>
<cfset date = replace(date,’”‘,“”,“All”)>

7. Converting the String into a date

<!— convert the string passed, into a date —>
<cfset date = DateFormat(date,“mm/dd/yyyy”)>

8. Validating the date

<!— set boolean to test off of, returns a true/false —>
<cfset validDate = isDate(date)>

9. End the try/catch

<!— catch the unpredictable errors —>
<cfcatch type=“any”>
<cfset msg = “CFCATCH :” & CFCATCH>
</cfcatch>
</cftry>

and now for the whole file all together, i even created a debug mode to show details… so all you would have to do is plug a ?debugmode=true into the URL, and it would show more info

<!— create a try catch in case of the text file not having a valid date—>
<cftry>
<!— set vars —>
<cfset msg = “”>
<cfset filePath = ExpandPath(“Example.txt”)>
<!— read the file in as a variable —>
<cffile action=“read” file=“#filePath#” variable=“myFile”>
<!— create the delimiter —>
<cfset line=chr(13)&chr(10)>
<!— get the first line of the txt file —>
<cfset date = listGetAt(myFile,1,line)>
<!— get rid of the left and right characters… which are quotes(“) —>
<cfset date = replace(date,’”‘,“”,“All”)>
<!— convert the string passed, into a date —>
<cfset date = DateFormat(date,“mm/dd/yyyy”)>
<!— set boolean to test off of, returns a true/false —>
<cfset validDate = isDate(date)>

<cfif isDefined(“URL.DEBUGMODE”) AND URL.DEBUGMODE NEQ False>
<!— do dumps to show output —>
Date:<cfdump var=“#date#”>
Date with no quotes:<cfdump var=“#date#”><br />
“isdate?”<cfdump var=“#validDate#”><br />
</cfif>
<!— serverside checking to validate it’s a good date, if not show an error —>
<cfif validDate>
<cfset msg = “This is a valid date : “ & date>
<cfelse>
<cfset msg = “the date was invalid in your file, please correct, and retry”>
</cfif>
<!— catch the unpredictable errors —>
<cfcatch type=“any”>
<cfset msg = “CFCATCH :” & CFCATCH>
</cfcatch>
</cftry>
<cfoutput>
#msg#
</cfoutput>

<TEXTFORMAT LEADING=“2″><P ALIGN=“LEFT”><FONT FACE=“Verdana” SIZE=“10″ COLOR=“#0B333C” LETTERSPACING=“0″ KERNING=“0″>test</FONT></P></TEXTFORMAT>

If you copy and past this code into an html page, the font shows up huge much like so:

test

Ryan Stille, Jason H. of CFWebtools and I spent a little time researching what we could do to fix this issue… not very complicated, but it’s surely bothersome to us, as well as the clients. I’m not all that proficient with regular expressions… so that is where Ryan came in great.

What you can do is take your htmlText of the rich text editor and do a while loop on the htmlText, and replace your SIZE=”##” WITH STYLE=”font-size: ##”.

You will want to make sure that your Rich Text editor has it’s ID attribute assigned

<mx:Script>
<![CDATA[
private function testReg():void{
var tempString:String = testText.htmlText;
trace("tempString: " + tempString);
var pattern:RegExp = new RegExp("SIZE=\"([0-9]{1,2})\“”,“g”); trace(“pattern :” + pattern.toString());

var result:Object;
/*
there is a really bad practice fix that i’m going to do
right now the pattern is case sensitive… i’m going to
put the size=“#” back in but in lower case, so the text editor still recognizes the different sizes
*/
while(result=pattern.exec(tempString)){
trace(tempString=tempString.replace(pattern, “STYLE=\”font-size: $1px\” size=\”$1\“”));
}
}

]]>
</mx:Script>
<mx:RichTextEditor id=“testText” htmlText=“test”/>
<mx:Button click=“testReg()”/>

Result:

<TEXTFORMAT LEADING=“2″><P ALIGN=“LEFT”><FONT FACE=“Verdana” STYLE=“font-size: 10px” COLOR=“#0B333C” LETTERSPACING=“0″ KERNING=“0″>test</FONT></P></TEXTFORMAT>

Now you can show this off and it works fantastic and displays like so:

test

What needs to happen:
=========================
1. Get a list of States to query 2. Query the Yahoo service 3. Write the XML File 4. Work with flex in importing that xml into a tree

Sound simple enough?

In this *Pt. 1* section of the yahoo maps geocoder, i’m going to go through how to simply query and put the data into variables, and DUMP them….

First, at the top of the page declare your tag

<cfhttp
url=“http://api.local.yahoo.com/MapsService/V1/geocode“
method=“post”
throwonerror=“yes”
charset=“utf-8″
>

<cfhttpparam
type=“url” name=“appid”
value=“MapToolsV1″ /> <cfhttpparam
type=“url” name=“state”
value=“IA” />

</cfhttp>

Next, create your variables, notice you have to Parse the xml from the cfhttp.filecontent

<cfset xmlObject =
XmlParse(cfhttp.FileContent)> <cfset Lat =
xmlObject.XMLRoot.XmlChildren[1].XmlChildren[1]>

<cfset Lng =
xmlObject.XMLRoot.XmlChildren[1].XmlChildren[2]>

<cfset State =
xmlObject.XMLRoot.XmlChildren[1].XmlChildren[5]>

Now, just dump the variables

<cfoutput>
#Lat#<br />
#Lng#<br />
#State#<br />
</cfoutput>

i’ll continue on this at a later date with example files… it requires quite a bit more complexity as we move through this.

HERE IS A TUTORIAL

say you want to develop on a remote machine, say a mapped drive? or something along those lines… but when you go to create your flex project all you get is this error

“Invalid server root. Server root must contain a WEB-INF/flex folder.”

WHAT DO YOU DO?

I’m not sure if this is technically correct or the downsides to this, all i know is that i couldn’t even get started until this was done… Please take a look at the tutorial and follow the steps… if your having the same issue, and find a different way, or more proper way to fix it, please post a comment, and we can exchange links….

Axel

also look at

http://www.kenreiss.com/blog/index.cfm/2006/8/10/Flex-20-with-CFMX-702–SUCCESS

View the example
Download the File
the basis of what they want to do is rather easy, but the error handling in cfform when the format is flash, is SOOOOO HARD TOOO DEBUG!

1. Call the setUp() function in the onload=”setUp();” in the beginning form tag that your going to create further into the lesson.

<cfform name=“Performance”
timeout=“500″ height=“800″ width=“800″
format=“flash” skin=“haloSilver”
action=“action.cfm” method=“post”
onload=“setUp();”>

2. Create a cfformitem type=”script” right under the cfform tag and create your setUp function as well as another function we are going to call, when one of your select boxes change.

<cfformitem type=“script”>
public function setUp():Void{
School.enabled = false;
}
public function changeStatus(status):Void{
if (Title.selectedItem.data == 1){
   //this is case sensitive so be careful
School.enabled = status;
}
}
</cfformitem>

3. Create Your two cfselects, and call the changeStatus() function in the onChange=”" event of the first one.

<cfselect name=“Title”
label=“Title” width=“200″
tooltip=“Please enter appropiate title.”
required=“Yes” onChange=“changeStatus(true)” >

<option>Select</option>
<option value = “0″>
Asso. & Asst. Deans
</option>
<option value = “1″>
Asso. & Asst. Provost & VPs
</option>
<option value = “2″>
Campus Directors
</option>
</cfselect>

<cfselect name=“School” width=“200″ required=“Yes” >

<option>
Select
</option>
<option value=“1″>
Dyson
</option>
<option value =“2″>
Education
</option>

</cfselect>

</form>

Hope this helps… take a look at the example.

The steps i’m going to cover might look like the last post BUT THEY ARE DIFFERENT!:

View Example

Download Example

First things first,

1. Make your Script tag

2. import Classes

3. Create vars

4. Create 3 function —-One will be called when the menu item is clicked —-One will be called on the load of the app. —-One will be used to handle the remoting event

5. Create your RemoteObject

6. Create Your CFC that will return the xml object

7. Create Your and Bind it

1.
==================

<mx:Script>
<![CDATA[ ]]>
</mx:Script>

2. FROM WITHIN YOUR SCRIPT TAG, IMPORT CLASSES
==================

import mx.events.MenuEvent;
import mx.controls.Alert;
import mx.collections.*;
/*THE RPC EVENTS WAS NOT IN THE FIRST POST*/
import mx.rpc.events.*;

3. CREATE VARS
==================

/*this var used to be an XMLListCollection*/
[Bindable]
public var menuBarCollection:XML; /*
DELETE THE private var menuBarXML, this will be handled by the event.result that comes back from the cfc
*/

4. Create 3 function
==================

private function menuHandler(event:MenuEvent):void {
Alert.show(“Label: “ + event.item.@label + “\n” + “Data: “ + event.item.@data + “\n”, “Clicked menu item”);
} private function setUp():void{
//this sends the request to the cfc remoteObj.getScripts.send();
}
private function scriptsReceived(event:ResultEvent):void{
//this will be called from the remoteObj menuBarCollection = new XML(event.result);
}

5. Create Your Remote Object
==================

/*
make sure when doing this on your own, you know where your webroot is, it is needed for finding the cfc
*/
<mx:RemoteObject
id=“remoteObj”
destination=“ColdFusion”
source=“Examples.Using-the-MenuBar.CFMenuRemoting.CFMenu”
fault=“Alert.show(event.fault.faultString,’Error’);”> <mx:method
name=“getScripts”
result=“scriptsReceived(event)”
/>
</mx:RemoteObject>

6. Create Your CFC IN THE current PROJECT FOLDER
==================
CFMenu.cfc – NOTE PLEASE REFER TO THE DOWNLOAD FOR THE FULL COMPONENT

<!—replace the following with a real query—>
<cfset menu = QueryNew(“id, name”,“integer,varchar”)> <!— make some rows in the query —>
<cfset newRow = QueryAddRow(menu, 2)>

<!— set the cells in the query —>
<cfset temp = QuerySetCell(menu, “id”, “1″, 1)>
<cfset temp = QuerySetCell(menu, “name”, “Menu 1″, 1)>
<cfset temp = QuerySetCell(menu, “id”, “2″, 2)>
<cfset temp = QuerySetCell(menu, “name”, “Menu 2″, 2)>
<!—CREATE XML DOC OBJECT —>
<cfxml variable=“mydoc”>
<menu>
<menuitem label=“File”>
<menuitem label=“Login” data=“mnuLogin”/>
<menuitem label=“Exit” data=“mnuExit”/>
</menuitem>
<menuitem label=“MoreData”>
<cfoutput query=“menu”>
<menuitem label=“#name#” data=“#id#”/>
</cfoutput>
</menuitem>
</menu>
</cfxml>

<cfreturn mydoc>

7. Create Your MenuBar and Bind it
==================

<mx:MenuBar
labelField=“@label”
itemClick=“menuHandler(event);”
dataProvider=“{menuBarCollection}”
/>

Hopefully this helps some people, i know i spent alot of time on it… but that may be because i think i’m a slow learner because i look into things too much, and tend to over analyze

I’m not brand new to flash, or flash development, i’ve never done anything truly amazing with it, but i’ve done what had to be done… it was always a pain… i’m so glad that flex 2.0 has released, i knew it would eventually get to this, and i can’t wait for it to just keep getting better…

A great tool that makes the web even more look like a true desktop application is the use of the it’s a fantastic addition, and i haven’t had a chance to look at the actionscript that it generates, but i know that i love it and it’s capabilities… i will soon be blogging on make the menu dynamic, and bringing the xml in from a query generated in coldfusion, but for now i’ll start rather simply… I can’t remember where i found this but it is a great thing!

View Example

Download Example

First things first,

1. Make your Script tag

2. import Classes

3. Create vars

4. Create 2 function —-One will be called when the menu item is clicked —-One will be called on the load of the app.

5. Create Your and Bind it

1.
==================

<mx:Script>
<![CDATA[

]]>
</mx:Script>

2. FROM WITHIN YOUR SCRIPT TAG, IMPORT CLASSES
==================

import mx.events.MenuEvent;
import mx.controls.Alert;
import mx.collections.*;

3. CREATE VARS
==================

[Bindable]
public var menuBarCollection:XMLListCollection;

private var menubarXML:XMLList =
<>
<menuitem label=“File”>
<menuitem label=“Login” data=“mnuLogin”/>
<menuitem label=“Exit” data=“mnuExit”/>
</menuitem>
</>

4. Create 2 function
==================

private function menuHandler(event:MenuEvent):void {
Alert.show(“Label: “ + event.item.@label + “\n” + “Data: “ + event.item.@data + “\n”, “Clicked menu item”);
}

private function setUp():void{
menuBarCollection = new XMLListCollection(menubarXML);
}

5. Create Your MenuBar and Bind it
==================

<mx:MenuBar
labelField=“@label”
itemClick=“menuHandler(event);”
dataProvider=“{menuBarCollection}”
/>

I worked on trying to get the xml to import from a cfc last night for about 4 hours… it really bites when there is no book for some of the stuff you want to do… so you figure it out, it takes you forever, then other people act like it’s soooo easy to do, because time goes on, people write about it, people learn more, and the community grows… i’m glad i can be a part of it, and for some reason i like the learning other things that arent written about, it keeps me alive and interested.

i’ll write later about importing the xml from a cfc file.

One of my recent assignments was to create a “Recently Updated List”

This list will contain the trackID, and a Title… it will sort by the date in descending order so we always see the most recent items first… It will join 2 tables – items(v_items), and events…

Items is the Main table, and Events are details about that item that happen along the tracking of that item…

For example, say you have track 897 897
========
(below are events)
—————————————–
edited by axel on 11/11/06 @ 2:00pm

We now are finished with this track
—————————————–
—————————————–
edited by axel on 11/11/06 @ 1:30pm

We did something else
—————————————–
—————————————–
edited by axel on 11/11/06 @ 1:00pm

we edited the table in the database to meet a need
—————————————–

<cfquery datasource=“#Application.AdminDsn#” name=“getFeaturesList”>
SELECT
v.itemid, v.title,
e.datecreated, e.eventid
FROM v_items v
INNER Join Events e
ON v.itemid = e.itemid
WHERE
e.eventid in (
SELECT TOP 1 e2.eventid
FROM events e2
WHERE e2.itemid = v.itemid
AND e.createdbyuserid = 92
ORDER BY e2.datecreated desc
)
AND
e.datecreated >
<cfqueryparam cfsqltype=“cf_sql_date”
value=“#DateAdd(‘m’,-1,Now())#”/>
AND v.statusID IN (5)
ORDER BY e.datecreated desc
</cfquery>

<cfif Trim(ListGetAt(CGI.HTTP_USER_AGENT, 2, “;”)) EQ “MSIE 6.0″>

<link rel=“stylesheet”
type=“text/css”
href=“css/main_IE6.css”
media=“screen”
/>

<cfelseif Trim(ListGetAT(CGI.HTTP_USER_AGENT, 2, “;”)) EQ “MSIE 7.0″>

<link rel=“stylesheet”
type=“text/css”
href=“css/main_IE7.css”
media=“screen”
/>

<cfelse>
<link rel=“stylesheet”
type=“text/css”
href=“css/main_FF.css”
media=“screen”
/>

</cfif>

The application no longer will display the time on the page, it turned to the original request of a progress bar that shows a percentage….

There are some problems of the page not doing what they want it to, when going back through mp3’s… the problem has been identified in .mp3 files are being cached in IE 6.

I’m currently trying to find a fix for this… so far, i’ve tried preventing the page cache using

but no luck so far… when i go into IE, and change my settings to

Tools > Internet Options > (Temporary Internet Files) > Click on Settings > Change the value “Check for newer versions of stored pages” to “every visit to the page” and then i deleted my files, and refreshed the page, and it worked….

Still working on a permanent fix, but we’ve identified the problem. Used a tool called “Service Capture” to find out that it was IE 6 that was doing it… the problem doesnt seem to be happening in firefox, and that is one of the reasons I never saw it, because my base alpha testing was done in firefox….

FOUND THE FIX!

filename = “sometrack.mp3″
//the filename is going to be dynamic
filename = filename + “?r=” + Date();
sndAudio.loadSound(filename, true);

NOTE!!!!!!!!
=================
this wont work when you try to trace it, your going to get errors because it’s not going to run on a webserver… but when it runs on a webserver it works because the command flash sends understands the querystring…

WOOOOOOOOOT!

var artist = “Set Your Goals”
var album = “Mutiny!”
var someVar = ‘<br> Some Test’ + escape(artist) + ‘/’ + escape(album) + ‘end’;
This was a workaround for some stuff I do for

killtheheart player

I haven’t been able to check it with any of the special characters for usage with xml or anything, but this was a quick save for me.