com.flagstone.transform
Class FSFrameLabel

java.lang.Object
  extended by com.flagstone.transform.FSTransformObject
      extended by com.flagstone.transform.FSMovieObject
          extended by com.flagstone.transform.FSFrameLabel
All Implemented Interfaces:
java.lang.Cloneable

public class FSFrameLabel
extends FSMovieObject

FSFrameLabel defines a name for the current frame in a movie or movie clip.

The name can be referenced from other objects such as FSGotoFrame2 to simplify the creation of scripts to control movies by using a predefined name rather than the frame number. The label assigned to a particular frame should be unique. Frames may also be reference externally when specifying the movie to play using a URL - similar to the way names links are used in HTML. When the Flash Player loaded a movie it will begin playing at the frame specified in the URL.

Attributes
type Identifies the data structure when it is encoded. Read-only.
label The name that will be assigned to the current frame.
isAnchor Will the label be used as an anchor.

The name is assigned to a particular frame when the FSFrameLabel object is defined prior to the FSShowFrame object that displays all the objects on the display list. The frame can then be referenced by its name once it has been defined. A frame cannot be referenced before the Player has loaded and displayed the frame that contains the corresponding FSFrameLabel object.

Examples

The following simplified code samples illustrate how to use the FSFrameLabel class to refer to a frame by its name rather than a number.

1. Using the FSFrameLabel object.
This examples uses the FSFrameLabel object to allow the movie to loop back and replay an animation starting at a named frame.

  movie.add(new FSFrameLabel("Frame Name"));
  ...
  movie.add(new FSShowFrame());
 
  ...
 
  FSDoAction frameAction = new FSDoAction();
 
  frameAction.add(new FSPush("FirstFrame"));
  frameAction.add(new FSGotoFrame2(false));
 
  movie.add(frameAction);
 
 

2. Controlling a movie clip.
The FSFrameLabel object can also be used to control the time-line of a movie clip. In this case though the mechanism is slightly different. From Flash 5 onward movie clips are defined as objects. The ExecuteMethod action is used to execute the gotoAndPlay() or gotoAndStop() methods that control a movie clip's time-line:

  // First define the commands that animate the movie clip.
  ArrayList commands = new ArrayList();
  ...
  commands.add(new FSFrameLabel("Frame Name"));
  commands.add(new FSShowFrame());
 
  FSDefineMovieClip movieClip = new FSDefineMovieClip(movie.newIdentifier(), commands);
 
  // Add the movie clip to the display list on layer 1 at (400, 400). Give it the name
  // "movieClip" to allow it to be referenced later.
 
  movie.add(movieClip);
  movie.add(new FSPlaceObject2(movieClip.getIdentifier(), 1, events, "movieClip", 400, 400));
 
  // Create the FSDoAction object that will start the movie clip playing.
 
  FSDoAction clipActions = new FSDoAction();
 
  // Movie clips objects can be controlled by executing pre-defined methods.
 
  // Define the arguments followed by their number for the gotoAndPlay method.
 
  clipActions.add(new FSPush("Frame Name"));
  clipActions.add(new FSPush(1));
 
  // Get the movie clip object using its name. It's location is specified relative to the "_root"
  // level which represents the main time-line of the movie.
 
  clipActions.add(new FSPush("_root"));
  clipActions.add(new FSPush("movieClip"));
  clipActions.add(FSAction.GetAttribute());
 
  actions.add(new FSPush("gotoAndPlay"));
  actions.add(FSAction.ExecuteMethod());
 
  movie.add(clipActions);
  movie.add(new FSShowFrame());
 

3. Defining an anchored frame.
Specifying a frame name as an anchor allows a movie start playing from any frame.

  // Define the anchored frame in a movie.
  movie.add(new FSFrameLabel("StartHere", true));
  movie.add(new FSShowFrame());
  ....
  movie.encodeToFile("movie.swf");
 

To start playing the movie at the frame labeled "StartHere" specify the label using the same format a HTML anchors:

  http://www.flagstonesoftware.com/flash/movie.swf#StartHere
 

This may be used either in a browser window to load a file or form within a movie using the FSGetUrl or FSGetUrl2 actions.

History

The FSFrameLabel class represents the FrameLabel tag from the Macromedia Flash (SWF) File Format Specification. It was introduced in Flash 3. In Flash 6 the label can support named anchors which allows a frame to be specified as the starting point when displaying a Flash movie in a web browser.


Field Summary
 
Fields inherited from class com.flagstone.transform.FSMovieObject
ButtonColorTransform, ButtonSound, DefineBitsPtr, DefineButton, DefineButton2, DefineFont, DefineFont2, DefineImage, DefineImage2, DefineJPEGImage, DefineJPEGImage2, DefineJPEGImage3, DefineMorphShape, DefineMovieClip, DefineShape, DefineShape2, DefineShape3, DefineSound, DefineText, DefineText2, DefineTextField, DefineVideo, DoAction, EnableDebugger, EnableDebugger2, Export, extendLength, FontInfo, FontInfo2, FrameLabel, Free, Import, Initialize, JPEGTables, length, LimitScript, PathsArePostscript, PlaceObject, PlaceObject2, Protect, QuicktimeMovie, RemoveObject, RemoveObject2, SerialNumber, SetBackgroundColor, ShowFrame, SoundStreamBlock, SoundStreamHead, SoundStreamHead2, StartSound, TabOrder, type, VideoFrame
 
Constructor Summary
FSFrameLabel(FSCoder coder)
          Construct an FSFrameLabel object, initialising it with values decoded from an encoded object.
FSFrameLabel(FSFrameLabel obj)
          Constructs an FSFrameLabel object by copying values from an existing object.
FSFrameLabel(java.lang.String aString)
          Constructs an FSFrameLabel object with the specified name.
FSFrameLabel(java.lang.String aString, boolean isAnchor)
          Constructs an FSFrameLabel object with the specified name.
 
Method Summary
 void appendDescription(java.lang.StringBuffer buffer, int depth)
          AppendDescription is used to present a string description of the object including all nested objects up to a specified depth.
 void decode(FSCoder coder)
           
 void encode(FSCoder coder)
           
 boolean equals(java.lang.Object anObject)
          Returns true if anObject is equal to this one.
 boolean getAnchor()
          Gets the flag indicating whether the frame name is also used as an anchor so the frame can be referenced from outside of the movie.
 java.lang.String getLabel()
          Gets the label.
 int length(FSCoder coder)
           
 void setAnchor(boolean isAnchor)
          Sets the flag indicating whether the frame name is also used as an anchor so the frame can be referenced from outside of the movie.
 void setLabel(java.lang.String aString)
          Sets the label.
 void setLabel(java.lang.String aString, boolean isAnchor)
          Sets the label defining whether it will be referenced as an anchor or not.
 
Methods inherited from class com.flagstone.transform.FSMovieObject
getType
 
Methods inherited from class com.flagstone.transform.FSTransformObject
clone, name, toString
 
Methods inherited from class java.lang.Object
finalize, getClass, hashCode, notify, notifyAll, wait, wait, wait
 

Constructor Detail

FSFrameLabel

public FSFrameLabel(FSCoder coder)
Construct an FSFrameLabel object, initialising it with values decoded from an encoded object.

Parameters:
coder - an FSCoder containing the binary data.

FSFrameLabel

public FSFrameLabel(java.lang.String aString)
Constructs an FSFrameLabel object with the specified name.

Parameters:
aString - the string that defines the label that will be assigned to the current frame.

FSFrameLabel

public FSFrameLabel(java.lang.String aString,
                    boolean isAnchor)
Constructs an FSFrameLabel object with the specified name. If the isAnchor flag is true then the frame will be directly selectable by a URL and the Flash Player will begin playing the movie at the specified frame.

Parameters:
aString - the string that defines the label that will be assigned to the current frame.
isAnchor - if true the name will be used as an anchor when referencing the frame in a URL.

FSFrameLabel

public FSFrameLabel(FSFrameLabel obj)
Constructs an FSFrameLabel object by copying values from an existing object.

Parameters:
obj - an FSFrameLabel object.
Method Detail

getLabel

public java.lang.String getLabel()
Gets the label.

Returns:
the string defining the label.

setLabel

public void setLabel(java.lang.String aString)
Sets the label.

Parameters:
aString - the string that defines the label that will be assigned to the current frame.

setLabel

public void setLabel(java.lang.String aString,
                     boolean isAnchor)
Sets the label defining whether it will be referenced as an anchor or not.

Parameters:
aString - the string that defines the label that will be assigned to the current frame.
isAnchor - if true the name will be used as an anchor when referencing the frame in a URL.

getAnchor

public boolean getAnchor()
Gets the flag indicating whether the frame name is also used as an anchor so the frame can be referenced from outside of the movie.

Returns:
true if the frame is an anchor frame, false otherwise.

setAnchor

public void setAnchor(boolean isAnchor)
Sets the flag indicating whether the frame name is also used as an anchor so the frame can be referenced from outside of the movie.

Parameters:
isAnchor - true if the frame is an anchor frame, false otherwise.

equals

public boolean equals(java.lang.Object anObject)
Description copied from class: FSMovieObject
Returns true if anObject is equal to this one. Objects are considered equal if they would generate identical binary data when they are encoded to a Flash file.

Overrides:
equals in class FSMovieObject
Returns:
true if this object would be identical to anObject when encoded.

appendDescription

public void appendDescription(java.lang.StringBuffer buffer,
                              int depth)
Description copied from class: FSTransformObject
AppendDescription is used to present a string description of the object including all nested objects up to a specified depth. This method provide a more controlled way of creating a string representation of an object since large objects such as font or shape definitions can contain dozens of nested objects. The representation of the object is appended to the StringBuffer, showing the name of the class and values of the attributes it contains. If the object contains any attributes that are objects then the object graph will be traversed up to the specified depth. If objects are nested at a level less than specified depth then the full string representation of the object is displayed. For objects at the specified depth only the name of the class is displayed. Any objects below this depth are not displayed.

Overrides:
appendDescription in class FSMovieObject
Parameters:
buffer - a StringBuffer to which the description of each object is appended.
depth - the maximum level of nesting up to which objects will be displayed.

length

public int length(FSCoder coder)
Overrides:
length in class FSMovieObject

encode

public void encode(FSCoder coder)
Overrides:
encode in class FSMovieObject

decode

public void decode(FSCoder coder)
Overrides:
decode in class FSMovieObject