Built Solid On Strong Foundations
True to the tree paradigm publisher Friends of ED and its label mate Wrox Press follow, Flash 5 ActionScript Studio is the trunk for which Foundation ActionScript provided the roots.
      Which is not to say that ActionScript Studio is not a good place to start if you do not currently have a copy of the other book. Other FoED books also contain some coverage of Flash 5’s programming language, and that may be enough exposure to convince you to don the programmer’s propeller-topped cap as well as the designer’s beret.
      Friends of ED’s tag line is Designer to Designer; their aim is to encourage established designers to share hard-won knowledge with other designers aspiring to full Flash 5 software mastery. No designer using Flash 5 without knowing something about its programming other half can claim to be fully in charge of their creativity.
      And even if you plan on basking in the luxury of Flash programmers being on tap for all the rest of your working life, then you will need to know something of the limits and possibilities of what they can achieve with your interface designs.
      The XML web is coming regardless of whether or not we fully realise its implications, and is changing conventional HTML and Flash. XHTML—the intermediate stage before we must begin using XML for web site design—is at version 1.1 with version 1.0 becoming an official recommendation in 2000. Flash 5, and by implication ActionScript, supports XML objects, and as with HTML it means the separation of presentation from content. That can only be a good thing.
      ActionScript Studio contains several chapters on XML and ActionScript, one on scripting Generator (which deserves its own stand-alone book), with the bulk of its 664 pages covering such ActionScript essentials as objects, methods and properties, sound control, interface design, 3D, games writing, smart clips and classic ActionScript structure. Each co-author uses a project based teaching method, and the source files are downloadable from the Friends of ED web site. My advice—choose the chapter you are most interested in, download the source files, work through the project, and then move on to the next one.
      Appropriately for a book aimed at professional practitioners or those about to be one, there is also some very practical advice on how to plan projects, work in teams, and building a web site from scratch using what co-author Sham Bhangal (whose credits appears throughout the FoED series) defines as advanced interface and animation control techniques.
      With its mix of high-end but accessible ActionScript methods and examples of how other designers work and or in teams, Flash 5 ActionScript Studio has joined Colin Moock’s ActionScript: The Definitive Guide as one of the two books that have found a permanent home in my backpack.

Footnote:
I am astounded at how many designers still write such lousy HTML code, and justify it by saying that it does not break the particular web browser they favour, so why bother learning to do it correctly? Talk about shortsightedness, not to say wilful ignorance! One of the biggest blessings of XHMTL and XML is they will not tolerate the kind of code lazy designers and developers became accustomed to creating throughout the HTML years.

The Book:

• Title: Flash 5 ActionScript Studio <;/i>
• Authors: Sham Bhangal et al
• Publisher: Friends of ED
• Published: 2001
• Pages: 664
• Illustrations: Monochrome
• ISBN: 1903450357
• Rating: 4.5