Help with OOP Classes in Flash-- creating data types?

[adamredwoods]

Hi,

I'm relatively new to AS3, but have a little programming background and some AS2 experience-- but sometimes examples and concepts go over my head.

What I'm trying to do is to create data types for multiple re-use. Say that I'm creating a game, so I want to create a player data type (multiple players), but also things like ship data (multiple ships). I have learned a little C, and in C I would use a struct. In AS3, I though I could use a class, but it's turning out to be more complicated than a simple struct. For one, I cannot put the class into the Flash timeline (confusing). So I created a separate file...

moz.as:

package moz {

import flash.display.MovieClip;


// Tech list for levels
 class ShipList {
    var weapon:Number;
    var travel:Number;
    var shields:Number;
}

// the player class
public class PlayerClass {
    var race:Number;
    var pname:String;
    var money:Number;
    var ships:ShipList;

    public function PlayerClass() {
        money=100;
        //
    }
}

and then in the timeline for Flash:

import moz.*;

var player:PlayerClass = new PlayerClass();
var player2:PlayerClass = new PlayerClass();

player.ships.weapon = 1;
player2.ships.weapon = 2;

I could have put the ShipList into the PlayerClass, but I am planning to have many ships, accessed through an array.

There errors I get are:

1046: Type was not found or was not a compile-time constant: PlayerClass.
1046: Type was not found or was not a compile-time constant: PlayerClass.
1180: Call to a possibly undefined method PlayerClass.
1180: Call to a possibly undefined method PlayerClass.

I could also be setting this up wrong in Flash. I have tried going through the Document Class, but that did not seem to make any difference.

I've search over the web for help, but I always end up with the same examples and I am not sure how to create something I actually want to use.

Any ideas? Is there a better way to create a struct? Help is greatly appreciated.

[adamredwoods]

Related, but can this be done with a class instead? I think a class would help against any misspelled variables when debugging (?).

http://www.kirupa.com/forum/showthread.php?t=335280

[micken]

For starters it is good practice to give each class it's own Actionscript file. From my experience trying to put more than one class in a file makes problems like this one that don't make much sense.

You can make a data type using a Class but that kind of defeats the purpose of Actionscript 3.0. Flash lets you link any library object with a class of it's own. This is your gateway from flash to code. You need a ship? make a movieclip called ship and link it to a class called Ship. Then make a file called Ship.as and inside declare a class called Ship that extends MovieClip.
Voila you now have a ship object which you can display on the screen whenever you want and store any data relevant to the ship inside.

Actionscript 3 makes putting actionscript inside frames less desirable. I like to think of each frame in FLASH as a little "box" of code and use it for small tasks like firing an event at a certain part of an animation or letting the rest of my game know an animation has finished.

[TheCanadian]

You can only have one public class per AS file. Any classes that are not defined withing the package block are only accessible by the class that is in the package block. And the AS file should be named after the main class name, eg: PlayerClass.as

[adamredwoods]

Originally Posted by micken

For starters it is good practice to give each class it's own Actionscript file. From my experience trying to put more than one class in a file makes problems like this one that don't make much sense.

And the AS file should be named after the main class name, eg: PlayerClass.as

Thank you both for these tips, this is what finally got my code to work. I don't understand why someone can't put multiple classes under one package, but rather has to separate them into one file. Seems unnecessary, but I'll accept it.

...also for other people who are interested: I needed to put PUBLIC in front of all my VARs (that I wanted public).

[TheCanadian]

Originally Posted by adamredwoods

Thank you both for these tips, this is what finally got my code to work. I don't understand why someone can't put multiple classes under one package, but rather has to separate them into one file. Seems unnecessary, but I'll accept it.

You can have multiple classes in the same package, just not in the same AS file.

Originally Posted by adamredwoods

...also for other people who are interested: I needed to put PUBLIC in front of all my VARs (that I wanted public).

That's because, by default, variables are in the internal namespace which means that they can only be accessed by classes and functions in the same package.