[flexcoders] TabNavigator and SWFLoaders problem

[durnelln]

Hi all,

I've been lurking on this list for a few weeks but I've now run into 
a problem and need some help myself...

My application's main screen consists of a number of windows, each of 
which is a Flex application in its own right.  The layout of the main 
screen is configurable from an external file which I parse at runtime 
and create the corresponding controls/sub-applications using 
Actionscript.  Each sub-applications is loaded in a SWFLoaders which 
has been sized appropriately and added to the configured container.  
Once the screen is built I then tell all the SWFLoaders to load their 
content.

This has all been working fine until now.  What I want to do is have 
a TabNavigator on the main screen with several tabs - each tab 
containing a sub-application so that the user can flip between them.  
What I am doing is creating a SWFLoader on each tab (within a canvas) 
and setting their widths and heights to 100% (to fill the tab 
whatever its size may be).

The sub-application on the first tab (i.e. the one visible at 
startup) is fine - it fills the tab as planned.  However, the sub-
applications on the subsequent tabs do not appear - UNLESS their 
widths and heights are set explicitly (e.g. width="200" 
height="100").  However this breaks my ability to change the size of 
the tabs and still have the contents fill them.  Nothing changes if I 
set the TabNavigator or canvas creationPolicy to "all" either.

Any ideas anyone?  Is this a bug?

I cannot post my entire application as it is getting pretty huge :-)  
However I have created an example application which shows a similar 
problem:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<mx:Application xmlns:mx="http://www.adobe.com/2006/mxml"; 
layout="absolute" applicationComplete="doStuff()">
        <mx:Script>
                <![CDATA[
                        public function doStuff():void
                        {
                                loader1.load();
                                loader2.load();
                                loader3.load();
                        }
                ]]>
        </mx:Script>

        <mx:TabNavigator creationPolicy="all" x="10" y="10" 
width="500" height="400">
                <mx:Canvas label="Tab 1: 100%" width="100%" 
height="100%">
                        <mx:SWFLoader id="loader1" autoLoad="false" 
width="100%" height="100%" source="BlueBox.swf"/>
                </mx:Canvas>
                <mx:Canvas label="Tab 2: explicit size" width="100%" 
height="100%">
                        <mx:SWFLoader id="loader2" autoLoad="false" 
width="200" height="200" source="BlueBox.swf"/>
                </mx:Canvas>
                <mx:Canvas label="Tab 3: 100% (same as tab 1)" 
width="100%" height="100%">
                        <mx:SWFLoader id="loader3" autoLoad="false" 
width="100%" height="100%" source="BlueBox.swf"/>
                </mx:Canvas>
        </mx:TabNavigator>

</mx:Application>

This application creates a TabNavigator with 3 tabs - all of which 
contain a SWFLoader which loads BlueBox.swf.  BlueBox.swf is simply 
an empty application with a blue border and background so I can see 
how large it is once loaded (see below).

Tabs 1 and 3 are identical - i.e. they both contain a SWFLoader sized 
to 100%.  However the one on tab 3 does not get sized/loaded 
properly.  The SWFLoader on tab 2 is very similar but its SWFLoader 
uses explicit widths and heights (which seem to work).

Here is my BlueBox.swf:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<mx:Application xmlns:mx="http://www.adobe.com/2006/mxml"; 
layout="absolute" backgroundGradientColors="[#9999ff, #9999ff]" 
borderColor="#0000ff" borderStyle="solid" borderThickness="2">
</mx:Application>

Thanks for your help (if you've managed to stay awake through all 
that!)

Nick.