Wow! Remember I said I was a beginner. I'm sure this is great information JesterXL, but it is WAY over my head for now. So, a custom component on the 'parent' can not change the 'parent state'? You can not transition between custom components? How would I code this? ~David T.
________________________________ From: flexcoders@yahoogroups.com [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of JesterXL Sent: Monday, January 22, 2007 12:06 PM To: flexcoders@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [flexcoders] Please Help - Components, States, & Transitions Components should never "know" about other components, in this case, a View knowing about another View. They should emit events about their state changing, or some other action being peformed. In the case of a LoginForm, a user clicking the submit button. Additionally, while states are really nice to have a comopnent represent different visual states, they shouldn't necessarely assume these states are exposed. They technically are since the currentState function is public, so shouldn't assume others won't set it. It's nicer if you provide a public method to change state internally, but for brevity's sake, let's just assume a parent will set it. Here's the scenario: - user submits signup1.mxml; it emits event - MXML view that is hosting signup1.mxml responds to event, and changes state in child ops_v1.mxml - user clicks cancel in ops_v1.mxml; it emits event - MXML view that is hosting ops_v1.xml responds to event, and changes state in signup1.mxml Rule of thumb: Views handle their own internal workings, and emit events about what happened. Parent can respond how they so choose. Parent in this case being the MXML form that hosts the child (Canvas embedding your signup1.mxml for example). Transitions are the change in one state to another. State being the state tag that has a string ID name in an MXML / AS component. Transition tags have a fromState and toState properties that are the names of the states you wish to transition between. In the case of a Login component that has, say "main", "loggingIn", "error", and "success". You want to disable the form fields when the user hits submit, and goes to the loggingIn state. You could easily do this by simply setting all fields enabled property to false. That looks boring, and is quite abrupt to the user. Why not fade + blur while placing a progress bar atop that waits for the server to tell it success or false? You can do this by making a transition tag that starts with the fromState being "main" and the toState being "loggingIn". Whenever your loginform has it's currentState change from "main" to "loggingIn", the transition will be triggered autoatically. Within the transition tag is where you can create animations, changes in form properties, styles, etc. Additionally, if your first attempt at creating a cool effect fails, you can simply delete the transition tag, and all code + states remain intact; transitions are only coupled to state names; that's it. If you don't have transitions, state changes are instaneous. Some people disagree with me, but I highly recommend all View's start with a "main" state that is the default currentState value so you can easily add more states later; either based off the main state or some other diffrent state. FlexBuilder the IDE is really helpful in starting these for you, although, the state tags are usually put at the top of your MXML and need to be moved lower manually. On Jan 22, 2007, at 12:46 PM, David Terry wrote: Hello, First, let me apologize. I am very, very new to Flex 2 & ActionScript 3, and the learning process has been very slow going and painful. I truly do not understand the relationship between components, states, and transitions. I have a main application page (ops_v1.mxml) with 2 custom components - login.mxml and signup1.mxml. I have figured out how to hide and show the components depending on states in the ops_v1.mxml page. But here is where I am completely lost. When someone clicks the register button within the login custom component how do I change the state on the ops_v1.mxml page? Conversely... How do I change back to the login state when someone clicks the cancel button on the register custom component? Next question. After figuring out how to change states; how do you apply a transition between those 2 custom controls? I am guessing I am really transitioning between the states, but I am lost here also. This is a really big problem for me. I have an application I need to make, but I am totally stuck here. The application will have many different custom controls and this is my first big step in understanding how integration between the components will work. Enclosed is the code for each item mentioned above. Thank you for all your help in advance. Best regards, David T. <<code.zip>> <code.zip>
