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Flash - Loading External Text
Written by Chris aka Solaris

Loading external text into flash has so many advantages. Consider this, trying to update a site every time something new happens. It would kind of get monotonous to have to edit the .fla every time this occurs. Using a text file is both easier to edit and alot faster. Doing so isnt as difficult as it seems either! It's actually QUITE easy and you can memorize the steps very quickly!

You can use a different font, but for now, use times new roman. This insures you can read what you have typed. Now after that, add a scrollbar from the components panel. Drag it to the right of the text field. It should attach itself and resize to make up for the text box.

After you have completed that, open frame one actions. Place this script inside:


  loadVarsText = new loadVars();
loadVarsText.load("test.txt");
loadVarsText.onLoad = function(success) {
    if (success) {
        trace("Doc Loaded");
        scroller.text = this.var1;
    } else {
        trace("not loaded");
    }
};

 

As you may have noticed, the text we will be loading will be called "test.txt" Later you can change this to your preferred text name.

The "trace" shows a message in the output window in flash mx, this will not be seen when viewed in a player or browser. This just insures that the loading of the text was successful when debugging.

Now that we have established the scripting, we need to create our text document, It also HAS to be a txt file. Include this paragraph, along with any edits you might want, edit everything except the var1=. That is needed when loading the data into flash.

As you may have noticed, the text we will be loading will be called "test.txt" Later you can change this to your preferred text name.

The "trace" shows a message in the output window in flash mx, this will not be seen when viewed in a player or browser. This just insures that the loading of the text was successful when debugging.


  var1=Hey guys this is a test.Hey guys this is a test.Hey guys this is a test.Hey guys this is a test.Hey guys this is a test.Hey guys this is a test.Hey guys this is a test.

 

As I mentioned earlier, make sure the text document is named "text.txt". Make sure you export the swf where the text file is, this makes it so much simpler.

You're done! Now make sure your text document is where your swf is or it wont load. If you have any problems, look below for a possible solution.

Solutions

My text isnt loading, what is wrong?
A possible error might be that your text field isn't named. If it isn't, name it "scroller".

My computer gives an error.
The reason you have been recieving erorrs or maybe even not even loading, is that you are using flash 5, if this is true, you should replace the var1= in the text document to mytext=.

 

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