[FONT=Arial]Hello everyone. I love Kirupa![/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]I am wrapping my brain around OOP and I need some advice. I am making two posts on two different subjects.[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]My question here is: when should I link an AS2 class to a library symbol which I then instance, and when should I use “new” in code to create a new instance of a class? (Feel free to correct my terminology.)[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]Let’s say I have a menu for general system options. I want to define it in a class called MenuSystem. One of the methods I want to attach to it is “summon”, which makes the menu visible, plays a sound, and changes its contents based on context.[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]I make a symbol in the Library which lays out all the menu’s elements and give this symbol the linkage identifier “ID_menuSystem”.[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]It seems I have two ways I can create, initialize, and refer to this thing and darned if I know which is better practice.[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]***METHOD A: [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]Make the class MenuSystem extend MovieClip. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]The class constructor does not do anything.[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]In the class, references to the menu clip’s methods are done thusly:[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]this._visible=true;[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]In the library, fill in the symbol’s AS 2.0 class as “MenuSystem”.[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]In my main code, in a startup initialization function, I create the menu on the stage with:[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]<MC to attach the menu to>.attachMovie(“ID_menuSystem”, “theMenuSystem”, depth)[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]And then call the method anytime by referring to the instance:[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]<path>.theMenuSystem.summon();[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]***METHOD B:[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]Don’t make the class MenuSystem extend MovieClip. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]The class constructor takes an argument “attachTo” for the MC to which the constructed menu’s MC should be attached.[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]The class constructor has in it:[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]this.myMC = attachTo.attachMovie(“ID_menuSystem”, “theMenuSystem”, depth);[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]In the class, references to the clip’s methods are done thusly:[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]this.myMC._visible=true;[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial] [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]In my main code, in a startup initialization function, I create the menu with:[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]this.theMenuSystem = new MenuSystem(<MC to attach the menu to>);[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]And then call the method anytime by referring to the instance:[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]this.theMenuSystem.summon();[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]***QUESTION:[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]Which method should I use, A or B? My main priorities are, in order:[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]1) Make code that can scale up to be part of a rather complex application.[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]2) Make code which will be easily reusable in other projects.[/FONT]
[FONT=Arial]3) Make code which is comprehensible to other (real) coders (me being a fake one).[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]???[/FONT]
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[FONT=Arial]Thanks very much for any advice you can give to someone who wants to do good OOP but is lacking much formal training.[/FONT]
