Foundation ActionScript

I am a designer who has known a little flash for a long time; meaning i have done a lot of animation and understand the basics of flash, yet was in dire need of rolling my sleeves up and embarking on the path of actionscript guru-ship. I am the type of person who wants to know not only the HOW, but the why, where, when, and what... before i feel I completely understand something and can really get creative with it. On the flipside, I have no patience for books written for the totally ignorant user; I understand the basics and don't want to have to go through 5 chapters of "go to insert and click 'add key frame'"-type material. At no point in this book did i feel i was wasting my time in this way.What I believe most valuable about this book in comparison to others i have read is that Sham creates a complete understanding for the not-yet-programmer of HOW TO THINK in code. This is to be distinguished from other books I have read which simply explain the components of actionscript and how they work. Each topic in "Foundation Actionscript" is preceded by analogic explanations which create and build a bird's eye understanding of how this funky language works. In the end, you are left with a solid foundation for the ability to use actionscript creatively and knowingly, having absorbed Sham's recommendations on coding best practices and professional application. To boot, his writing style is casual, entertaining, and very clear... making the trudge through learning quite pleasurable. For someone with a short attention span, this too is invaluable: I completed the book in just a few days.

This text is an excellent resource for learning simple to rather advanced techniques using ActionScript. This book is definately not for someone just learning Flash (for that, I'd recommend Foundation Flash) but is great for anyone that understands the basics of Flash and wants to move on to create even more interactive and complex content through the use of ActionScript code. Bhangal takes great care to show the tools available and the steps required to make a "good" Flash site using nothing but code, rather than the download hungry, gratuitous Flash sites found all over the web.After working through the book, I find myself often quoting Bhangal and returning to the book as a refernce.

This book is excellent, as is the before it in the series "Foundation Flash 5". The author, Sham Bhangal, takes his explanations of actionscripting a bit further than other authors I have read. Like other books, Foundation Actionscript has projects with examples of the scripting and explains what the script means, but this book also explains the thought processes and logic behind the writing of the code! The book does a good job of teaching the reader to take a problem and break it down into many smaller problems. In my opinion this makes Foundation Actionscripint superior to other books I have read on this subject. I highly recommend this book especially if you are new to object oriented programming. If you are new to Flash you should read Foundation Flash 5 (or some other book on the basics) first.

While this book doesn't quite dive into advanced topics such as creating 3d engines or complex math formulas in actionscript, it does a GREAT job of introducing actionscript to someone who is already competent in Flash.I've had a good amount of Flash experience, designed a few sites in all-flash movies...but never did much with Actionscript. This book claimed to be a good startup...and it is!If you know some Flash and have been just a bit confused about understanding levels, movie clip timelines, and complex actions and how you can make them all fit together, this is the book for you!

Flash books have always been short on ActionScripting, they all focus on how to use the program. For developers who know Flash but not ActionScript (The powerful scripting language for Flash) this book is their guide. Well written, and a great companion to Foundation Flash 5, this book will become an ActionScripters best friend. It is as good a learning tool as it is a reference manual. Bravo!