Flash CS3, ActionScript 3.0, JSON keep it simple tutorial

Here's what I recently found to work if you want Flash CS3 to read JSON structured data via ActionScript 3 and the Adobe core library:

1. Create the JSON file. My file is called numbers.php which looks like this and the JSON is echoed via PHP:

[ {"name":"Jaylo", "number":"3243251"}, {"name":"Jenny", "number":"8675309"}]

Note: having var People= {} ; People.numbers = [The above JSON data] seems to break Adobe's decode static function so JSON needs to be in pure form.

2. Download the adobe core library. After download, the files you should be concerned with are located in src/com/adobe/serialization/json.

3. Create a new layer in your flash file, label it "actionscript", select frame 1 on that layer, then hit F9 (Windows)/Option + F9 (Mac) to open the Actions window. Here's what the ActionScript 3.0 should look like inside of the Actions window:

/*Import all the classes you need (you can skip the next three imports if your ActionScript is NOT in an external package but in frame 1 of the main flash file. */

import flash.net.URLRequest ;
import flash.net.URLLoader ;
import flash.events.* ;

import com.adobe.serialization.json.JSON /*Path to the JSON class (in JSON.as). NOTE: make sure to keep all the classes in the original json folder together and that at the very beginning of each class file in the json folder, the file path after the word 'package' accurately reflects that path to the FOLDER in which all the classes are located. E.g. package com.adobe.serialization.json*/

/*Create the objects you need*/

var loader:URLLoader = new URLLoader() ;
var request:URLRequest = new URLRequest() ;

/*Connect to and load the data within the numbers.php file*/

request.url = "http://path_to_file.com/numbers.js" ;
loader.load(request) ;

/*Attach a listener to the loader object that will point to and fire a decodeJSON function upon completion of the file load.*/
loader.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, decodeJSON) ;

/*decodeJSON function will decode (convert the data into a Flash object) and present the data. Function will not return anything (:void).*/

function decodeJSON(event:Event):void {

var loader:URLLoader = URLLoader(event.target) ;
var People:Array = JSON.decode(loader.data) ;

/*Trace the JSON data, remember it used to look like this ([ {"name":"Jaylo", "number":"3243251"}, {"name":"Jenny", "number":"8675309"}])*/

trace(People[0].name) ; //Jaylo
trace(People[0].number) ; //3243251
trace(People[1].name) ; //Jenny
trace(People[1].number) ; //8675309

/*Or, you can also use a loop...*/

for (var key:Object in People) {
trace(People[key].name) ;
trace(People[key].number) ;
}

}

There you have it, a way to connect to a JSON file via Flash. Happy programming.

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