ptg 12 Chapter 1 A file in Flash is called a document. Flash documents, which have the FLA filename extension, contain all the information required to develop, design, and test interactive content. Flash documents are not the same as the movies you play with the Flash Player. Instead, you publish your Flash documents as Flash movies, which have the SWF filename exten- sion and contain only the information needed to display the movie. A new Flash document is based on the scripting language you want to use, either ActionScript 2.0 or ActionScript 3.0. You can create new doc- uments in several ways including using the New command on the File menu and the New Document task pane. When you open a new Flash document, it’s blank, ready for you to create or insert text, graphics, and other media content. By default, the first Flash document is titled Untitled1. Flash numbers new documents consecutively. You can open and work on as many new documents as you have memory (RAM) for. Creating a New Document Create a New Blank Document Click the File menu, and then click New. TIMESAVER Click Flash Document on the Welcome screen to create a new blank document. Click the General tab. Click ActionScript 3.0 or ActionScript 2.0. IMPORTANT ActionScript 2.0 and ActionScript 3.0 are not compatible with each other. ActionScript 3.0 is recommended. ◆ If you want to create a specific type of document, click the type you want. Click OK. 4 3 2 1 2 3 4 Did You Know? You can open a new window with a copy of the current document. Create or open the Flash document you want to open in a new window, click the Window menu, and then click Duplicate Window. Creating New Documents for Other Purposes In addition to creating FLA documents in ActionScript 2.0 or 3.0 for the Flash Player, you can also create FLA documents to publish applications for Adobe AIR 2.0 (for Mac, Windows, and Linux), iPhone OS (for iPhone, iTouch, and iPad devices) (New!), Flash Lite 4 (a Flash player for less power and memory-constraint devices), and Adobe Device Central (for mobile devices). For Your Information Documents with the FLA extension Document with other extensions From the Library of Wow! eBook ptg Chapter 1 Getting Started with Flash CS5 13 Creating a New Document from a Template Create a New Document from a Template Click the File menu, and then click New. TIMESAVER Click a template category on the Welcome screen to open the New From Template dialog box, where you can select a template. Click the Templates tab. Click a template category. Click the template you want to use. View the templates in the Preview box and read the description. Click OK. 6 5 4 3 2 1 Flash makes it easy to create many common documents based on a template. A template opens a Flash document (such as an animation or set of menus) with predefined formatting and placeholder text, graph- ics, and actionscripts. The templates make it easy to create common types of Flash projects. Flash comes with a set of templates, which includes the following categories (New!): Advertising, Animation, Banners, Media Playback, Presentations, and Sample Files. When you select a template category, a list of templates appears. Select a tem- plate to display a brief description. If you can’t find the template you want, you can check the Adobe Flash Support Center Online Web site for more. 5 2 4 6 3 See Also See “Saving a Document in Different Formats” on page 22 for information on saving a document as a template. From the Library of Wow! eBook ptg 14 Chapter 1 You can open an existing document file and the Flash program at one time, or you can open the file from within Flash. In Flash, you can use the Welcome screen, Open commands on the File menu, or Adobe Bridge CS5 (a stand-alone file management program that comes with Flash CS5) to open Flash documents, scripts, and movies in several for- mats. The default file format for Flash is FLA. However, the internal for- mat of an FLA file is XFL (eXtensible Form Language) (New!). XFL allows you to exchange file content between programs, such as Adobe InDesign and Adobe After Effects. You can also open an XFL file as you would an FLA file. When you open a document, a tab appears across the top of the Document window, which you can click to display it. Opening an Existing Document Open a Flash Document Click the File menu, and then click Open. TIMESAVER Click Open or a recently opened Flash document name on the Welcome screen to open a document. To open a speci fi c t yp e o f Fla sh file, click the File as type list arrow (Win), or the File type popup (Mac), and then select the file format you want. Navigate to the drive or folder where the file is located. Click the document file you want to open. Click Open. 5 4 3 2 1 3 5 2 Did You Know? You can view what is inside of an XFL file. An XFL file is essentially a ZIP package containing the XML and the assets for a FLA file. To view the actual XML and assets of the FLA file, change the .XFL file extension to .ZIP and unzip the folder. Format Description ActionScript (.as) A file to store ActionScript code for a Flash document. XFL (.xfl, .xml) A packaged XML representation of a FLA file along with the assets for that file. Communications (.asc) A file to store ActionScript code on a computer with Flash Communication Server. FLA Document (.fla) A Flash document you create and save in Flash authoring environment. JavaScript (.jsfl) A separate file with JavaScript code to add new functionality to Flash. Flash Movie (.swf) A compressed movie file you publish in the Flash authoring environment. Other Dynamics From the Library of Wow! eBook ptg Chapter 1 Getting Started with Flash CS5 15 Open a Recently Opened Document Click the File menu, and then point to Open Recent. Click the document you want to open. Browse Documents in Adobe Bridge Click the File menu, and then click Browse in Bridge. Adobe Bridge CS5 opens, displaying files and folder on your computer. Select a workspace display to view your files the way you want. Navigate to the drive or folder where the Flash file is located. To open a Flash fi le , dou bl e-clic k the file icon. When you’re done, click the File menu, and then click Return to Adobe Flash. TIMESAVER Press A +Option (Mac) or Ctrl+Alt+O (Win). 5 4 3 2 1 2 1 1 2 Did You Know? You can open a recent file quickly from the Start menu (Win). Click the Start button, point to Adobe Flash Professional CS5 (7), Recent Items (Vista) or My Recent Documents (XP), and then click the file name you want to open. 4 5 3 2 From the Library of Wow! eBook ptg 16 Chapter 1 When you create a new Flash document or open an existing one, you need to set up or change the document properties. You set document properties at the beginning of the project to make basic decisions about how your movie looks and operates. You use the Document Properties dialog box or the Property Inspector to specify document property settings that affect the entire movie, such as the background color, the size and location of the Stage, the frame rate—the number of frames per second in which the computer plays an animation, and the unit of measure for rulers. These settings apply only to the current doc- ument unless you set Flash defaults to apply to every document. You can use the Properties command on the Window menu to display the Property Inspector, which appears vertically on the screen. Changing Document Properties View Document Properties Click the Selection tool on the Tool s pan el . Click the Window menu, and then click Properties to open the Property Inspector. TIMESAVER Press A +F3 (Mac) or Ctrl+F3 (Win). View the document properties at the top of the Property Inspector: ◆ Stage Size. The current size appears in the button label. ◆ Background Color. The color of the Stage background. ◆ Frame Rate. The speed at which the movie runs. 3 2 1 1 3 Document name Did You Know? You can change the background color quickly in the Property Inspector. Open the Property Inspector, click the Background color box, and then select a color from the panel. You can change the frame rate quickly in the Property Inspector. Open the Property Inspector, and then enter the number of animation frames to be dis- played every second in the Frame Rate box. From the Library of Wow! eBook ptg Chapter 1 Getting Started with Flash CS5 17 Change Document Properties Create or open a document. Click the Modify menu, and then click Document. TIMESAVER Click the Size button in the Property Inspector or double-click the frame-rate box in the Status bar on the Timeline. To set the Stag e dim en sions, do one of the following: ◆ Specify size in pixels. Enter values in the Width and Height boxes. The default size is 550 x 400 pixels. ◆ Set size to an equal space around content. Click Contents. ◆ Set size to the maximum print area. Click Printer. ◆ Set size to default setting. Click Default. Click the Background Color box, and then select a color. Enter a frame rate. For most computers playing from the Web, 8 fps (frames per second) to 24 fps is adequate. The default is 24 fps. To speci fy th e uni t of mea su re fo r rulers, click the Ruler Units popup, and then select an option. To set prop er ti es fo r a ll ne w documents, click Make Default. Click OK. 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 3 7 Improving Searchability by Internet Search Engines When you add a title and description to Flash document properties, you’re making it easier for Internet search engines to categorize the content in your Flash movie file (.swf). The title and description boxes are metadata properties for the SWF file format. The Internet uses metadata as a standard format for gathering and transferring data. When you enter a title and description, use descriptive key- words that reflect the type of user you want to attract to your Web site. For Your Information See Also See “Displaying Rulers” on page 89 for information on using rulers. 6 4 8 From the Library of Wow! eBook . the Flash Player. Instead, you publish your Flash documents as Flash movies, which have the SWF filename exten- sion and contain only the information needed to display the movie. A new Flash. Click Flash Document on the Welcome screen to create a new blank document. Click the General tab. Click ActionScript 3. 0 or ActionScript 2.0. IMPORTANT ActionScript 2.0 and ActionScript 3. 0. and the Flash program at one time, or you can open the file from within Flash. In Flash, you can use the Welcome screen, Open commands on the File menu, or Adobe Bridge CS5 (a stand-alone file