ActionScript for Flash MX: The Definitive Guide, Second Edition

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Copyright © 2007 O’Reilly & Associates, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Chapter 4: Primitive Datatypes

simplest way to import a Unicode text file is to use the #include directive in concert

with the special

//!-- UTF8 comment, which effectively copies and pastes the con-

tents of the file into a Flash movie at compile time. For information on using

#include with Unicode, see the #include directive in the Language Reference. Exter-

nal Unicode text can also be stored as XML or URL-encoded variables. For informa-

tion on loading external XML or variable files, see the XML.load( ) and LoadVars.

load( ) methods in the Language Reference.

Note that the specific encoding format supported by

#include and LoadVars is UTF-

8, while the encoding formats supported by XML are UTF-8, UTF16-BE, and UTF-

16LE (i.e., either big-endian or little-endian). When a file is UTF-16 encoded, it is

expected to start with a byte order marker (BOM) indicating whether the encoding is

big-endian or little-endian. Most text editors add the BOM automatically. When no

BOM is present in a file, the encoding is assumed to be UTF-8. When in doubt, you

should use UTF-8 encoding, where byte order is not an issue. For more information

on UTFs and BOMs, see:

http://www.unicode.org/unicode/faq/utf_bom.html

To include small amounts of Unicode directly within the Flash MX authoring tool,

use either ...