ActionScript: The Definitive Guide

Name

MovieClip._height Property — height of a clip or movie, in pixels

Availability

Flash 4; enhanced in Flash 5

Synopsis

mc._height

Access

Read-only in Flash 4; read/write in Flash 5

Description

The floating-point _height property is a non-negative number specifying the height of mc, in pixels. If mc has no content, _height is 0. The _height property measures the content of a clip as the distance between the highest occupied pixel and the lowest occupied pixel, even if there is empty space between those pixels. An occupied pixel is a pixel that contains a shape, graphic, button, movie clip, or other content element. Changes made to a clip’s height in the authoring tool or via _ yscale are reflected by _height.

We may set the value of _height in order to vertically resize a movie clip. Attempts to set _height to a negative value are ignored. Setting a clip’s _height to does not make it invisible; rather, the clip becomes a one-pixel horizontal line.

The _height of the main movie (either _root._height or _level n ._height) is not the Stage height as specified under Modify → Movie → Dimensions in the authoring tool but rather the height of the contents of the main movie. There is no explicit Stage height property; if required, we must provide the Stage height manually as a variable. For example, if a movie’s Stage has a height of 400, we could add the following variable:

_root.stageHeight = 400;

To make that value available on the timeline of any clip, use:

Object.prototype.stageHeight = 400; ...