Learning ActionScript 3.0

Chapter 15. PROGRAMMING DESIGN AND RESOURCES

Having covered the big bones of ActionScript 3.0, we’re now faced with the challenge of building a skeleton. Where do you start? Should you start with the spine of a project and build outward, or perhaps begin with a toe and build up from there? Just how do you add the connecting tissue that holds the whole thing together?

The best answer to these questions is that it depends a lot on each project, and one school of coding may not work in all situations. A lot of factors affect how you approach a programming task including the size of the project, how many programmers are contributing to the code, to what degree the user is involved in the final work, and, of course, your personal style.

We’d like to wrap up this book with a big-picture overview of several programming theories that you can explore further when choosing your first bone.

• Programming Design Methodologies. Learning syntax is one thing, but knowing how to pull it all together is another. As you gain experience and develop your own working processes, following a recommended development model can sometimes help get things rolling. We give you a glimpse of a handful of methodologies that have been developed over the years, to see if any suit your needs.

• Object-oriented Design Patterns. Good planning is helpful to any programming effort, but object-oriented programming, in particular, can sometimes benefit from established patterns of coding. We’ll outline a few widely used design ...