Programming Flash Communication Server

This is the Title of the Book, eMatter Edition

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

Understanding the Framework

|

593

Understanding the Framework

The component framework comprises nearly 600 lines of code (not counting the

components’ code), which was never documented. It’s no wonder some developers

decided to shy away from it and develop their own framework!

As we’ve seen throughout the chapter, to load one or more external .asc files, use the

load( ) command in your application, such as main.asc:

load("components.asc");

An .asc file can load other .asc files. For example, loading components.asc is really

just a shortcut to loading framework.asc and many other components cited within it.

You can load the framework and only those components you want (such as the

Chat), as follows:

load("framework.asc");

load("components/chat.asc");

The Framework’s Files

Let’s look at the files that make up the server-side framework. For a detailed descrip-

tion of each file, refer to “The Framework’s Code,” later in this chapter. Here’s a

brief description of all the files that make up the server-side framework:

components.asc

A very simple file that loads the framework.asc and every communication com-

ponent that ships with FlashCom. You can add a load( ) statement to automati-

cally load your own custom components as well. Loading components.asc is easy

but is overkill if you need only one or two components.

framework.asc

This constitutes the framework itself and is where the global

gFrameworkFC sin-

gleton—one of two main pillars of the component framework—is defined. The

gFrameworkFC stores references to each component’s instances, along with the

components’

clientGlobals memory space, as discussed later. This file automati-

cally loads application.asc and facade.asc as well.

application.asc

This file is necessary for the framework. This is where the framework hijacks the

application object to enhance it with some framework-specific functionality.

};

_fEventDispatcher = new EventDispatcher( );

Example 14-9. Server-side port of the EventDispatcher class (continued)