I purchased this book looking for a simple, easy-explanation, hands-on approach to learning Flash. I found this volume to contain incredible strengths, and, frustrating weaknesses as well.
FIRST THE GOOD:
The book is very easy to read, and covers all of the basics you need to know in order to create animations in Flash. Lots of humor and easy-to-understand explanations. From the basics to many advanced features, it's all here - for ANIMATION, that is. And best of all, there are loads of practice exercises - again, for ANIMATION.
NOW THE BAD:
As I read through the first ten chapters of the book, I was on fire. "Wow, it's all so clear! This makes sense!" The authors took the time to explain and provide walkthroughs for EVERY detail I could think of concerning animation. I just kept thinking, "Ok, I'm getting this animation thing down...I can't wait to dive into interactivity!" - arguably the "sweet-spot" of Flash. Well, come chapter 11 (near the very end of the book), I got into interactivity...for all of a few dozen pages. Suddenly, I was left with short, concise explanations of what my interactivity options were...but with few and usually absolutely no walkthroughs or how-tos. In fact, the following paragraph appeared over and over again: "Components are outside the scope of this book," "bindings are outside the scope of this book," and even "Actionscript is outside the scope of this book." Concerning Actionscript, apparently it is essential for writing in interactivity.
THE BUGGY:
The sum result of this experience is that I feel frustrated and greatly let-down. Even the sources that the writers suggested for "further study" I found are not conclusive. If the 500-page book would take an additional 5,000 pages to deal with all aspects of Flash, then it's understandable that other sources need to be suggested. But in this case I recommend:
A) The writers offer substantial volumes that actually do cover everything not included in this Missing Manual, and not only O'Reilly books, and
B) Don't advertise on the back of the book that the book will cover "interactive features" if in fact they will be glossed over.
Funny enough, I'm still mostly in favor of this book due to the incredibly easy-to-understand first 10 chapters that deal with animation. However, if you are looking for a book that will help you create interactive features, such as tests, quizzes, and interactive learning modules, plan to be searching for another book after this one, because you will have learned little-to-nothing.
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