flash data integration: Every article I read seems to say you need Flash MX 2004 Professional to
connect with ColdFusion. I was wondering if I could just use Flash 8 and
ColdFusion together and what would I need to connect. In the tutorials I have
read I needed two includes of #Netservices or something like that. If I go to
make those includes do I need to have those files in my directory?

Any help would be awesome! Thanks everyone!

I do not think FLash is needed to use ColdFusion. ColdFusion is a serverside
scripting language.

Look in the ColdFusion forum for more assistance.

Generally when Professional versions of Flash are recommended it is because
the author is using the Flash data components. However Flash
non-professional versions have LoadVars and XML Actionscript classes that
communicate with any serverside language including ColdFusion. In fact the
examples for the sendAndLoad method for both of these show a ColdFusion file
name. However the server script could be changed to ASP or PHP and the Flash
movie would not change.

Your main decision will be the data structure protocol to use to send and
receive data between the Flash movie and the server script. You can choose
URL vars, the traditional web data structure or XML.

For URL Vars study the Flash Actionscript LoadVars class and in particular
the sendAndLoad method has a great example. ColdFusion has all you need to
get the
data from the Flash LoadVars sending object and return to a Flash LoadVars
receiving object.
See: http://livedocs.macromedia.com/flash/8/main/00002336.html

For XML study the Flash Actionscript XML class and again the sendAndLoad
method for this class has a great example. Here you need to know XML. Flash
does the XML parsing for you. On the server you need to learn an XML library
from Microsoft or perhaps the ColdFusion scripting language has an XML
library.
See: http://livedocs.macromedia.com/flash/8/main/00002879.html

Also with XML Flash Pro versions have an XMLConnector component
with binding to the UI components if that suits your coding style.
--
Lon Hosford
www.lonhosford.com
Flash, Actionscript and Flash Media Server examples:
http://flashexamples.hosfordusa.com
May many happy bits flow your way!
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