Megan — Tue, 17 Jan 2006 19:33:10 +0000

Update: Seems to be a problem with the XML. Looks like it's handling everything before D in the alphabetical order, but then has problems after that. Is there anything in my xml around the "D" area that would be causing a problem? I tried taking out the whole D section and that seems to correct the problem.

Whew, that's a relief actually! Minor problem

Megan — Tue, 17 Jan 2006 16:16:05 +0000

More problems - I got it put into my player and everything seemed fine but now I've got instances where I've got several glossary items on a page and some work but others don't. I've checked the spelling and the order of items on the flash screen and everything seems fine.

Here is an example:

http://admmail.uwaterloo.ca/~mjjack/glossary/medieval_philos.html

If you go to the very end of the timeline you can see that A=B works, but Nirguna Brahman doesn't. Atman works (it's off the edge of the screen but I think I can fix that) but the rest don't.

These are now being loaded into the player which is a separate movie. I had to put the actionscript calls into that file instead of the regular movie. I hope this all makes sense! All the files are on my web space here:

http://admmail.uwaterloo.ca/~mjjack/

Any help? (I know this is a pretty big question!)

JeevesBond — Mon, 19 Dec 2005 03:45:14 +0000

var CONST_NOTHING_ERROR = 'Error! No term or definition found';
	//Change the above to give a different error message when nothing is found.
var CONST_NO_DEFINITION_ERROR = 'Error! The term was found in the glossary, but there was no description with it or the description was blank';
	//Change the above to give a different error message when a term is found but a definition for it is not.
var objGlossary = new Object();
	//Associative array for glossary terms
glossaryXML = new XML();
	// Activate the XML object
/*
With the XML Object now active you must now load an XML foramtted document.
Any DTD or XSL formatting will be ignored.
*/

glossaryXML.onLoad = myLoad;
glossaryXML.load("glossary2.xml");

glossaryXML.ignoreWhite = true; // strips white space from the XML document

// Before proceeding too far into the program, make sure the XML document has loaded
// Extract information from the XML file
function myLoad(ok) {
	if (ok == true) {
		GetTerms(glossaryXML);
	}
}

function GetTerms(xmlParse) {

	for (var objNodeLoop = xmlParse.firstChild; objNodeLoop != null; objNodeLoop = objNodeLoop.nextSibling) {

			//Following is responsible for traversing up and down in the XML tree
			//Moves us down childNodes when they are available and reverses back up
			//parentNodes when no more nodes or children are available on current level.
		
		checkNode(objNodeLoop);
		
		for (objNodeLoop = objNodeLoop.firstChild; objNodeLoop.firstChild != null; objNodeLoop = objNodeLoop.firstChild) {
			//Loop through child nodes
			checkNode(objNodeLoop);
		}
			//Head down tree as far as we can, checking all the way
		
		while (objNodeLoop.nextSibling == null && objNodeLoop.parentNode != null) {
			objNodeLoop = objNodeLoop.parentNode
		}
			//Head back up tree seaching for available siblings			
	}
}

function checkNode(objNode) {
		
		//NOTE: This function interacts directly with objGlossary associative array.
		//this is the reason it does not return a value.
		//Only rules for placement of the desired elements within XML is that the term and definition
		//must be children of glossaryitem and there cannot be more than one term or definition per
		//glossaryitem, if there is the first value will be overwitten. 
	
	var strTerm = new String();
	var strDefinition = new String();
	
	if (objNode.nodeName == 'glossaryitem') {
				//glossaryitem element found, search the children...
			
		strTerm = '';
		strDefinition = '';
		
		for (var objGlossaryItems = objNode.firstChild;
			 objGlossaryItems != null;
			 objGlossaryItems = objGlossaryItems.nextSibling) {
			
			if (objGlossaryItems.nodeName == 'term') { strTerm = objGlossaryItems.firstChild.nodeValue; }
			if (objGlossaryItems.nodeName == 'definition') { strDefinition = objGlossaryItems.firstChild.nodeValue; }
				//term or definition found, shove value into a string for later use.
		}
		if (strTerm != '' && strDefinition != '') {
			objGlossary[strTerm] = strDefinition;
		} else if (strTerm != '' && strDefinition == '') {
			//If a term is defined but no matching Definition output an error message...
			objGlossary[strTerm] = CONST_NO_DEFINITION_ERROR;
		}
	}
}

function findTerm(termText) { 

	term_txt.htmlText= termText;
	if (objGlossary[termText] == null) {
		definition_txt.htmlText = CONST_NOTHING_ERROR;
	} else {
		definition_txt.htmlText = objGlossary[termText];
	}
	
	// we'll need to create a tooltip to put it in instead of the current text boxes.
	
}

'
Version 2, sorry I took so long!
There's a new constant: CONST_NOTHING_ERROR
And a new conditional in findTerm(termText) that checks to see if the return from the array is blank and sets the definition to CONST_NOTHING_ERROR if it is and outputs the glossary entry if it isn't.

Megan — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 17:17:08 +0000

Whoo-hoo! It works! And I did the tool tips all by myself

http://admmail.uwaterloo.ca/~mjjack/glossary/glossary.swf

Now I can dump the actionscript code into an external file.

Jeeves - if the term is not found it returns nothing. How can I put an error message in there for that?

Thanks a million for the code Would have rather done it myself but this is probably a much better solution.

Megan — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 14:28:12 +0000

I don't know, we'd probably need to throw a lesbian in the mix or something

Will look at that in a few minutes, Jeeves

What do you think would be the best way to display the definition? I could do a tooltip type thing if I can find some good code for it, otherwise just a plain pop-up box. I might need some help figuring out how to make the box the right size for the text.

JeevesBond — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 13:30:43 +0000

Hmmmph, you declined in a tongue in cheek, damn I really want that date sort of way.

Anyway we could make some cash and raise the profile of TWF by going on there, all publicity is good!

bja888 — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 09:10:36 +0000

Hey dont get me involved. I already have my happily ever after. I declined way at the beggnning to the thread.

JeevesBond — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 05:21:58 +0000

So does this mean I win the date?

I reckon we should turn this into a sordid love triangle thing and go on Jerry Springer.

Megan — Sun, 11 Dec 2005 22:36:29 +0000

God, Bryan, that was implicit with the original question! Stop being a jerk about it, jeez.

bja888 — Sun, 11 Dec 2005 19:20:03 +0000

I used studio 8 to work on it but I exported as 7.

You didn't write that code your self did you? Or read the comments?
I noticed it was missing a few key things to make it functional. I just figured you hadn't gotten around to that yet. So my primary concern was to get your trace functions working correctly. Next time you need the whole problem solved for you just say so.