URLLoader  - AS3

Indicates the number of bytes that have been loaded thus far during the load operation.

Indicates the total number of bytes in the downloaded data. This property contains 0 while the load operation is in progress and is populated when the operation is complete. Also, a missing Content-Length header will result in bytesTotal being indeterminate.

The data received from the load operation. This property is populated only when the load operation is complete. The format of the data depends on the setting of the dataFormat property:

If the dataFormat property is URLLoaderDataFormat.TEXT, the received data is a string containing the text of the loaded file.

If the dataFormat property is URLLoaderDataFormat.BINARY, the received data is a ByteArray object containing the raw binary data.

If the dataFormat property is URLLoaderDataFormat.VARIABLES, the received data is a URLVariables object containing the URL-encoded variables.

Related API Elements

//params.txt is a local file that includes: firstName=Tom&lastName=Jones
var lbl:TextField = new TextField();
var urlRequest:URLRequest = new URLRequest("params.txt");
var urlLoader:URLLoader = new URLLoader();
urlLoader.dataFormat = URLLoaderDataFormat.VARIABLES;
urlLoader.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, urlLoader_complete);
urlLoader.load(urlRequest);
 
function urlLoader_complete(evt:Event):void {
    lbl.text = urlLoader.data.lastName + "," + urlLoader.data.firstName;
    addChild(lbl);
}

Controls whether the downloaded data is received as text (URLLoaderDataFormat.TEXT), raw binary data (URLLoaderDataFormat.BINARY), or URL-encoded variables (URLLoaderDataFormat.VARIABLES).

If the value of the dataFormat property is URLLoaderDataFormat.TEXT, the received data is a string containing the text of the loaded file.

If the value of the dataFormat property is URLLoaderDataFormat.BINARY, the received data is a ByteArray object containing the raw binary data.

If the value of the dataFormat property is URLLoaderDataFormat.VARIABLES, the received data is a URLVariables object containing the URL-encoded variables.

The default value is URLLoaderDataFormat.TEXT.

Related API Elements

var PATH:String = "lorem.txt";
var urlRequest:URLRequest = new URLRequest(PATH);
var urlLoader:URLLoader = new URLLoader();
urlLoader.dataFormat = URLLoaderDataFormat.TEXT; // default
urlLoader.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, urlLoader_complete);
urlLoader.load(urlRequest);
 
function urlLoader_complete(evt:Event):void {
    textArea.text = urlLoader.data;
}

Creates a URLLoader object.

Related API Elements

Registers an event listener object with an EventDispatcher object so that the listener receives notification of an event. You can register event listeners on all nodes in the display list for a specific type of event, phase, and priority.

After you successfully register an event listener, you cannot change its priority through additional calls to addEventListener(). To change a listener's priority, you must first call removeListener(). Then you can register the listener again with the new priority level.

Keep in mind that after the listener is registered, subsequent calls to addEventListener() with a different type or useCapture value result in the creation of a separate listener registration. For example, if you first register a listener with useCapture set to true, it listens only during the capture phase. If you call addEventListener() again using the same listener object, but with useCapture set to false, you have two separate listeners: one that listens during the capture phase and another that listens during the target and bubbling phases.

You cannot register an event listener for only the target phase or the bubbling phase. Those phases are coupled during registration because bubbling applies only to the ancestors of the target node.

If you no longer need an event listener, remove it by calling removeEventListener(), or memory problems could result. Event listeners are not automatically removed from memory because the garbage collector does not remove the listener as long as the dispatching object exists (unless the useWeakReference parameter is set to true).

Copying an EventDispatcher instance does not copy the event listeners attached to it. (If your newly created node needs an event listener, you must attach the listener after creating the node.) However, if you move an EventDispatcher instance, the event listeners attached to it move along with it.

If the event listener is being registered on a node while an event is being processed on this node, the event listener is not triggered during the current phase but can be triggered during a later phase in the event flow, such as the bubbling phase.

If an event listener is removed from a node while an event is being processed on the node, it is still triggered by the current actions. After it is removed, the event listener is never invoked again (unless registered again for future processing).

Parameters

function(evt:Event):void

Closes the load operation in progress. Any load operation in progress is immediately terminated. If no URL is currently being streamed, an invalid stream error is thrown.

Sends and loads data from the specified URL. The data can be received as text, raw binary data, or URL-encoded variables, depending on the value you set for the dataFormat property. Note that the default value of the dataFormat property is text. If you want to send data to the specified URL, you can set the data property in the URLRequest object.

Note: If a file being loaded contains non-ASCII characters (as found in many non-English languages), it is recommended that you save the file with UTF-8 or UTF-16 encoding as opposed to a non-Unicode format like ASCII.

A SWF file in the local-with-filesystem sandbox may not load data from, or provide data to, a resource that is in the network sandbox.

By default, the calling SWF file and the URL you load must be in exactly the same domain. For example, a SWF file at www.adobe.com can load data only from sources that are also at www.adobe.com. To load data from a different domain, place a URL policy file on the server hosting the data.

You cannot connect to commonly reserved ports. For a complete list of blocked ports, see "Restricting Networking APIs" in the ActionScript 3.0 Developer's Guide.

In Flash Player 10 and later, if you use a multipart Content-Type (for example "multipart/form-data") that contains an upload (indicated by a "filename" parameter in a "content-disposition" header within the POST body), the POST operation is subject to the security rules applied to uploads:

• The POST operation must be performed in response to a user-initiated action, such as a mouse click or key press.
• If the POST operation is cross-domain (the POST target is not on the same server as the SWF file that is sending the POST request), the target server must provide a URL policy file that permits cross-domain access.

Also, for any multipart Content-Type, the syntax must be valid (according to the RFC2046 standards). If the syntax appears to be invalid, the POST operation is subject to the security rules applied to uploads.

For more information related to security, see the Flash Player Developer Center Topic: Security.

Parameters

Learn more

Related API Elements

package {
    import flash.display.Sprite;
    import flash.events.Event;
    import flash.net.URLLoader;
    import flash.net.URLRequest;
    import flash.text.TextField;
    import flash.text.TextFieldAutoSize;
    import flash.xml.*;
    import flash.events.IOErrorEvent;
  
    public class URLLoader_loadExample extends Sprite {
        private var xmlTextField:TextField = new TextField();
        private var externalXML:XML;    
        private var loader:URLLoader;

        public function URLLoader_loadExample() {
            var request:URLRequest = new URLRequest("xmlFile.xml");

            loader = new URLLoader();
            
            try {
                loader.load(request);
            }
            catch (error:SecurityError)
            {
                trace("A SecurityError has occurred.");
            }

             loader.addEventListener(IOErrorEvent.IO_ERROR, errorHandler);
            loader.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, loaderCompleteHandler);

            xmlTextField.x = 10;
            xmlTextField.y = 10;
            xmlTextField.background = true;
            xmlTextField.autoSize = TextFieldAutoSize.LEFT;

            addChild(xmlTextField);
        }

        private function loaderCompleteHandler(event:Event):void {

                try {
                    externalXML = new XML(loader.data);
                    readNodes(externalXML);    
                } catch (e:TypeError) {
                    trace("Could not parse the XML file.");
                }
        }

        private function readNodes(node:XML):void {

                for each (var element:XML in node.elements()) {
                    xmlTextField.appendText(element.attributes()[0] + "\n");

                    readNodes(element);
                }    
        }

        private function errorHandler(e:IOErrorEvent):void {
            xmlTextField.text = "Had problem loading the XML File.";
        }
    }
}

Dispatched after all the received data is decoded and placed in the data property of the URLLoader object. The received data may be accessed once this event has been dispatched.

This event has the following properties:

Related API Elements

Dispatched if a call to the load() method attempts to access data over HTTP, and Adobe AIR is able to detect and return the status code for the request.

The HTTPStatusEvent.HTTP_RESPONSE_STATUS constant defines the value of the type property of a httpResponseStatus event object.

This event has the following properties:

Related API Elements

Dispatched if a call to URLLoader.load() attempts to access data over HTTP. For content running in Flash Player, this event is only dispatched if the current Flash Player environment is able to detect and return the status code for the request. (Some browser environments may not be able to provide this information.) Note that the httpStatus event (if any) is sent before (and in addition to) any complete or error event.

This event has the following properties:

Related API Elements

Dispatched if a call to URLLoader.load() results in a fatal error that terminates the download.

This event has the following properties:

Related API Elements

Dispatched when the download operation commences following a call to the URLLoader.load() method.

This event has the following properties:

Related API Elements

Dispatched when data is received as the download operation progresses.

Note that with a URLLoader object, it is not possible to access the data until it has been received completely. So, the progress event only serves as a notification of how far the download has progressed. To access the data before it's entirely downloaded, use a URLStream object.

This event has the following properties:

Related API Elements

Dispatched if a call to URLLoader.load() attempts to load data from a server outside the security sandbox. Also dispatched if a call to URLLoader.load() attempts to load a SWZ file and the certificate is invalid or the digest string does not match the component.

This event has the following properties:

Related API Elements

Note: To run this example, put a file named urlLoaderExample.txt in the same directory as your SWF file. That file should only contain the following line of text: answer=42&question=unknown

The example code does the following:

1. The constructor function creates a URLLoader instance named loader and a URLRequest instance named request, which contains the location and name of the file to be loaded.
2. The loader object is passed to the configureListeners() method, which adds listeners for each of the supported URLLoader events.
3. The request object is then passed to loader.load(), which loads the text file.
4. When the URLLoader has finished loading the text file the Event.COMPLETE event fires, triggering the completeHandler() method. The completeHandler() method creates a URLVariables object from the text loaded from the file. The URLVariables object converts URL-encoded name/value pairs into ActionScript properties to make it easier to manipulate the loaded data.

package {
    import flash.display.Sprite;
    import flash.events.*;
    import flash.net.*;

    public class URLLoaderExample extends Sprite {
        
        private loader:URLoader;
        public function URLLoaderExample() {
            loader = new URLLoader();
            configureListeners(loader);

            var request:URLRequest = new URLRequest("urlLoaderExample.txt");
            try {
                loader.load(request);
            } catch (error:Error) {
                trace("Unable to load requested document.");
            }
        }

        private function configureListeners(dispatcher:IEventDispatcher):void {
            dispatcher.addEventListener(Event.COMPLETE, completeHandler);
            dispatcher.addEventListener(Event.OPEN, openHandler);
            dispatcher.addEventListener(ProgressEvent.PROGRESS, progressHandler);
            dispatcher.addEventListener(SecurityErrorEvent.SECURITY_ERROR, securityErrorHandler);
            dispatcher.addEventListener(HTTPStatusEvent.HTTP_STATUS, httpStatusHandler);
            dispatcher.addEventListener(IOErrorEvent.IO_ERROR, ioErrorHandler);
        }

        private function completeHandler(event:Event):void {
            var loader:URLLoader = URLLoader(event.target);
            trace("completeHandler: " + loader.data);
    
            var vars:URLVariables = new URLVariables(loader.data);
            trace("The answer is " + vars.answer);
        }

        private function openHandler(event:Event):void {
            trace("openHandler: " + event);
        }

        private function progressHandler(event:ProgressEvent):void {
            trace("progressHandler loaded:" + event.bytesLoaded + " total: " + event.bytesTotal);
        }

        private function securityErrorHandler(event:SecurityErrorEvent):void {
            trace("securityErrorHandler: " + event);
        }

        private function httpStatusHandler(event:HTTPStatusEvent):void {
            trace("httpStatusHandler: " + event);
        }

        private function ioErrorHandler(event:IOErrorEvent):void {
            trace("ioErrorHandler: " + event);
        }
    }
}