Introducing Starling

Starling is an ActionScript 3 2D framework developed on top of the Stage3D APIs (available on desktop in Flash Player 11 and Adobe AIR 3). Starling is mainly designed for game development, but could be used for many other use cases. Starling makes it possible to write fast GPU accelerated applications without having to touch the low-level Stage3D APIs. Most Flash developers want to be able to leverage GPU acceleration (through Stage3D) without the need to write such higher-level frameworks and dig into the low-level Stage3D APIs. Starling is completely designed after the Flash Player APIs and abstracts the complexity of Stage3D (Molehill) and allows easy and intuitive programming for everyone. Obviously Starling is for ActionScript 3 developers, especially those involved in 2D game development; of course you will need to have a basic understanding of ActionScript 3. By its design (lightweight, flexible and simple), Starling can be used also be used for other use cases like UI programming. That said, everything is designed to be as intuitive as possible, so any Java or .Net developer will get the hang of it quickly as well Table of Contents......Page 7 Conventions Used in This Book......Page 9 Safari® Books Online......Page 10 Acknowledgments......Page 11 Intuitive......Page 13 How......Page 14 Layering Restrictions......Page 19 Getting Started......Page 20 Setting Up Your Scene......Page 21 Wmode Requirements......Page 25 Progressive Enhancements......Page 26 The Display List......Page 27 Event Propagation......Page 41 Touch Events......Page 42 Simulating Multi-touch......Page 44 Texture......Page 47 Image......Page 49 Collision Detection......Page 56 Drawing API......Page 58 Flat Sprites......Page 59 MovieClip......Page 63 Texture Atlas......Page 68 Juggler......Page 74 Button......Page 77 TextField......Page 85 Embedded Fonts......Page 88 Bitmap Fonts......Page 91 RenderTexture......Page 100 Tweens......Page 102 Asset Management......Page 106 Handling Screen Resizes......Page 107 Plugging Starling with Box2D......Page 109 Profiling Starling......Page 113 Particles......Page 116