Turbine MML Sample


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Turbine MML Sample
(Flash MX; PDF)

Turbine Media Markup Language is a simple XML language that can express all the rich media capabilities contained in Turbine. With MML you can display text and images, draw shapes, movie clips, buttons, video and audio, and control all of these with scripting. MML elements can be explicitly placed on a certain position or they assume sequential positions across the movie (this feature is called AutoLayout). For example the following tags display a text label above a shape and an image:

<Text>This is a block of text</Text>

The above tags will display in Flash as:

And in PDF as: (a new window will open)

Click Here to Generate PDF

Movie Clips

Movie Clips can be used to organize or animate elements like text, images or shapes. For example the example below displays a series of text blocks across 4 frames, and also a Flash movie from an external .swf file (either from the local disk or a remote http location):

<MovieClip>
  <Frame>
    <Text>Running</Text>
  </Frame>
  <Frame>
    <Text>Running.</Text>
  </Frame>
  <Frame>
    <Text>Running..</Text>
  </Frame>
  <Frame>
    <Text>Running...</Text>
  </Frame>
</MovieClip>

This displays in Flash as:

Each frame is translated to a new page when outputting to PDF. So the above example would produce a PDF document with four pages.

Buttons

Turbine MML can also create clickable buttons, with up, over and down states:

  <State type="up,hit">
    <Shape>
      <LineStyle color="#404080" width="5"/>
      <FillColor color="#8080ff"/>
      <Rect size="200,100"/>
    </Shape>
    <Text pos="100,50" placepoint="center">This is the UP state</Text>
  </State>

  <State type="over">
    <Shape>
      <LineStyle color="#8080dd" width="5"/>
      <FillColor color="#ddddff"/>
      <Rect size="200,100"/>
    </Shape>
    <Text pos="100,50" placepoint="center">This is the OVER state</Text>
  </State>

  <State type="down">
    <Shape>
      <LineStyle color="#606060" width="5"/>
      <FillColor color="#808080"/>
      <Rect size="200,100"/>
    </Shape>
    <Text pos="100,50" placepoint="center" color="#ffffff">This is the DOWN state</Text>
  </State>

  <Script event="Release">
    getUrl("http://www.blue-pacific.com", "_blank");
  </Script>

</Button>

This displays in Flash as:

When outputting to PDF, only the "Up" state of the button will be visible:

Click Here to Generate PDF

Scripting

Powerful scripting is also included in Turbine 7, which includes an on-the-fly ECMA Script compiler. ECMA Script is known in the Flash scene as Action Script and has a simple JavaScript-like syntax. Action Script can freely interact with all the MML elements. The following example causes an image to be attached to the mouse cursor:

<Text>Move the mouse over here</Text>

<Script>
  onEnterFrame = function (){
    flower._x=_xmouse;
    flower._y=_ymouse;
  }
</Script>

This displays in Flash as:

MML inside .swf Movies

But MML can also be integrated inside .swf movies, which allows for better, simpler positioning of elements. On this example the tags that create the above "Running..." movie clips are placed on a textfield inside this .swf movie:

After being loaded by Turbine, the MML tags on the above .swf will be executed and produce the results below. Note how the resulting elements are displayed on the position of the above Flash text field (where the MML tags were issued):

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