The com.ghostwire.ui.data.uiModel class is used to represent a collection of items used as data source for various components in the Aspire UI library. Data-driven components such as the uiComboBox, uiListBox, uiMenu, uiMenuBar, and uiTabView are populated using uiModel objects.

A uiModel object can be populated using an array of data objects (duplicates will be ignored), an array of strings, or an XML object. When populating using XML, the XML can either be embedded with the rest of your application code, or loaded from an external XML file during run-time.

Using Embedded XML
You can declare an XML object in AS3 as follows:

var menuXML:XML = 
<menu>
    <item label="ItemA" />
    <item label="ItemB" enabled="false" />
    <item label="ItemC" >
        <!-- comment: a group of radio items -->
        <item label="ItemCSubMenuItemA" group="RadioGroup1" />
        <item label="ItemCSubMenuItemB" group="RadioGroup1" />
        <item label="ItemCSubMenuItemC" group="RadioGroup1" checked="true" />
    </item>
    <!-- comment: empty item denotes a separator -->
    <item />
    <!-- comment: a check item -->
    <item label="ItemD" checked="false" />
    <item />
    <item label="ItemE" />
</menu>

You can then pass the XML to the constructor when instantiating a uiModel object:

var menuModel:uiModel = new uiModel(menuXML);

Using External XML File
If the XML is saved in an external XML file, you can have the uiModel object call the loadXML() method:

var menuModel:uiModel = new uiModel();
menuModel.loadXML("menu.xml"); // load "menu.xml" and populate the model

This basically means that you can easily externalize the data source of any data-driven component in the Aspire UI library by having its uiModel object call loadXML() during run-time.

Aspire UI Components
Aspire UI is a library of Actionscript 3.0 (AS3) classes for building flexible and lightweight UI elements in Adobe Flash applications. Key features include easy skinning using PNG image files, automatic tab focus ordering, CSS text styles, and layout management. This is a pure AS3 library with no dependency on the Flex framework.

You may experiment with the various features by downloading the trial version.

Other Posts You Might Enjoy:

• uiImage: Preloading External Bitmap Images
• Using uiMenu: Implementing “long press” contextual menu
• [AS3] Saving XML As Binary
• [AS3] Embedding Binary XML
• [AS3] Applying ROT128 Encryption On Binary XML

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