Okay so as I understand it, there are several filetypes used in Flash development. Among them are .fla .as .mxml .flm .swf .swc .swz and possibly others, which combined in the right way with the right tools will yield your .swf file which is what you'd include in your object and embed HTML tags to make the Flash program work in a browser.
I have tools which I can use to work with all of those filetypes except .fla
Is there anything other than Adobe's commercial Creative Suite or Flash Builder which can work with these files? Alternately, is the file format specification for .fla publicly posted anywhere? My searches for both indicate "no".
I don't really need to use .fla in a new application but it might be nice if I have that option. Also most code from other people includes .fla files and thus is useless to me without a proper tool.
I know the .fla is mostly the animation stuff (MovieClip), and animation could be achieved strictly in code (.as .flm) but it's additional work. If I could use/generate .fla files directly (preferably via GUI), I could more neatly separate the graphics/animation from the backend code. And I'd be able to work with other peoples' code as well (since most use .fla files)
"Just use the 30 day demo" and "Just use Creative Suite/Flash Builder" are not acceptable answers as I'd like to use it longer than 30 days, I'd like to keep it legal, and I don't have the $700-ish to spend on full (not update) Flash Builder.
I don't strictly-speaking have to have this, since for a brand new project, animation could be done entirely strictly in code, but I wouldn't be able to work on other peoples' projects if they used even a single .fla file in the code anywhere and it is nice to have.
I have tools which I can use to work with all of those filetypes except .fla
Is there anything other than Adobe's commercial Creative Suite or Flash Builder which can work with these files? Alternately, is the file format specification for .fla publicly posted anywhere? My searches for both indicate "no".
I don't really need to use .fla in a new application but it might be nice if I have that option. Also most code from other people includes .fla files and thus is useless to me without a proper tool.
I know the .fla is mostly the animation stuff (MovieClip), and animation could be achieved strictly in code (.as .flm) but it's additional work. If I could use/generate .fla files directly (preferably via GUI), I could more neatly separate the graphics/animation from the backend code. And I'd be able to work with other peoples' code as well (since most use .fla files)
"Just use the 30 day demo" and "Just use Creative Suite/Flash Builder" are not acceptable answers as I'd like to use it longer than 30 days, I'd like to keep it legal, and I don't have the $700-ish to spend on full (not update) Flash Builder.
I don't strictly-speaking have to have this, since for a brand new project, animation could be done entirely strictly in code, but I wouldn't be able to work on other peoples' projects if they used even a single .fla file in the code anywhere and it is nice to have.
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