Chapter 15. Menu Systems

One very important thing that you can add to a Flash movie is a means of navigation. If you are creating a Flash site that is to act as an entire Web site, it's important that you provide some sort of menu system so that users can find their way around the movie. The menu can be as simple as a set of buttons , or it can be very complex.

When you're planning the design of your menu, there are several things that you must consider. This chapter covers two of them:

• Space. How much space do you have for the menu? If you don't have a lot of space, which is often the case, you'll need a compact menu. Using an expandable menu is a great solution for movies with limited menu space.

• Data. Do you want the menu to be data-driven or static? If the menu is to be data-driven, you'll have to make it extensible so that you can add or remove menu items. If you create a data-driven menu system, you also might consider delivering dynamic content.

There are other things to consider, such as ease of use and complexity, but these two should be high on your list. This chapter looks at three different ways to approach creating menu systems:

• Simple pop-up menu. You can conserve space by creating a pop-up menu system using a static movie clip.

• Windows -based menu. A windows-based menu system is a common and easily understood metaphor. You can add a little more pizzazz to this menu by making it data-driven.

• Scrolling menu. You can take advantage of the power of the Generator authoring extensions to create a scrolling menu with a minimum of ActionScripting.

We start off with a simple pop-up menu.