How to Make a Countdown Clock on Flash

Create your own vritual timer using Flash.

Adobe Flash includes the Flash scripting language, ActionScript, which controls and creates the functionality in animations. Perhaps you want to include a countdown clock in your multimedia project. A countdown clock can provide your users with day, hour, minute and second updates on the time remaining until a certain event. Make a countdown clock in Flash using ActionScript functions and methods.

Instructions

1. Launch Flash. Select "File" and "New" to create a new project. Select the "Flash File (ActionScript 3.0)" option and click "OK."

2. Select the Text tool from the Tools panel and create a text box. Set the text area to "Dynamic Text" or "TLF Text" from the "Properties" panel. Type "clockTxt" for the "Instance Name."

3. Click on the first frame of the timeline. Open the Actions panel by pressing "F9," Type the ActionScript code to create a clock that counts down to the next year. The lines that begin with // are descriptions, not part of the code:

   // register the function

   addEventListener('enterFrame',clock_handler);

   // this is called repeatedly

   function clock_handler(evt:Event):void{

   // the current date

   var today:Date = new Date();

   // the current Year

   var currentYear = today.getFullYear();

   // the current time

   var currentTime = today.getTime();

   // make and store the end date (next new year)

   // modify to fit your need

   var endDate:Date = new Date(currentYear+1, 0, 1);

   var endTime = endDate.getTime();

   // time left

   var timeLeft = endTime-currentTime;

   var sec = Math.floor(timeLeft/1000);

   var min = Math.floor(sec/60);

   var hours = Math.floor(min/60);

   var days = Math.floor(hours/24);

   // result of remaining value variable. convert seconds to string

   sec = String(sec%60);

   // if reduced < 2 add a 0

   if (sec.length<2) {

   sec = "0"+sec;

   }

   min = String(min%60);

   if (min.length<2) {

   min = "0"+min;

   }

   hours = String(hours%24);

   if (hours.length<2) {

   hours = "0"+hours;

   }

   days = String(days);

   if (timeLeft>0) {

   // combine values into one string

   var counter:String = days+":"+hours+":"+min+":"+sec;

   clockTxt.text = counter;

   } else {

   trace("It's A Brand New Year!");

   var newTime:String = "00:00:00:00";

   clockTxt.text = newTime;

   removeEventListener('enterFrame',clock_handler);

   }

   }

4. Select "Control" and "Test Movie" to test the countdown clock.

References

• Republic of Code: Event Handling in ActionScript 3.0

Resources

• Adobe: Date.getTime