Adobe FLEX 2 - CREATING AND EXTENDING COMPONENTS Manual page 77

CHAPTER 7
7
Creating Simple MXML
Components
Adobe Flex applications typically consist of multiple MXML and ActionScript files, and each
MXML file is a separate MXML component. MXML components let you encapsulate
functionality in a reusable component, extend an existing Flex component by adding new
functionality to it, and reference the MXML component by using an MXML tag.
This topic describes how to create simple MXML components. For information on advanced
techniques for creating MXML components, see Chapter 8, "Creating Advanced MXML
Components," on page 91.
Contents
About MXML components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
Scoping in custom components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
Applying styles to your custom component . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
About MXML components
In typical Flex applications, you do not code the entire application within a single source code
file. Such an implementation makes it difficult for multiple developers to work on the project
simultaneously, makes it difficult to debug, and discourages code reuse.
Instead, you develop Flex applications using multiple MXML and ActionScript files. This
architecture promotes a modular design, code reuse, and lets multiple developers contribute
to the implementation.
MXML components are MXML files that you reference by using MXML tags from within
other MXML files. One of the main uses of MXML components is to extend the
functionality of an existing Flex component.
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