GreenSock Transform Manager (AS3)
I was working on a project recently, where I wanted to offer the user some fine grained control over transformation of display objects. A quick search led me to Green Sock, run by Jack Doyle. What can I say other than that Jack has tweening libraries for every flavor project and task. He also has a transform manager library, which at the time was only ActionScript 2. After an email exchange, Jack graciously provided me with an advance copy of his ActionScript 3 code base. That ActionScript 3 version is now done and you can purchase a license by heading over to the Green Sock web site.
What does this transformation manager do? Uh, what doesn’t it do?
My requirements were pretty simple. I wanted to be able to select a display object and have it pop to the front, then let the user rotate it to their liking. With Jack’s transform manager, that required little more effort than instantiating the manager class, and adding the desired display objects to the manager. Done. It was actually more time consuming to remove all the extra features of the transform manager than it was to drop it in place.
When selected, a display object has a ton of potential functionality. You can scale the object either from the center or not, through up to eight grab handles. You can control various boundaries for the display object. You can select multiple display objects, and transform all of them at the same time. Jack has even captured common keyboard interactions like constraining proportions, and nudging display objects around through the arrow keys.
var manager:TransformManager = new TransformManager( { scaleFromCenter: true, allowDelete: true, forceSelectionToFront: true } ); // ... manager.addItem( photo );
Did I mention that there’s even events (in AS3 style) for a variety of interactions?
What I’ve come to find over time, is that all of Jack’s libraries are wonderful! They give you high performance and fine grained control over every aspect of interaction. To that end, Jack has a plethora of examples on the Green Sock web site, which I encourage you to explore. Since they’re all from the same company, they’re also all very consistent, which is another added bonus for productivity.
While Jack does have a lot of samples, I couldn’t help but put one of my own together as well. This example loads fifty photos from those most recently uploaded to Flickr (where else?). Each photo has been added to the transform manager and can be manipulated at will. You can even delete the photos you don’t like. All tweening of the display objects is accomplished through Jack’s TweenMax library as well. The possibilities are endless thanks to these wonderful libraries from GreenSock.
August 14th, 2008 at 12:23 am
The libraries do look wonderful. The price, not so much.
August 14th, 2008 at 7:30 pm
First off, thanks Kevin for the great write-up on your experience with TransformManager.
Nicolas, I guess it all depends on how you look at it. I completely understand the hesitation to fork over a few hundred dollars for an ActionScript class. Then again, given the fact that it represents well over $10,000 worth of my time, $299 seems like quite a bargain. In the end, you have to weigh how much time and hassle it would save you if you tried to recreate something similar. Most of us work against tight deadlines too, so having a plug-and-play solution available for immediate purchase can be a real boon.
I’ve worked on a few projects that required this kind of functionality, and if I could have found a robust 3rd-party solution that I could trust for $299, I would have snatched it up in a heartbeat. It would have saved me a boatload of time/hassle and allowed for better profit margins on the projects. My clients would have been happier too with the quicker turnaround and lower price.
Also, we’ve all seen open source projects that fizzle and die because the authors got busy with other stuff and couldn’t cash-flow the project. I’ve learned the hard way that it takes a LOT to create, document, distribute, enhance, and support open source code. My hope is that the income generated by TransformManager sales would help guard against those common frailties of open source projects and in the end provide a better service to developers like you.
August 15th, 2008 at 3:18 am
i have to agree with Jack here, especially given the fact that you get the base tweening classes for free, where you can see for yourself that the quality of his work is top notch. so you`re not shelling out money for something which can be potentially just a buggy and slow heap of code hacked together as is the case with too many open source projects sadly! this is clearly a well rounded product, meant for professional, paid for projects.
August 15th, 2008 at 12:58 pm
While I’m happy to pay for quality products such as the GreenSock range, $299 does seem a lot, you can buy Flash for a mere $699!
I guess, as with most things, people will vote with their feet (mouse).
August 15th, 2008 at 2:56 pm
I’d say that anyone who would suggest that $299 is not worth it is not realistically looking at the time it takes to produce this, and the amount of features that come with it. Even if you don’t start from scratch and go with one of the other existing solutions out there, the time you spent modifying the existing code to do what TransformManager would cost much more (I’m speaking from experience).
August 19th, 2008 at 1:00 am
Given the looming Attention Economy…I’d say Jack and whoever else wishes to monetize their time would find better fortune selling implementation materials. The party ends when just one other person in the world offers the same solution for free…and are only a quick Google search away. It may be better to build a loyal following of thousands by selling easy to read documentation or online video lessons showing various ways to implement the solution…just my 2 cents.
November 11th, 2008 at 3:03 am
For the people that think $299 is a lot, how long would it take you to develop the same exact thing? If you are a professional, multiply that by your hourly rate. For me it seems like an ok price, but I would probably attempt to build a solution myself first. I think any self respecting developer would probably do the same. There is just a sense of pride when you build something on your own.
February 7th, 2009 at 5:11 pm
Given that an enormous number of people have been using Jacks base tweening classes for a long time , at no cost or for a voluntary contribution I do not think we should be complaining about him charging for this enormously powerful and complex class, which you would probably only need for something that is going to make you money.
I use Jacks classes because I feel confident that they will continue to be supported and improved. I use them pretty much every day. That is worth some money. Which is why I also donate for the Tweenmax classes.