Display properties of HTMLLoader objects

The basic display properties of the HTMLLoader allow you to position the control within its parent display object, to set the size, and to show or hide the control. You should not change these properties for the HTMLLoader object of an HTML window.

The basic properties include:

Outside an HTML window, the width and height properties of an HTMLLoader object default to 0. You must set the width and height before the loaded HTML content can be seen. HTML content is drawn to the HTMLLoader size, laid out according to the HTML and CSS properties in the content. Changing the HTMLLoader size reflows the content.

When loading content into a new HTMLLoader object (with width still set to 0), it can be tempting to set the display width and height of the HTMLLoader using the contentWidth and contentHeight properties. This technique works for pages that have a reasonable minimum width when laid out according the HTML and CSS flow rules. However, some pages flow into a long and narrow layout in the absence of a reasonable width provided by the HTMLLoader.

The paintsDefaultBackground property of an HTMLLoader object, which is true by default, determines whether the HTMLLoader object draws an opaque background. When paintsDefaultBackground is false , the background is clear. The display object container or other display objects below the HTMLLoader object are visible behind the foreground elements of the HTML content.

If the body element or any other element of the HTML document specifies a background color (using style="background-color:gray" , for example), then the background of that portion of the HTML is opaque and rendered with the specified background color. If you set the opaqueBackground property of the HTMLLoader object, and paintsDefaultBackground is false , then the color set for the opaqueBackground is visible.

Avoid scaling an HTMLLoader object beyond a scale factor of 1.0. Text in HTMLLoader content is rendered at a specific resolution and appears pixelated if the HTMLLoader object is scaled up.

SWF and PDF content loaded into in an HTMLLoader object disappears in the following conditions:

• If you scale the HTMLLoader object to a factor other that 1.0.

• If you set the alpha property of the HTMLLoader object to a value other than 1.0.

• If you rotate the HTMLLoader content.

The content reappears if you remove the offending property setting and remove the active filters.

In addition, the runtime cannot display PDF content in transparent windows. The runtime only displays SWF content embedded in an HTML page when the wmode parameter of the object or embed tag is set to opaque or transparent . Since the default value of wmode is window , SWF content is not displayed in transparent windows unless you explicitly set the wmode parameter.

For more information on loading these types of media in an HTMLLoader, see Embedding SWF content in HTML and Adding PDF content in AIR .

The HTMLLoader class inherits several methods that can be used for special effects. In general, these effects have limitations when used with the HTMLLoader display, but they can be useful for transitions or other temporary effects. For example, if you display a dialog window to gather user input, you could blur the display of the main window until the user closes the dialog. Likewise, you could fade the display out when closing a window.

The advanced display properties include:

The following example illustrates how to set the filters array to blur the entire HTML display:

var blur = new window.runtime.flash.filters.BlurFilter(); 
var filters = [blur]; 
window.htmlLoader.filters = filters;