One of the annoying things i come across when developing Flash content, is the mediocre way the IDE supports testing and debugging. Especially when trying to keep your project organised by using lots of actionscript and seperate swf files.

Ever try to test a preloader locally? I did, and it wasn’t plesant i can tell you that much. Using things like ‘loadMovie’, ‘loadVars’, and more of those external ‘load’ Actionscripts seems like a great idea when developing flash content. And i still believe it is by the way. But it sure is a hassle to test how your preloading and loading of content works for your end users. You can test it locally of course, and yes that does work, but it still is a shame to have this great preloading actionscript, which creates the most fantastic effects, but it just won’t show in the internal flash viewer :(.

throttling your expensive internet connection
Macromedia sure missed this in my opinion, it would sure make my life a lot easier :). One of the solutions people are talking about is the use of ‘bandwith throttle’ programs. These software products shrink your internet bandwidth, so you can have the same experience as your end users (modem or broadband wise). In a quick search, i was able to find one of them. This one is shareware though, so be prepared to pay ;)

develop with this boo boo in mind
Another solution for this problem might be developing your preloaders etc. with internal timers in them. By doing this, you might be able to simulate a slow connection yourself. E.g. a preloader might contain a script like:

var virtualBytesLoaded = 0;
var timer = setInterval(doTick, 1000);

doTick = function ()
{
    virtualBytesLoaded += 100;
}

It sure as h*ll ain’t pretty, but as long as it gets the job done….. let’s all pray they fix this in the next expensive version of Flash ;)