Rating: 
Summary: Flash 5 or MX?
Review: I'm sorry for the author, but i see not much about Flash MX in this book and a lot about Flash 5. Just a fiew pages about components and a superficial tractation on actionscript. The rest of the book is a good book about Flash animation, but not suitable to learn applications development in Flash(that is supposed to be one of the Flash MX main goals).
Rating: 
Summary: Fluff for beginners
Review: If you are new to Flash, and multimedia authoring in general, this book is an adequate, easy to understand introduction to Flash MX.However, if you have any experience in multimedia authoring, using previous versions of Flash, web programing, etc., you will be very disappointed, so don't buy this book. The title 'The Complete Reference' is a total misnomer. This book is neither a reference ( it's a feature by feature tutorial/description ) nor is it complete ( it glides over ActiveScript, and practically skips video altogether). The author has won awards for writing beginner oriented computer how to books, and this shows in his easy to understand prose. Unfortunately, one gets the impression that the author is neither a designer nor a programmer. The use of incorrect technical terminology in some places is disconcerting at the best, and totally misleading at the worst. There is even an aside where the author inadvertently, perhaps through ignorance, takes the European Computer Manufacturers Association (ECMA) to task on the features of the core standard upon which Active Script is based. One imagines the author might be better off sticking to books on word processing and spreadsheets in the future, which has been his forte in the past.
Rating:
Summary: This book is a stain on the launch of Flash MX
Review: Osborn, who published this sad book, should be ashamed of themselves. It's almost as if they're trying to give Flash MX a bad name. Interesting that their 'Complete Reference' series doesn't have a volume on Flash 5. Weird eh? It's almost as if that's what they contracted the author to write in the first place? And then at the last minute they just stuck MX on the cover instead of 5? I've been a Flash designer for 3 years and was looking forward to the MX release. I ordered this book at the same time as the software and could hardly believe it when I sat down with them. The book seems to be at least 2 years out of date and referring to a different product altogether. It says MX on the cover but simply ignores the new release. Flash MX is a sophisticated new product and each one of the new features could benefit from some deep, exploratory coverage. This book covers none of them. It's a shallow walk-through of generic Flash functionality that could have been written about Flash 5 or even 4 for that matter. ActionScript, for example, which is the engine at the heart of Flash has been powerfully improved and elaborated in the MX release, and yet it hardly gets a mention at all in over 800 pages. This book will tell you next to nothing about Flash MX. Avoid it.
Rating:
Summary: I Can't Believe I Wasted my Money on This Book!
Review: Some people think that just because a series is well established that it always has good books. This is totally not true with the Complete Reference series. This book was one of the worst things I've ever read. It was written badly, organized horribly, and was hardly "Complete." It semed like they barely put any effort into making it a Flash MX book instead of a Flash 5 book! Osborne should be ashamed of themselves for publishing this book. After trying to work with this pile of doggy doo doo, I got smart and bought Flash MX Savvy by Watral and Herber. That book rocks...Flash MX: The Complete Refernce stinks.
Rating: 
Summary: Good Flash MX 2004 Book for both Beginners and Advanced
Review: The first thing I liked about this book were the notes and tips in each chapter. Someone could just read the notes and tips and get some pretty good applicable tips on Flash MX. The book begins with the beginner in mind. I found the chapters on sound and video extremely helpful. I too have not read the Actionscript part yet, but know it will help me understand object programming using Actionscript 2.0 better than I do currently! Thanks for a great book!
Rating:
Summary: For basic edition of Flash MX 2004 ONLY
Review: This book does not attempt to cover the full edition of Flash MX 2004. If you have the professional version of Flash DO NOT BUY THIS BOOK! The book is titled "The Complete Reference" for Macromedia Flash MX 2004 but "Complete" it is not. The book is only 700 pages. I should have purchased the "Bible" series for this application. Osborne books are pretty much hit or miss... and you don't know until you try to look something up.
Rating:
Summary: For basic edition of Flash MX 2004 ONLY
Review: This book does not attempt to cover the full edition of Flash MX 2004. If you have the professional version of Flash DO NOT BUY THIS BOOK! The book is titled "The Complete Reference" for Macromedia Flash MX 2004 but "Complete" it is not. The book is only 700 pages. I should have purchased the "Bible" series for this application. Osborne books are pretty much hit or miss... and you don't know until you try to look something up.
Rating:
Summary: Not Very Good At All
Review: This book is really quite poor. Using this book to learn Flash MX would be like learning to write a novel by reading the dictionary. It spends loads of time going over the basics (which is fine for beginners I suppose) but provides no real examples of how to apply most of these concepts in a step-by-step manner. It also basically has nothing to do with Flash MX. It covers all of the things that are pretty much common to the previous versions of Flash, but skips over the major new aditions to MX. Like importing Video! There is almost nothing in this book about that - It is a MAJOR upgrade with Flash MX. There is one tutorial - an extrmely basic one - in the "advanced action scripting section", and it is only three pages long. Aditionally, the example provided is not really the best way to achieve what is being attempted in the example. Not an example of an experts work at all. If you want to actually learn how to use Flash, don't buy this book. If you simply want a dictionary style book that simply talks about what flash can do, rather than how to do it, then this book fits that bill.
Rating:
Summary: The Best Book for intermediate and advanced designers/progra
Review: This has no examples of Action Script that are useful. I continually pick it up and give it another chance, but time and time again I find frustration. I am very dissapointed in this book. As a flash author, I need more examples of script and less simple definitions of what things are. Much better books are available from the publisher "Friends of Ed".
Rating:
Summary: The worst I've seen in a long time
Review: This has no examples of Action Script that are useful. I continually pick it up and give it another chance, but time and time again I find frustration. I am very dissapointed in this book. As a flash author, I need more examples of script and less simple definitions of what things are. Much better books are available from the publisher "Friends of Ed".
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