populating and and accessing data from a value object

Question

I have have a problem loading and accessing data from a value object in my new project.. I load an xml file via a service, which contains title and locations of asset files, I need to be able to access the location of an asset file by specifying the title and retrieiving it from a value object.. I'm using the Robotlegs framework, here's an example of the xml:-

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<files id ="xmlroot">
<file title="css_shell"                 location = "css/shell.css"  />
<file title="xml_shell"                 location = "xml/shell.xml"  />
<file title="test"                      location=   "test/location/test.jpg" />
<file title ="shell_background_image"   location = "images/shell_images/background_image.jpg" />
</files>

I then push this data into a value object as a Dictionary hash.. hopefully

//-----------  populate value objects ------------------------------------
var xml:XML = new XML(xml);
var files:XMLList = xml.files.file;

for each (var file:XML in files) {
var filePathVO:DataVO = new FilePathVO( [email protected](),
     file.location.toString()
);

 filePathModel.locationList.push(filePathVO);
filePathModel.locationHash[filePathVO.title] = filePathVO;
 }

I've tested accessing this from a view component.

// accessing from another class -----------------

var _background_image_path:String = String( filePathModel.locationHash['shell_background_image']);

it returns undefined.. any ideas?

thanks martin :-)

Answer 1

You forgot the @ for location attribute on this line:

var filePathVO:DataVO = new FilePathVO([email protected](),
     file.location.toString());

The real problem lies on the line:

var files:XMLList = xml.files.file;

Change it to

var files:XMLList = xml.file;

The xml variable refers to the root tag of the xml; there is no need to access it explicitly with xml.files. xml.files.file actually looks for file tags that are direct children of files tags that are direct children of the root-xml tag. It would've worked had your xml been something like:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<root>
  <files id ="xmlroot">
    <file title="css_shell" location = "css/shell.css"  />
    <file title="xml_shell" location = "xml/shell.xml"  />
    <file title="test" location=   "test/location/test.jpg" />
    <file title ="shell_background_image" location = "images/shell_images/background_image.jpg" />
  </files>
</root>