Author Colin Moock starts off with a primer to Flash terminology and a quick example application--an interactive quiz. Following that, the book quickly gets down to ActionScript nuts and bolts. The first part covers the basics of the language, such as operators, variable scope, and conditional logic, in a traditional presentation. A few lines of example code illustrate each concept.
Critical topics like arrays, movie clips, and object-oriented programming are covered well at the detail level, though a more extensive example application would really have come in handy to illustrate the big picture. The back of the book contains an excellent reference to the ActionScript language, complete with inline example code. ActionScript is an important tool to master, and ActionScript: The Definitive Guide is a fine means to that end. --Stephen W. Plain