Filtering Array For Objects with Unique values in ActionScript

I happened to go through many instances where I had to filter a flat list on given attribute for unique values. For example I have flat list of employees who is working in different territory with there achievements, problem is show the graph based on territory. In flex you can use GroupedColletion to achieve this, but if you doing it in flash you are left with no options other than Array.filter. Here is how I did it.

var flatData:Array = [

{ Region:"Southwest", Territory:"Arizona", Territory_Rep:"Barbara Jennings", Estimate:40000 , Actual:38865 },

{ Region:"Southwest", Territory:"Arizona", Territory_Rep:"Dana Binn", Estimate:30000 , Actual:29885 },

{ Region:"Southwest", Territory:"Central California", Territory_Rep:"Joe Schmoe" , Estimate:30000 , Actual:29134 },

{ Region:"Southwest", Territory:"Northern California" , Territory_Rep:"Lauren Ipsum" , Estimate:40000 , Actual:38805 },

{ Region:"Southwest", Territory:"Northern California" , Territory_Rep:"T.R. Smith" , Estimate:40000 , Actual:55498 },

{ Region:"Southwest", Territory:"Southern California" , Territory_Rep:"Jane Grove" , Estimate:45000 , Actual:44913 },

{ Region:"Southwest", Territory:"Southern California" , Territory_Rep:"Alice Treu" , Estimate:45000 , Actual:44985 },

{ Region:"Southwest", Territory:"Nevada" , Territory_Rep:"Bethany Pittman", Estimate:45000 , Actual:52888 }

];

 

// sort first to make sure filter logic doesn’t fail

flatData.sortOn("Territory");

// function to return true for false for filtering

function is_unique_ter(item:*, index:int, arr:Array) {

    if (index<arr.length–1) {

        return item.Territory!=arr[index+1].Territory;

    } else {

        return true;

    }

 

}

 

//assign filtered data to different array

var filteredflatData:Array=flatData.filter(is_unique_ter);

 

// trace out contents of filteredflatData

for (var i:Object in filteredflatData) {

    var s="";

    for (var j:String in filteredflatData[i]) {

        s+=( filteredflatData[i][j])+",";

    }

    trace(s);

}

it should give trace output like this:

30000,Southwest,Arizona,29885,Dana Binn,
30000,Southwest,Central California,29134,Joe Schmoe,
45000,Southwest,Nevada,52888,Bethany Pittman,
40000,Southwest,Northern California,55498,T.R. Smith,
45000,Southwest,Southern California,44913,Jane Grove,

Overview Actionscript

ActionScript is a programming language for Flash Player run-time environment. It was developed targeting designers to help them program interactivity. Today ActionScript enables efficient programming of flash applications ranging from Intros to complex, data-driven interactive applications.

ActionScript 1 started with Flash 5, which used “prototype” extensively to program interactive components for flash movies. ActionScript 2 was introduced with Flash MX 2004, which for the first time got Object Oriented concepts and implementations. Even though programmers using OOP methodologies final compiled binary was still using the ActionScript 1 format, hence the performance of flash applications were not that good by then.

Here came ActionScript 3, will lots on improvements over earlier version, AVM (ActionScript Virtual Machine) was written from the scratch, standardized components creation and usage methods. Closing up lot many security loop holes, still maintaining the backward support.