This book is designed for beginners to ActionScript 3 programming and the Flash CS3/Flash CS4 programs. It is unique in its approach of emphasizing the "timeline programming techniques" that have made Flash development accessible over the years. It addresses ActionScript control of text, animation, components, graphics, masking, XML, and 3D methods, and it provides custom classes for parsing and graphing mathematical expressions. The tiered learning approach starts from scratch and builds each example upon what has come before, eventually producing dozens of classic applets. While many examples have been chosen to reflect the needs and interests of mathematics and science specialists, the book has a lot to offer general Flash developers who have found our focused examples of functionality and user interface extremely useful. This book offers a step-by-step path to learning essential ActionScript programming that is based on the popular tutorials at FlashandMath.com.