EDIT

Undo / command Z: You can undo multiple things

Redo / command Y: Watch this keystroke shortcut— it’s different! Redo multiple undos

Cut / command X: Removes the selected object(s) and saves them to the clipboard temporarily

Copy / command C: Copies the selected object(s) and saves them to the clipboard temporarily

Paste in Center / command V: Pastes whatever is in your clipboard in the center of your view—which is not necessarily the center of the stage

Paste in Place / command shift V: Pastes what’s in your clipboard exactly where it was when you copied or cut it—most likely to move something to a different frame or layer

Clear: Removes whatever is selected without putting it in the clipboard

Duplicate / command D: Creates a copy of the selected object(s) and places it slightly down and to the right of the original

Select All / command A: Selects everything on the stage on all layers, unless they’re locked

Deselect All / command shift D: Unselects everything

Find & Replace / command F: Choose to find and replace colors, fonts, text, bitmaps, symbols, sounds and video, and replace with something else—very handy if a symbol you’ve used a lot needs to be replaced with another

Find Next: Locates and highlights the object matching the last thing you were replacing

Timeline: Cut, copy, paster, clear, remove, or select all frames. Very handy.

Edit Symbols / command E: Highlight the symbol you want to modify first. This puts you into symbol editing mode. Double clicking the symbol image in the library also works

Edit Selected: Opens symbol editing mode with the selected symbol ready to work on

Edit in Place: Puts you in symbol editing mode, but you can still see dimmed versions of whatever else is on stage. Double clicking on the symbol on stage does the same thing

Edit All: I can’t get this to work.

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VIEW

Go To: A way to move from scene to scene. You can also do this using the scene panel, or from the clapper icon at the bottom right of the timeline

Zoom In / command + : Enlarges your view: the command spacebar also works

Zoom Out / command - : Reduces your vide: command spacebar option also works

Magnification: Toggle to view at various enlargements, as well as show all and fit in window.

Preview Mode: Draws objects on stage with more or less resolution; fast and outline modes make things work faster, but don’t look great

Work Area / command shift W: If you uncheck this, you loose the grey “off stage” areas to the top and left of your stage.

Rulers: Show or hide rulers in the measurement units you specified in the movie properties dialog box

Grid: Show, hide, and edit the grid; used for exact positioning of things; turn “snap to grid” on or off

Guides: You can drag vertical and horizontal guides from the rulers. Use this menu item to lock them, show/hide them, and change their color

Snapping: This is an interesting new feature. By default, “snap align” is checked. As you move an object around the stage, dashed lines show you where alignment with other objects occurs. Handy. Also choose to snap to the grid, guides, pixels, and objects. You can use the magnet in the tool box to snap to objects as well.

Hide Edges / command shift E: If you check this you’ll never know what you’re working on! You can hide edges a layer at a time

Show Shape Hints / command option H: Shape hints are used to control how a shape tween works. Check this to see where you’ve put them

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INSERT

New Symbol / command F8: This opens symbol editing mode with a clear slate. Draw your symbol using the drawing tools, or paste something from Illustrator

Timeline: Layer: adds a new layer above the currently selected one;
Layer Folder: adds a layer folder (used for consolidating things) above the currently selected layer. Add layers to a folder by dragging them underneath the folder so they tuck in;
Motion Guide: adds a motion guide layer above the currently selected layer. You can also add a motion guide layer by clicking on the icon in the lower left of the timeline;
Keyframe / F6: adds a keyframe (a solid dot) in the frame of the selected layer where the playhead is, or in the currently selected frame: if there is something in the previous keyframe, that object will be copied into the new keyframe;
Blank Keyframe: adds a hollow dot to the frame of the selected layer where the playhead is, or in the currently selected frame: it doesn’t copy anything from the previous keyframe;
Create Motion Tween: creates animation between two keyframes: make sure the first keyframe in the sequence is selected

Timeline Effects: Play with these at your own risk; they create animations, but I understand they are cumbersome and add greatly to your file size

Scene: add a new scene after the current one; rearrange and name your scenes with the scene panel (Window > design panels > scene)

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MODIFY

Document / command J: Opens the document properties dialog box

Convert to symbol / F8: Turns the selected object(s) into a symbol; you get to decide what kind of symbol it will be and to name it

Break Apart / command B: This breaks apart things you paste into Flash from Illustrator so that you can modify them. It also breaks apart a bitmap so you can use is as a fill

Bitmap: swap bitmap: choose to replace the selected bitmap image with another in the library;
trace bitmap: turns a bitmap into an vector image; specify the number of colors you want and the size of the smallest area of color you want to retain

Symbol: Duplicates the selected symbol, or lets your swap it for another in your library

Shape: Use the options under this menu item to reshape your drawing: select what you want to deal with and choose from smoothing, sharpening, optimizing, converting lines to fills (handy!), expanding fills (shrinks or expands a fill by the number of pixels you specify), and softening fill edges. If you’re creating a shape tween, you can add or remove shape hints here as well

Timeline: Layer Properties: use this dialogue box to change the nature of a layer, hide, show or lock it, and change its highlight/outline color;

Reverse Frames: select the sequence of frames you want to reverse in the timeline, then select this. Nice to make something go backwards in time;

Convert to Keyframes / F6: this turns the selected frame into a keyframe;

Clear Keyframe / shift F6: this deletes the currently selected keyframe;

Convert to blank Keyframes / F7: this placed hollow dots in the selected frames and deletes anything in that was in frames to the right of it.

Timeline Effects: Play with these at your own risk: they do some cool things, but greatly encumber your playback and file size, from what I understand

Transform: These do, by selecting them, what the free transform tool and the transform dialog box do to the selected objects: scale, rotate, skew, distort, envelope, etc.

Arrange: Moves selected objects in front of or behind others. Remember grouped objects will always be on top of ungrouped things

Align: Select several objects to align or to distribute them along several axes (top, left, etc.); “To Stage,” when checked, uses the center of the stage as the registration point for alignment

Group / command G: Select the objects you want to stay together and group them

Ungroup / command shift G: Select a group and use this to break it apart into separate elements

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TEXT

Font: Choose from the fonts you have on your machine. See the section on type for more information

Size: Select a type size

Style: Choose from plain, bold, italic, bold italic, and super- or subscript

Align: Select paragraph format

Tracking: Add (command option right arrow) or delete (command option left arrow) letter spacing

Scrollable: Use this feature for dynamic text boxes

Check Spelling: A nice new feature! (use it)

Spelling Setup: A dialog box with massive options for selecting dictionaries, as well as what kinds of things to ignore or include in a spell check

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CONTROL

Play / return: Plays the movie on your stage from the point where the playhead is

Rewind / command option R: Moves the playhead to the first frame in the scene

Go to End: Moves the playhead to the last frame in the scene

Step Forward One Frame / . (period): Moves the playhead forward one frame

Step Backward One Frame / , (comma): Very handy for moving around in bits.

Test Movie / command return: This opens the Flash Player and shows you your movie “in context”

Debug Movie / command shift return: Use this to make sure any actionscript you’ve used is correct

Test Scene / command option return: NICE new feature! Now you can just test a scene in the Flash Player instead of the whole movie

Loop Playback: This loops the movie when you play it on-stage; make it stop by hitting the return key!

Play All Scenes: When you play your movie on-stage, checking this will take you through all your scenes instead of just the current one

Enable Simple Buttons: Use this to test a button on stage without having to “test movie;” remember to uncheck it when you’re done or you won’t be able to move or otherwise mess with your buttons.

Enable Live Preview: I always have this checked. I don’t know why

Mute Sounds: A nice thing when the sounds in your movie are playing over and over and making you (or your roommate) nuts

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WINDOW

New Window: Creates a duplicate of your movie; I have no idea why you’d want to do this since whatever you do in the new window happens in the old one too

Toolbars: Hides or shows the movie controller and the edit bar (which is either on top of or under the timeline, and which I could not live without

Properties: Another must: this is your properties palette where you can do just about almost anything the menu items can

Timeline: Don’t know why this would ever be hidden...

Tools: Ditto

Library / command L: This should be open by default (like the tools). As it is, you need to open the library every time you open a new project or a project in progress. Well worth memorizing the command L shortcut

Design Panels: I have most of these showing to the right of my stage most of the time. You can collapse them without closing them when they get in the way: select from align, color mixer, color swatches, info, scene, and transform

Development Panels: These panels include the actions panel (for adding actionscript), behaviors, components, component inspector, debugger, and output panels: most of these are used for serious scripting

Other Panels: The Accessibility panel is where you can add alt tags and descriptions of things for people with disabilities; also included in this group are the history, movie explorer, string, and common libraries panels

Hide Panels / F4: Hides or shows the currently available panels

Panel Sets: Choosing one of these rearranges everything and shows what Macromedia wants you to see

Save Panel Layout: Once you’ve got everything set up just the way you like it, choose this and your arrangement and preferences will become an option under Panel Sets

Cascade: Displays all open projects in a diagonally stacked fashion

Tile: Resizes all open projects and puts them side by side

(List of open projects)

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