MACROMEDIA FLASH MX, Reference

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Object.valueOf() 675
Object.valueOf()
Availability
Flash Player 5.
Usage
myObject .valueOf() : Object
Parameters
None.
Returns
The primitive value of the specified object or the object itself.
Description
Method; returns the primitive value of the specified object. If the object does not have a primitive
value, the object is returned.
Example
The following example shows the return value of valueOf() for a generic object (which does not
have a primitive value) and compares it to the return value of toString():
// Create a generic object
var myObject:Object = new Object();
trace(myObject.valueOf()); // output: [object Object]
trace(myObject.toString()); // output: [object Object]
The following examples show the return values for the built-in classes Date and Array, and
compares them to the return values of
Object.toString()
:
// Create a new Date object set to February 1, 2004, 8:15 AM
// The toString() method returns the current time in human-readable form
// The valueOf() method returns the primitive value in milliseconds
var myDate:Date = new Date(2004,01,01,8,15);
trace(myDate.toString()); // output: Sun Feb 1 08:15:00 GMT-0800 2004
trace(myDate.valueOf()); // output: 1075652100000
// Create a new Array object containing two simple elements
// In this case both toString() and valueOf() return the same value: one,two
var myArray:Array = new Array("one", "two");
trace(myArray.toString()); // output: one,two
trace(myArray.valueOf()); // output: one,two
See the example for Object.toString() for an example of the return value of
Object.valueOf()
for a custom class that overrides
toString()
.