Shared Object Local editors - Flash and Joomla News from Eyezberg

Oct 10 2006

Shared Object Local editors

(19 votes)

Flash - Actionscript Editors

Written by eyez

SOL or Local Shared Objects editors

Flash cookies, known as SOL files, can store a lot of information without most users knowing about it. They are becoming widely used tools to track site visitors, just like the standard browser cookies, with the benefit of not being cleared when the user deletes his regular cookies.

SOL files are read on written by SWF files, and stored in a not easily accessible location. With the tool listed heere, it is possible to

browse the stored SOL files
read file contents
modify variable values inside those files (usefull for testing)
create new SOL files

Two tools are free, the third also but only for ASV customers.

ASV SOL Editor

ASV SOL editor

Website

With ASV SOL Viewer and Editor you can,

    * Open and view SOL files,
    * Edit contents of SOL files,
    * Create new SOL files.
this is a tool which is free for ActionScript Viewer customers, and not available otherwise.

Viewing SOL Files

The contents of the open SOL file will be presented as a tree structure. The root item indicates the name of the Shared Object. You can edit this name using the File|Edit Object Name command. (However, changing the Object Name will render the SOL file useless. Not recommended unless you are creating a new SOL file).

Items listed at the first level below the Object name correspond to the properties of the Shared Object, of various types. Certain types can only have a value, some (like array) can have a child items which can be any of the other types.

Editing SOL Files

When an item is selected, the name of the selected property and its value (if applicable) will be shown on the panel to the right.

You can edit the Property Name and the Value fields, then press Enter or the Apply button to make it permanent (You'll still need to save the file though). For String and XML types, you can edit the Value in the text box (to insert a return character, press ctrl+Enter).

You can also save the contents of the text box to a file, or load it from a file, using the Save/Load buttons. (UTF8 encoded text/xml files are not fully supported in this version).

Creating new items:

You can either use the toolbar buttons or right-click menu to access the item related commands.

.sol Editor

Website

This tool opens an existing shared object file (.sol) displays the contents of the file and allows you to change the variable values.
When you create a Flash movie wich uses the local shared object, it is useful to see what is stored and change the values to test all possibilities.

It can read values of type :
* Number
* Boolean
* String
* Object
* null
* undefined
* Array
* XML
* Date
It can't change the type of a value, but from version 1.0.6.0, you can add or remove values.

SolVE

Solve screenshot

Website

SolVE is a Local Shared Object View/Editor that runs on both Mac OS X and Windows. Coded in Java with IBM's SWT, SolVE looks and behaves like a native application. Currently, SolVE supports the following data types in local shared object files:

    * Number
    * Boolean
    * String
    * Object
    * Null
    * Undefined
    * Array

Features

SolVE is not entirely feature-rich at this point. Still in version .2, the interface allows for basic operations only. The main differentiator between SolVE and the other .sol editors (.sol Editor and ASV SOL Viewer/Editor) is that SolVE is a native solution for Mac OS X users and SolVE is available in languages other than English. Basic feature list:

    * Runs on Mac OS X and Windows, as long as a JVM at least v1.4 is installed
    * Create new .sol files
    * Interactive tree display to visually inspect and change contents of a .sol file
    * Internationalization support.