AS3 stack overflow?

Question

Working with Arrays. I create objects on a Class base, push them into an Array, I have 2 buttons: one adds a Child and pushes it into the Array, second one Shifts Array and removes the Child. Also a function on my mouse, if I click an object, I define it's Array number, remove the Child and... well, not sure if successful but "delete Array[i];" where i is target's Array number. I can see Array.length in a text field every time I do something. Second button actually does remove an object from Array, the number decreases. But deleting a specified object from the Array, as well as Array.slice(i,1), doesn't reduce the Array length. So I'm afraid it may cause overflow. It's only Array, not sure, maybe it's fine to have over a million cells in an Array? Like if I make a game with meteor shower, meteors are removed from the screen, but the Array still has their cells. And if they appear like 30-50 per sec, it's obvious I may get memory problems in 20 minutes of running it. Well it's 60k so maybe I shouldn't worry as only graphics take much memory?

Still, I could use an advice on how to shift an object in a middle of an Array. Chosen one. How do I delete it as if it never was created, same as Shift does? (it does, right?)

Answer 1

Array.splice() will do most of the tricks. As you remove the meteor off screen, you can splice it out of the array, do like this:

var i:int=meteorArray.indexOf(meteorToRemove);
if (i>=0) meteorArray.splice(i,1);

Answer 2

You should not create a new object as a good practice if you are deleting other. Try recycling, or better said 'object pools'

You should figure out the number max of elements you may use at once. create a property 'active' on each and set it to true or false instead of creating/deleting. Then you can run the update on each object and update it only if necessary

For example:

var meteors:Array = [];

// create 500 meteors
for ( var i:int = 0; i < 500; i++ ) {
  var meteor:Meteor = new Meteor();
  meteor.active = false;
  meteors.push(meteor);
}

// enable one meteor
meteors[0].active = true;

// in your update method:
for each (var meteor in meteors ) 
  if ( meteor.active )
    meteor.update();

Hope that helps.

Also you can add a helper method to get a meteor available:

function getMeteorAvailable():Meteor
{
  for each (var meteor in meteors ) 
      if ( !meteor.active )
        return meteor;
}