One of the most powerful aspects of flash is it's ability to populate the interface with externally sourced data.

The easiest way to do this is a simple text file to feed static data to the Flash application. This is usually done in XML to make the data more human readable. A good example of this would be country location (x,y) and sales data used in the Library House Banner.

To make the application more dynamic calling data from a database using unique 'i-d's. This is usually achieved by making a get or a post call to a server based scripting language such as PHP, ASP or Perl. The Stained Glass Design Tool uses a glass database to supply the color, image address, price and pattern data to name but a few.

The Honda Virtual Institute required a wide range of communication methods as there was no access to their training database and so a lot of what would have been databased static information was exported as XML. User training status information was posted to the Flash application on receipt of a user id. It was then handed back using SCORM, a specialist training based language.