Error: Could not resolve to a component implementation.

Often when refactoring code I'll extract ActionScript code out of an MXML file into an ActionScript based superclass to get a cleaner separation between logic and the view. In doing so I sometimes forget to update MXML variable declrations, leading to the confusing error:

Could not resolve <mx:states> to a component implementation.

In this case my MXML class extends another custom class and looks like:

1. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
2. <example:CustomCanvas xmlns:example="com.example.*" xmlns:mx="http://www.adobe.com/2006/mxml">
4.     <mx:states>
6.         <mx:State name="default"/>
7.         <mx:State name="custom"/>
9.     </mx:states>
11. </example:CustomCanvas>

The issue is that the "mx" namespace doesn't match the root component's namespace so the MXML compiler gets

confused about it being a property versus a child component. The simple fix is to just change the namespace on the
 property to match the root component's namespace like this:

 
 

  
  
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<example:CustomCanvas xmlns:example="com.example.*" xmlns:mx="http://www.adobe.com/2006/mxml">
        <example:states>
            <mx:State name="default"/>
            <mx:State name="custom"/>
        </example:states>
</example:CustomCanvas>