title: Changing Spark TextArea text color dynamically over a range of characters
body: <p>Hoping to obtain the help of some Flex 3/4 gurus out there...</p>
  
  <p>I am attempting to dynamically change the color of a subset/portion of text in a Spark TextArea control.  Using the MX-based TextArea, I could leverage the mx.controls.textClasses.TextRange type and change the color directly as follows:</p>
  
  <p><code>
  TextRange tr = new TextRange(theTextAreaControl, false, beginIndex, endIndex);
  &nbsp;tr.color = somePredefindColor;
  </code></p>
  
  <p>Input Parameters to TextRange constructor:
  <br></p>
  
  <ol>
  <li>1st argument: The TextArea control that will provide access to the underlying <i>textField</i> property</li>
  <li>2nd argument: Indicates the TextRange will not modify the content of the TextArea</li>
  <li>3rd argument: The beginning index position in the TextArea text string</li>
  <li>4th argument: The ending index position in the TextArea text string</li>
  </ol>
  
  <p>How would I go about doing this for a Spark-based TextArea control?  I am looking to dynamically change the font color for a range of text, not just the entire TextArea AND I cannot statically specify the font color.  The problem I run into when trying to re-use the TextRange type is that the 1st argument is expected to provide the <i>textField</i> property, which is currently not on the Spark-based TextArea control.  I thought about extending the Spark-based TextArea control to provide this accessor property but that seems like overkill and is probably not the best approach.</p>
  
  <p>Any help would be greatly appreciated.</p>
  
  <p>Thanks,
  Michael</p>