Measuring Length (inches/cm) of a Text (CS5/ActionsScript)

I need to perform resizing of a cell so that it is exactly the smallest width possible without an overflow/overset condition being caused. I could perform a resizing loop to check when Cell.overflow becomes false, but that seems slow and ugly. Is there a way that I can determine the required width (in inches/cm, etc) of the cell's text contents, and then set the width of the cell accrodingly?

TIA

mlavie