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Old 02-01-2009, 07:11 PM   #285
rps
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Join Date: Oct 2008

Posts: 57
Originally posted by Jim Sachs:
Regarding the use of .png files as clock faces - Yes, the clock is an offshoot of the Logo system, so I could eaily put the hands over any picture. I may make it an option. But first I have to make the digital clock and calendar.

Regarding the second-hand, you are the first one to say that. Everyone else who's commented thought that the smooth-sweeping hand was great. It sure would have been a LOT easier to just move it once per second. You just need to read the Seconds field of the system time structure, and place the hand accordingly. I had to figure out the math (not my strong point) to factor in the milliseconds since the last screen refresh. The smooth-sweep looks far more elegant to me because when I see the "stuttering" hands in other programs I think, "Well, sure, they just have 60 different pre-antialiased drawings of that hand. Anybody could do that".  

What can I say? I just like the old clock from MA2.6 better!

However, since you've already done the hard part, it should be relatively easy to add a checkbox to the clock configuration tab, labeled "Smooth second hand movement" (or something like that). If it's checked, do what you're doing now; if it's not, then just reset milliseconds in the time to zero, before doing what you're doing now. Effectively, the second hand will be drawn in the same spot for 1000 milliseconds, before the "second" changes, and hand position is updated to a new spot. It should only take one line of code (plus the code to save and restore one more option) to make it work either way.

Originally posted by patscarr:
I'd like to see examples of both the stuttering and smooth sweeping in the aquarium so I could make an educated decision as to which one I like best.  
MA2.6 has the stuttering second hand; MA3Beta9 has the smooth (or sweep) second hand.

~Ralph S.
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