Author Topic: Countdown Clock for Windows? (Read 14937 times)

clemon79 · « **on:** January 03, 2005, 03:04:34 AM »

Last night I was playing Time's Up at a friend's place, and we were using the trusty G8 Game Timer to keep time instead of the silly egg timer that comes with that otherwise fantastic game. (Help a fellow Invisioner out, go buy six copies now.

So anyhow, we got to thinking, we had a laptop with a nice big screen handy, wouldn't it be neat (and far easier to see from across the room than the G8) to use that as a clock display? We have a lot of game show nuts here, and many of them can code, so does anyone know of a standard countdown timer (along the lines of a basketball shot clock or the "Clock in the wings" on Clark Pyramid) that has been written for Windows? Here's my ideal feature list:

* Easy-to-click buttons onscreen (and/or distinct keyboard commands) for Start / Pause, Stop / Clear, and Reset Clock. Ideally Start Clock would both reset and start clock when clock is at :00.
* Either font-changable, or a number of different game-show type numerical fonts (Eggcrate, seven-segment, vein) could be selected. Color of font and background should be customizable, and an extra added bonus would be for those colors to change upon clock expiry.
* Fills up the screen when maximized. As in, if it's set for 60 seconds, there is no trailing "0" in the minutes column. Just a "60", with or without the leading colon. (Really, it ought to fill up the window, whatever size the window is.)
* Offers a toggle to turn tenths-of-a-second on and off.
* Will play the WAV of your choice when the clock hits zero.
* Will LOOP the WAV of your choice while clock is running. (good for Scrabble "ticka-ticka-ticka" or Pyramid "wah")
* Offers both count-up and countdown modes.

I'm aware of Curt's Wonderwall clock, but that has the Wonderwall doohickies onscreen as well, and I'm looking for something that could be suited to several game-show-esque and other gaming functions. Plus I want those numbers to FILL UP the screen, at least as much as we can and still have the controls be convenient.

So did someone write this and I don't know about it? It strikes me that it wouldn't be THAT hard to write, and while I'm pretty 'tarded when it comes to Visual C++, I'm not THAT awful, and maybe this would be a good Visual Basic project, just for learning purposes. Seems like it would be easy to write something basic and then add on options until it became pretty ub3rl33t.

Speedy G · « **Reply #1 on:** January 08, 2005, 11:03:15 PM »

[quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jan 3 2005, 04:04 AM\']So did someone write this and I don't know about it? It strikes me that it wouldn't be THAT hard to write, and while I'm pretty 'tarded when it comes to Visual C++, I'm not THAT awful, and maybe this would be a good Visual Basic project, just for learning purposes. Seems like it would be easy to write something basic and then add on options until it became pretty ub3rl33t.

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I've got something that's currently in the ballpark. I use it as a form just to play around with various things, so it's not exactly production quality.

Timer program (Pre-alpha to say the least)

The "Open File" button lets you select a file to be used as the background (but it doesn't currently loop). Place a file with the name "buzzer.wav" in the same directory as the program to indicate a timesup sound. The "Change Color" button randomly changes the background color of the clock. Reset does little more than open the controls back up, as it stands now. I've disabled window resizing (so I didn't have to take everything else off the form).

It's on the right track, hopefully! I don't yet know the time commitment my classes will require this semester. After fall semester's programming bonanza (don't ask), it may be a little while before I feel like doing it in my spare time, either.

pacdude · « **Reply #2 on:** January 09, 2005, 08:11:59 PM »

I've got a ghetto scoreboard I made for my school's basketball team, and you can find it at

http://www.pacdudegames.com/scoreboard.swf

That can be fullscreened (hit F11), and to avoid screen clutter, it uses keyboard shortcuts:

CLOCK
A - Start Clock
S - Stop Clock
D - Reset Scoreboard to 8:00
F - Subtract One Minute
G - Add One Minute

SCORES
Z - Add 1 Point to Home
X - Subtract 1 Point to Home
C - Add 1 Point to Away
V - Subtract 1 Point to Away

OTHER
Q - Bonus Light Home Toggle
P - Bonus Light Away Toggle
M - Buzzer
N - Period Indicator
Left Arrow - Posession Arrow Away
Right Arrow - Posession Arrow Home

Of course, this is basketball, but I can edit/change almost anything. The extreme timer stuff I'm not sure if I can do. Customizability in terms of sound and color might be feasible.

Fedya · « **Reply #3 on:** January 09, 2005, 11:25:20 PM »

A quick Google search showed Big Time, as well as 1time.

I haven't tested either of them to see if they do what you want.

chris319 · « **Reply #4 on:** January 10, 2005, 09:00:05 AM »

This sounds like about 10 minutes of programming in Visual BASIC.

I wrote one for a run-thru using (get this): an old 8086 machine that was lying around gathering dust. I upgraded it to DOS 5.0 and wrote it in QuickBASIC. You whippersnappers remember DOS, don't you? It's what we geezers used back in the olden days. There were no TrueType fonts and no sound effects (SFX were done manually) and it fed a standard video monitor using -- get ready now -- a CGA card! With no TrueType fonts I had to write the low-level code to render the numerals (your basic egg-crate font). It counted down from 30 to 0 with a tap of the space bar. It could be stopped in mid-count by tapping the space bar again, or allowed to count all the way down to 0. In either case, when the clock stopped counting, it paused for five seconds and reset itself to 30 again. This turned out to be a VERY handy feature. If you want the code, email me.

clemon79 · « **Reply #5 on:** January 10, 2005, 12:03:40 PM »

[quote name=\'chris319\' date=\'Jan 10 2005, 07:00 AM\']This sounds like about 10 minutes of programming in Visual BASIC.
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I'm thinking so too. And since I have Visual Basic .NET now, I'm thinking it might be a simple, usable, and extensible first project for it. I just need to pick up a copy of VB.NET For Utter Maroons at my local Overly Inviting Book Emporium.

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You whippersnappers remember DOS, don't you? It's what we geezers used back in the olden days.

This made me smile. I picked up a new bookcase last week, and I was cleaning some stuff out of the old one in the process of transferring books from the old to the new, so I can turn an empty shelf so made from this process into more storage for my DVD collection. The stuff that was going was largely unread issues of Microsoft Certified Professional magazine (they start sending them to you when you pass your first MCSE test, and they don't stop until you yell at them for a while) and oooooooold software manuals. PFS: First Choice? Out. The first version of Microsoft Works For Windows? No thanks, I've been through about four versions of Office since. Is this a modem manual? Do I even HAVE this modem anymore? Stacker 3.0? Yeesh, why the hell did I ever use that to start with? (Answer, for the whippersnappers: my first drive in my first PC (I was an Apple II user up until '91) was 80 megabytes. That's mega, with an M, not giga.)

But I couldn't throw away my DOS 5 command reference. That's command line, man. I still use that. And I think someplace I still have a fully boxed-up retail DOS 4.1.

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There were no TrueType fonts and no sound effects (SFX were done manually) and it fed a standard video monitor using -- get ready now -- a CGA card!

For those scoring at home, both TrueType and sound card support in the OS were innovations that didn't come around until Windows 3.1. (And DirectX was still a solid three years away.)

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In either case, when the clock stopped counting, it paused for five seconds and reset itself to 30 again. This turned out to be a VERY handy feature.

I bet. The G8 Game Timer we use is more designed as a chess clock, but it functions just fine for games where we don't want to deal with a crappy sand egg timer (or as a shot clock in Password, where one isn't included). No real function to stop the clock, but hitting the big blue button both resets the clock to whatever and starts it counting down.

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If you want the code, email me.

I know Quick was the predecessor to Visual....is the code close enough that any of it would be useful in a Visual environment? If so I may take you up on that at some point. In fact.....

byrd62 · « **Reply #6 on:** January 13, 2005, 08:37:20 PM »

[quote name=\'pacdude\' date=\'Jan 9 2005, 08:11 PM\']Of course, this is basketball, but I can edit/change almost anything. The extreme timer stuff I'm not sure if I can do. Customizability in terms of sound and color might be feasible.

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Good try, but when I timed it against a :30 TV commercial, it ran :23 off the clock, making each "second" worth about 1¼ seconds. Also, any chance you can make it a football clock, with down and yardage indicators?

pacdude · « **Reply #7 on:** January 13, 2005, 08:39:35 PM »

[quote name=\'byrd62\' date=\'Jan 13 2005, 08:37 PM\'][quote name=\'pacdude\' date=\'Jan 9 2005, 08:11 PM\']Of course, this is basketball, but I can edit/change almost anything. The extreme timer stuff I'm not sure if I can do. Customizability in terms of sound and color might be feasible.

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Good try, but when I timed it against a :30 TV commercial, it ran :23 off the clock, making each "second" worth about 1¼ seconds. Also, any chance you can make it a football clock, with down and yardage indicators?

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Oh, thanks. Make me seem like a rookie. :-P I can make it a football clock, but since the timer is crap, why bother?

(Set the quality to either medium or low and see it. And try to time it against an actual clock.)

Fedya · « **Reply #8 on:** January 13, 2005, 11:07:59 PM »

[quote name=\'clemon79\' date=\'Jan 10 2005, 12:03 PM\']Do I even HAVE this modem anymore? Stacker 3.0? Yeesh, why the hell did I ever use that to start with? (Answer, for the whippersnappers: my first drive in my first PC (I was an Apple II user up until '91) was 80 megabytes. That's mega, with an M, not giga.)
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I've got you beat: my first computer didn't have a hard drive. It was a TI-99/4A, with programs being saved to cassette tape. Do the young farts here even know what cassettes are? :-p

Of course, I'm sure Matt, the other Chris, and the rest of the senior set will regale us of their stories when the only computer and broadcasting equipment available had vacuum tubes and stored data on punch cards....

TLEberle · « **Reply #9 on:** January 13, 2005, 11:17:27 PM »

Didn't the Neanderthals use those to listen to music? Or something?

As a note of comparison my first computer, a C64, had 1/250,000th of the hard drive that my current computer does.

ObGameShows: Didn't TPIR give away Commodores eons ago?

clemon79 · « **Reply #10 on:** January 13, 2005, 11:36:05 PM »

[quote name=\'TLEberle\' date=\'Jan 13 2005, 09:17 PM\']As a note of comparison my first computer, a C64, had 1/250,000th of the hard drive that my current computer does.
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I was lookin' at yesterday's Fry's ad (the P-I is good enough to scan their advertisements for the Web site), and I noticed they have a 250 GB drive on sale for $125.

That's 50 cents per 500 MB of space, or .1 cents per megabyte.

To wit, I once paid $300 for a 700 MB drive. Right around 42.9 cents per.

A 42,900% decrease.

Oy.

trainman · « **Reply #11 on:** January 13, 2005, 11:55:06 PM »

[quote name=\'TLEberle\' date=\'Jan 13 2005, 08:17 PM\']As a note of comparison my first computer, a C64, had 1/250,000th of the hard drive that my current computer does.

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Shouldn't that be zero percent of the hard drive of your current computer? C64's didn't have built-in hard drives. (I know third-party manufacturers came out with external hard drives for the Atari 8-bit computers relatively late in their product lifetimes, so I assume the same is true for the C64, although they would of course have been ridiculously expensive at the time -- even more expensive and smaller than the $300 700MB drive Chris mentioned above.)

bossjock967 · « **Reply #12 on:** January 14, 2005, 06:45:12 AM »

Back when I was in high school... we got a new 540 MB hard drive for the computer lab. We popped it in one of our state of the art 486 DX-4 100 MHz machines... and fired it up. One of the guys said... "There is NO WAY we would ever fill this up!!"

Today... 1 have 2 180 GB hard drives on a RAID. Once I got it up and running... I heard myself say outlud... "There is NO WAY I will ever fill this up!!"

How times change...

zachhoran · « **Reply #13 on:** January 14, 2005, 08:24:14 AM »

[quote name=\'Fedya\' date=\'Jan 13 2005, 11:07 PM\']
I've got you beat: my first computer didn't have a hard drive. It was a TI-99/4A, with programs being saved to cassette tape. Do the young farts here even know what cassettes are? :-p

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The Commodore VIC-20 also had a Datasette which would save programs to cassette tapes. Not to mention it had a whopping 5K of memory built in

But I'm sure some still made mini-game show programs in BASIC on it.

zachhoran · « **Reply #14 on:** January 14, 2005, 08:27:12 AM »

[quote name=\'TLEberle\' date=\'Jan 13 2005, 11:17 PM\']

ObGameShows: Didn't TPIR give away Commodores eons ago?

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Yeah they gave away Commodore 64's in the mid 80s as shopping era WOF, All New LMAD, and $25K Pyramid did. In 1980, Face the Music gave away a Commodore PET as the one prize to a champ who won at the $1K level, and the contestant wasn't too excited about it.