That's the start anyway. Basically it picks a random word between the available words, splits it up into letters, and sends it going down the screen. But it goes both ways, and when the first letter hits the bottom of the screen, the letter that was going double speed, now goes normal, and it switches.

That's my Idea, take it if you want, I don't really care what you say, except just report how it goes.

Anyway, I want to at least start with Screen Savers, and so I'm using Brian's article. Wiki doesn't have anything on making them. Googling it, all the recognizable sites give you nothing, and I'm not brave enough to go to sites I don't recognize.

So to begin, I googled MSVC 6.0 and discovered it was Microsoft Visual C 6.0. Okay, so I downloaded the only available version, Microsoft Visual C++ Express. Great, looks nothing like his, and looks difficult to manage.
So my first request would be a compiler I can use for this. Is it possible to use BM for this?

Edit: BTW, the code looks nothing like the screensaver. While waiting I'm making a better Pseudo-type

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MM out-
Thought travels much faster than sound, it is better to think something twice, and say it once, than to think something once, and have to say it twice.
"Frogs and Fauns! The tournament!" - Professor Winneynoodle/HanClinto
I reserve the full right to change my views/theories at any time.

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 16, 2007).]

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 16, 2007).]

There is a sample Screen saver included with Visual C# Express and Visual Basic Express. Does not come with Visual C++ Express. It is an RSS reader, but I think it also includes how to draw and move text.

You may want to give those a try.

lol. Any help with anything would be awesome.

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MM out-
Thought travels much faster than sound, it is better to think something twice, and say it once, than to think something once, and have to say it twice.
"Frogs and Fauns! The tournament!" - Professor Winneynoodle/HanClinto

I reserve the full right to change my views/theories at any time.

Let me know if you have any questions. I think the sample may have what you need. Just delete the code regarding the RSS functionality.

A question, I've downloaded the C# thing, and attempting to learn. Is it basically any ordinary application but with a different extension? Does changeing the extension change anything with the program?

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MM out-
Thought travels much faster than sound, it is better to think something twice, and say it once, than to think something once, and have to say it twice.
"Frogs and Fauns! The tournament!" - Professor Winneynoodle/HanClinto

I reserve the full right to change my views/theories at any time.

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 16, 2007).]

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 16, 2007).]

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MM out-
Thought travels much faster than sound, it is better to think something twice, and say it once, than to think something once, and have to say it twice.
"Frogs and Fauns! The tournament!" - Professor Winneynoodle/HanClinto

I reserve the full right to change my views/theories at any time.

You're the only person in about 3 or 4 years that has commented on or asked about the articles (that I know of), so that's why I didn't spend any time updating them yet. Let me know if you have any specific questions and I'll help you out - but I don't know really anything about Blitz Basic or Visual Basic.

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Brian

"OOP programmers have a lot of class"

Check out this webhost! Fantastic prices, features and support!

;Screen Saver: Fathers: Pseudo Graphics 800,600 SeedRnd MilliSecs() SetBuffer BackBuffer() ;Number of words Global numwords = 1 Global Y = 13 Global X = 8 Type AcWord Field Together$ Field Letters$(7) Field NumLetters Field CurLetter Field Direction Field X Field Y End Type Type DoWord Field Together$ Field Letters$(7) Field NumLetters Field CurLetter Field Direction Field X Field Y End Type ;List of Words Dim Words$(numwords) Words$(0) = "Loveable" Words$(1) = "Generous" Repeat If KeyHit(1) End EndIf ;Across first For Loop_Var = 2 To 47 ;Get Word RandChosen = Rnd(0,numwords) A.AcWord = New AcWord A\Together$ = Words$(RandChosen) A\NumLetters = Len(A\Together$) For LoopVar = 1 To (A\NumLetters - 1) ;Flag A\Letters$(LoopVar) = Left(Word$,LoopVar) A\Letters$(LoopVar) = Right(A\Letters$(LoopVar),1) Next A\Y = Y Y = Y + 13 Next ;;Do Stuff Ac.AcWord = Each AcWord Text Ac\X,Ac\Y,Ac\Letters$(Ac\CurLetter) Ac\X = Ac\X + 8 ;Down Second For Loop_Var = 2 To 50 ;Get Word RandChosen = Rnd(0,numwords) D.DoWord = New DoWord D\Together$ = Words$(RandChosen) D\NumLetters = Len(D\Together$) For LoopVar = 1 To (D\NumLetters - 1) ;Flag D\Letters$(LoopVar) = Left(Word$,LoopVar) D\Letters$(LoopVar) = Right(D\Letters$(LoopVar),1) Next D\X = X X = X + 16 Next ;;Do Stuff Do.DoWord = Each DoWord Text Do\X,Do\Y,Do\Letters$(Do\CurLetter) Do\Y = Do\Y + 13 Cls Flip X = 0 Y = 0 Forever

I've got the make it into a screensaver part, but not the commandline, and change it into C++ part. I've never done graphics in C++ before so I'm having trouble. In the 2 languages i know, I can't set the extension.
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MM out-
Thought travels much faster than sound, it is better to think something twice, and say it once, than to think something once, and have to say it twice.
"Frogs and Fauns! The tournament!" - Professor Winneynoodle/HanClinto

I reserve the full right to change my views/theories at any time.

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 16, 2007).]

C++ Express is meant for creating .NET applications, but by installig the above package, you will be able to use regular ol' Win32. You will need this to match Brian's article. Win32 is Microsoft's C API set for creating Window applications. They later created Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC) as their standard C++ way of developing. And now they have .NET.

Do I need to make a Win32, or does it work with something else?

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MM out-
Thought travels much faster than sound, it is better to think something twice, and say it once, than to think something once, and have to say it twice.
"Frogs and Fauns! The tournament!" - Professor Winneynoodle/HanClinto

I reserve the full right to change my views/theories at any time.

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 16, 2007).]

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 16, 2007).]

Make your .exe file

JUST rename the extension .scr

OPening in the display control in the control panel and you are done.

Best o luck to ya!

Oh, I just had the hide extension on.

Fixing up Pseudo-Code to be in BlitzMax since I can't handle C++. Here's the latest:
Edit 2: Cut out for length reasons.

The line in bold is causing problems, its trying to convert a string array to a float, and i don't know why.
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MM out-
Thought travels much faster than sound, it is better to think something twice, and say it once, than to think something once, and have to say it twice.
"Frogs and Fauns! The tournament!" - Professor Winneynoodle/HanClinto

I reserve the full right to change my views/theories at any time.

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 16, 2007).]

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 17, 2007).]

Take the example and change the following code. In the file ScreenSaverForm.cs, there is a method called OnPaint. Replace it with this:

protected override void OnPaint(PaintEventArgs e) { String[] text = new String[3]; text[0] = "Great"; text[1] = "Terrific"; text[2] = "Fun!"; Random rand = new Random(); int choice = rand.Next(3); int xPoint = rand.Next(600); int yPoint = rand.Next(800); e.Graphics.DrawString(text[choice], new Font("Verdana", 25, FontStyle.Bold), new SolidBrush(Color.BlanchedAlmond), new PointF(xPoint, yPoint)); //rssView.Paint(e); //rssDescriptionView.Paint(e); }

Just comment out the RSS code. The background pictures are actually quite fitting for Father's Day. The above code will actually draw the items rather quickly. To fix this, create member variables to hold the choice, xPoint, and yPoint. Then, create the random numbers in backgroundChangeTimerTick (the method just below OnPaint) and continue to call DrawString in your OnPaint, but use the member variables in your call.

For some added effect, you can uncomment rssView.Paint or the other one (if you want). Then, right-click on the 'Paint' part of rssView.Paint and select 'Go To Definition'.

In Paint is DrawItemTitle. Right-click and go to definition. There is a for loop in there with the comment //Draw the title of the item. You can use this as a place to type in some bible verses.

Anyway, just some ideas.

Let me know if you have any more questions. Hopefully you can get this done by tomorrow.

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MM out-
Thought travels much faster than sound, it is better to think something twice, and say it once, than to think something once, and have to say it twice.
"Frogs and Fauns! The tournament!" - Professor Winneynoodle/HanClinto

I reserve the full right to change my views/theories at any time.

In any case, I'm sure your dad will enjoy it. Like I said, I think it's a nice idea! Have fun with it!

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MM out-
Thought travels much faster than sound, it is better to think something twice, and say it once, than to think something once, and have to say it twice.
"Frogs and Fauns! The tournament!" - Professor Winneynoodle/HanClinto

I reserve the full right to change my views/theories at any time.

I'll help as I can, but remember I'm not a Blitz or VB programmer. I can look some stuff up on blitzbasic.com, but that's it.

For exiting by moving the mouse: at the beginning of your program, get the current mouse position like this:

origMouseX=MouseX()
origMouseY=MouseY()

Then, I would add something like the following to your main loop:

button=GetMouse()
If button <> 0 Then End
If MouseX() <> origMouseX Then End
If MouseY() <> origMouseY Then End
value=GetKey()
If value <> 0 Then End

In other words, all you're doing is detecting if the mouse buttons were pressed, if the mouse moved, or if a key was pressed. If so, then exit the program.

For graphics, I would use something like DrawImage. There is a good simple example at: http://www.blitzbasic.com/b3ddocs/command.php?name=DrawImage&ref=2d_cat . In this example, the While loop at the bottom is where you would put your mouse movement detection stuff.

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Brian

"OOP programmers have a lot of class"

Check out this webhost! Fantastic prices, features and support!

This is the new code, still stuck on that error.
Edit 2: Cut out for length reasons.
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MM out-
Thought travels much faster than sound, it is better to think something twice, and say it once, than to think something once, and have to say it twice.
"Frogs and Fauns! The tournament!" - Professor Winneynoodle/HanClinto

I reserve the full right to change my views/theories at any time.

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 16, 2007).]

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 17, 2007).]

The example in the articles I wrote for this site simply use Windows GDI.

As far as screen savers go, there's really nothing special about them - they are just normal programs with a .scr extension instead of .exe. On thing screen savers SHOULD have though (though not required) is to accept command line parameters:

/c to start in "configure" mode (i.e. let the user change settings, etc.)
/s to start in "normal" mode (i.e. running like a typical screen saver)
/l or /p to start in "preview" mode (i.e. to run in that little monitor on the dialog when you choose which screen saver you want to use)

Once your screen saver app has been placed in the Windows system folder (c:/windows/system32), it will be detected and shown in the screen savers list. Windows will pass it those above command line parameters depending on how it wants you to start, but it's up to you to do it or ignore the request and simply start how you want.

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Brian

"OOP programmers have a lot of class"

Check out this webhost! Fantastic prices, features and support!

quote:

---

This is the new code, still stuck on that error.

---

I'm not sure how DrawText works, but it looks like you have the parameters in the wrong order. You have x, y, "text" but some samples I found via Google have "text", x, y.

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Brian

"OOP programmers have a lot of class"

Check out this webhost! Fantastic prices, features and support!

Alright, past due date, but I'm trying to make this still go on for a belayed FD Present.

Problems:
I've taken care of those errors due to you guy's collective help, and now I've got 2 more.
1. This one has to do with the arrays, i haven't sized them well yet.
2. This one isn't technically a bug, but it just makes a blank screen with nothing changing. I've tried no Back Buffer, no cls, no clip, no both, none of the above, nothing seems to change.

Current Code:

'Screen Saver: Fathers: Pseudo Graphics 800,600,32,60,Graphics_BackBuffer SeedRnd MilliSecs() 'Number of words Global numwords = 3 Global Y = 13 Global X = 8 Type AcWord Field Together$ Field Letters$[7] Field NumLetters Field CurLetter Field Direction Field X Field Y End Type Type DoWord Field Together$ Field Letters$[7] Field NumLetters Field CurLetter Field Direction Field X Field Y End Type 'List of Words Local Words$[numwords] Words$[1] = "Loveable" Words$[2] = "Generous" AcrossList:TList = CreateList() DownList:TList = CreateList() StartMX = MouseX() StartMY = MouseY() Repeat Cls Flip If MouseX() <> StartMX End EndIf If MouseY() <> StartMY End EndIf valve = GetChar() If valve <> 0 End EndIf 'Across first For Loop_Var = 2 To 47 'Get Word RandChosen = Rnd(1,numwords) A:AcWord = New AcWord A.Together$ = Words$(RandChosen) A.NumLetters = Len(A.Together$) For LoopVar = 1 To (2) 'Needs to be num of letters. A.Letters$[LoopVar] = Left(Word$,LoopVar) A.Letters$[LoopVar] = Right(A.Letters$[LoopVar],1) Next ListAddLast AcrossList, A A.Y = Y Y = Y + 13 Next 'Do Stuff For Ac:AcWord = EachIn AcrossList DrawText Ac.Letters$[Ac.CurLetter],Ac.X,Ac.Y Ac.X = Ac.X + 8 Next 'Down Second For Loop_Var = 2 To 50 'Get Word RandChosen = Rnd(0,numwords) D oWord = New DoWord D.Together$ = Words$(RandChosen) D.NumLetters = Len(D.Together$) For LoopVar = 1 To (2) 'Needs to be num of letters D.Letters$[LoopVar] = Left(Word$,LoopVar) D.Letters$[LoopVar] = Right(D.Letters$[LoopVar],1) Next ListAddLast DownList, D D.X = X X = X + 16 Next ';;Do Stuff For Do oWord = EachIn DownList DrawText Do.Letters$[Do.CurLetter],Do.X,Do.Y Do.Y = Do.Y + 13 Next X = 0 Y = 0 Forever

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 17, 2007).]

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 17, 2007).]

[This message has been edited by Mene-Mene (edited June 17, 2007).]

Graphics 800,600,32 ; Set drawing operations for double buffering SetBuffer BackBuffer() ... ; all your current pre-loop code here Repeat Cls ; clear the screen ... ; all your current loop code here Flip ; flip the image into view and clear the back buffer Forever

Note especially the Flip.

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Brian

"OOP programmers have a lot of class"

Check out this webhost! Fantastic prices, features and support!

------------------
MM out-
Thought travels much faster than sound, it is better to think something twice, and say it once, than to think something once, and have to say it twice.
"Frogs and Fauns! The tournament!" - Professor Winneynoodle/HanClinto

I reserve the full right to change my views/theories at any time.