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Creating Stopwatch (Count up timer)

Connor

January 31, 2019 11:56

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Hi I'm trying to create a timer for use in my in my BrightSign Project. 

I have a network of multiple BrightSign units (LS423). At one point in the presentation a video starts playing on one of the units. When this happens I want another unit to display a timer which will count up in seconds (the idea is to show playback time of the video on the other player)

Using variables, UDP Commands, and conditional targets, I've created a timer that counts up in seconds when the video begins. The only thing I need for it now is to take the format of a clock so instead of showing 61 (seconds), it shows 1:01.

I think this would be a lot easier to establish using a HTML5 widget, but I can't find what I'm looking for.

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6 comments

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  Bright Scripters February 07, 2019 13:27

  Sounds like you could still implement with the same building blocks that you have used.

  Instead of handling the displayed time in a single variable, showing an integer value, you could break it into three variables:

  Minutes (Min)

  Seconds Right Digit (SecRight)

  Seconds Left Digit (SecLeft)

  With every timer tick, you increment the SecRight variable.

  If SecRight reaches 10, reset SecRight zero, and increment the SecLeft variable.

  If SecLeft reaches 6, reset SecLeft, and increment variable Min

  Using Live Text, place the variables next to each other, with Fixed Text, showing the ":" character.

   

  I've never done it before, so I may have missed something.

  Please share your results.

  Best of luck!

   

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  Connor February 08, 2019 13:00

  Hey, thanks for getting back to me.

   

  I tried as you suggested and successfully created the stopwatch format I desired. 

  However, it seems this method isn't an accurate measure of time passing and so doesn't support my needs. It works great for rough showing of time passing over a few minutes but gradually slips out.

  Could you recommend any other methods?

  I'd like to use the the VideoTimeCode events to trigger lights etc. and I'd like a reliable visual representation of the video timecode. If it's a few milliseconds out then thats not an issue as long as the offset remains the same.

   

   

   

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  Chris Dotson March 19, 2019 20:18

  I would be interested in a stopwatch function as well. I get this request a lot and have to resort to making everything in HTML.

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  Bright Scripters March 20, 2019 00:30

  HTML/JS could be a good solution.

  BrightScript in a BrightAuthor plugin is another option.

  Depending on the application; If you want to avoid programming, and feel more comfortable with video creation, then you could use After Effects to bake the stopwatch into a video.

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  Chris Dotson March 22, 2019 15:43

  If I do it in HTML, I would have to do the entire presentation in HTML and that is something I would like to avoid. 
  
  I think this is a feature that should be added to BrightAuthor. Maybe I'll talk to the company about it. Ideally, it starts on load and stops based upon any of the event types.

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  Bright Scripters March 27, 2019 11:45

  You can combine HTML with native BrightAuthor elements. 

  HTML is not all or nothing.