New user - another question please?

[Bridgette]

Well, I bought the program and it's amazing what can be done with it. I've just spent hours the last few days learning how to use it, and have managed to get an onscreen keyboard with moving fingers hitting each key with input from the keys on the 'real' keyboard.

I have spent a long time trying to figure out how to script this and have a quick question, which is probably brainless for those of you who do this kind of stuff all the time :-)

(I know nothing about programming - I'm a therapist wanting to create something for my disabled kids, and this is a challenge for me ...)

Here goes:
There are pressed letter keys and fingers. I have figured out how to show and hide each of these on different key presses.
If I do a script action on a keypress and then list the hide and show commands, then when I play the movie and press the letter, the movie stops playing. Do I need to put in some command to go back to scene 1 or frame 1?

This is probably a dumb question, but I've got this far - I should be able to do this with some scripting to make it quicker and more versatile ?

Thanks
Bridgette

[carnwath]

Zip your program and upload it here. Its really difficult to visualize otherwise.

If you include not only the swf but the movie source and any gifs or external pictures we can re-assemble and test it.

Include any description of what you need the end result to do

There are many of us who are willing to code up part or all of what you want to achieve. Its a challenge to help newbies in scripting getting started by doing so but we need a glimpse of what you have done this far.

[Bridgette]

Thanks for taking a look at this. I've only done 3 keypresses so far to make sure I can do this.


You can press the f and v keys on the regular keyboard
to see keypresses on the onscreen keyboard
I wanted to do a script for the 'r' key. I presume that if I have a script written for each keypress then I can use the scripts for sequence of keypresses, for instance if I wanted a 'c-a-t' sequence pressed onscreen to demonstrate keypresses and correct fingering for specific words.

Thanks
Any help is much appreciated.
Bridgette

[carnwath]

Pretty Good for a beginner !

I like it. The only problems were incorrect syntax for hide and show
which should have been object.hide() or object.show()

I also declared the objects in the main starting script and played with the paint images which are being shown - not sure when they all should occur but try it out, so look at the scripting for main and keypresses.

[Bridgette]

carnwarth - thanks so much - I'll take a look.

Bridgette

[JDE]

Bridgette,
I have a 14-year-old son with Down Syndrome, so I got interested in your project.

One thing that is very common for a tutorial like yours is to keep an action script running on a regular basis to check for key presses, and then to do an action based on the key press. I have others on this forum to thank (especially Bret and Ed) for help with these ideas -

The idea is to set a single variable = true or false- eg, true when key is down, false when up. The action script keeps testing for the true or false state for each key; if the key is down, your finger and key graphics show up; if up, they disappear.

I made a simple example of this and created a *.swf file from your movie: www.pedaplus.com/flash/typing_tutorial_and_training.swf (http://www.pedaplus.com/flash/typing_tutorial_and_training.swf)

[JDE]

here's the source movie:

[Bridgette]

Thanks for the help with the file and the correct scripting.

Here's the 'preliminary' keyboard which still needs lots of work, and cleanup - it's still in a very rough format.

http://www.customsolutions.us/typing_free/Correct_fingering.htm

I would appreciate any feedback or suggestions.

thanks again.

Bridgette

[Bridgette]

Just a quick note - I see that an initial 'mouse click' anywhere on the keyboard is needed before the key strokes on the keyboard will be active. Is there a reason for that?

Bridgette

[JSDvs9172]

That's just a quirk of the Flash Player (or maybe your browser?) You have to do this in other flash files, too - for example, MSN's "celebrity dethmatch" trivia game OutSmart! (http://zone.msn.com/outsmart/) is programmed in Flash albeight not necessarily 3DFA, but the same thing happens there - if you wait a sec when asked to give your name, the game's "host" tells you to (quote) "click the box, type your name and hit the return key." That's for the same reason as this example.

[JDE]

Bridgette, I like what you're doing with this. Just curious - is the end product going to be basically a "modelling" type of program? I guess I'm curious how the tutorial works. Will the fingers type something for the user to imitate, or does the user type first and see which finger he should be using?

[Bridgette]

It will do all of the above. It has been developed for students with disabilities. At the moment, my web site with the keyboarding testing is www.customsolutions.us/keyboarding. It was put together very quickly, but allows for students to select the adaptive or alternate keyboard hardware and software modifications they are using and then to compare their times given the different equipment and setup they are using. I've had good feedback and am now expanding the site.

Thanks for our feedback.
Bridgette

[Bridgette]

web site is www.customsolutions.us/keyboarding

(no perdiod at end)


Originally posted by Bridgette
It will do all of the above. It has been developed for students with disabilities. At the moment, my web site with the keyboarding testing is www.customsolutions.us/keyboarding It was put together very quickly, but allows for students to select the adaptive or alternate keyboard hardware and software modifications they are using and then to compare their times given the different equipment and setup they are using. I've had good feedback and am now expanding the site.

Thanks for our feedback.
Bridgette