The Liberty Basic Newsletter - Issue #90 - JUNE 2001

Liberty BASIC News
Programmer Spotlight: Bill Jennings
Button Hinges - Mike Bradbury
Technical Corner
Poll Results
Snippets

---

 

Liberty BASIC News

The Liberty BASIC Network is dead. The LBN gave us lots of great LB information while it existed. Thank you Ian for a wonderful site that helped many of us learn Liberty BASIC. Carl Gundel has announced that we can expect to see an alpha of Liberty BASIC v3.0 in a few weeks! Exciting news indeed! Alyce Watson has released a multimedia helpfile. It contains information on how to play avi's, mp3's, two wav files at once, etc.! Check out her website for more information. http://iquizme.0catch.com/lb/

 

There is a new Liberty BASIC group. This one caters to more experienced LB users. It will cover many of the advanced techniques for Liberty BASIC. Join at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/lbexp

Happy Programming!

Brandon Watts
brandonwatts@ga.prestige.net
http://www.tegdesign.com/lboutpost/lbnews

---

 

Programmer Spotlight: Bill Jennings

This months programmer spotlight is on Bill Jennings. Bill is a very valuable member of the group. He does the Newsletter index which contains a list of all of the articles in all of the newsletters! This is a very helpful resource. Let's learn more about him now.

Q. How did you find Liberty BASIC?
A. I got tired of Q-Basic, so I searched the web and found several others, including LB 1.41.

Q. Why do you use Liberty BASIC?
A. It was by far the quickest way to learn programming in Windows.

Q. What do you think LB's best feature is?
A. Its ability to use DLLs, which makes it very versatile and powerful. I must also mention the importance of the LB family of users. If this group had not helped me over the initial hurdles, I soon would have given up. I am especially indebted to Alyce Watson for her unflagging interest in helping us all.

Q. What are some programs that you have made in LB?
A. I have written apps for my own record keeping, like calendars, finances, gas mileage. I also wrote a travel program that scrolls (USA) maps with click-on symbols for info on food, camping, etc. and a nutrition program that totals nutrients for selected food items.

Q. What do you enjoy doing in your free time?
A. Learning to use the cool LB features that Carl Gundel keeps adding, collecting folk music, fishing and travelling. I'm a retired GM process engineer.

Q. How old are you?
A. 72 next month.

Q. Where are you from?
A. Born and raised in central Michigan.

---

 

Button Hinges - Mike Bradbury

' Here's an idea which may be of use to someone reading the newsletter. Lots of
       ' my programs use flaps which may lift/drop or open to the left/right and are given
       ' the appearance of being hinged.
       ' Run this code to see how buttons can be used to make lines and simulate hinges
       ' in non-graphics windows. The window which opens, has a 'drop-down' flap with
       ' hinges. Click a hinge to open the flap; click a hinge to close the flap.
       ' Mike Bradbury Staffordshire, England 

nomainwin
       is$="Drop down flap."
       sto$="Click hinge to see what is behind here!"
       stc$="Click hinge to close flap."
       msg$="Buttons can be other things too - like pretending to be hinges and lines "_
       +"in non-graphics windows!"
       x1=150: y1=150 ' window position top left corner
       ww1=400: wh1=170: wh2=90 ' width & heights for windows
       flapopen=0
       UpperLeftX=x1: UpperLeftY=y1
       WindowWidth = ww1 : WindowHeight = wh1
       BackgroundColor$ = "darkcyan"
       ForegroundColor$="yellow"
       Button #flap1.q, "Quit", [quit], UL, 345, 20, 35, 25
       Button #flap1.line, "", [donowt], UL, 1, 85, 399, 1 ' button one pixel high 
       Button #flap1.hinge1, "", [open.flap], UL, 50, 165, 25, 5
       Button #flap1.hinge2, "", [open.flap], UL, 325, 165, 25, 5
       Button #flap1.line, "", [donowt], UL, 1, 169, 399, 1
       statictext #flap1.st0, is$, 50, 30, 250, 30
       statictext #flap1.st1, sto$, 50, 135, 250, 30
       statictext #flap1.st2, "", 50, 95, 250, 30

open "Flap1" for window_popup as #flap1
       print #flap1, "trapclose [donowt]" ' allow close only by Quit button
       print #flap1.st0, "!font arial 14"
       print #flap1.st2, "!font arial 14"

[loop]
       wait
       goto [loop]
       '
       [donowt]
       goto [loop]
       '
       [open.flap]
       if flapopen then goto [close.flap]

UpperLeftX=x1: UpperLeftY=y1+wh1
       WindowWidth = ww1 : WindowHeight = wh2
       BackgroundColor$ = "darkcyan"
       ForegroundColor$="yellow"
       Button #flap2.hinge1, "", [close.flap], UL, 50, 2, 25, 5
       Button #flap2.hinge2, "", [close.flap], UL, 325, 2, 25, 5
       Button #flap2.line, "", [donowt], UL, 1, 1, 399, 1
       statictext #flap2.st1, stc$, 325,10,75,40

open "Flap2" for window_popup as #flap2
       flapopen=1-flapopen
       print #flap1.st1, msg$;
       print #flap1.st2, "Hi there!";
       goto [loop]

[close.flap]
       if NOT(flapopen) then goto [loop]
       close #flap2
       flapopen=1-flapopen
       print #flap1.st1, sto$
       print #flap1.st2, "";
       goto [loop]

[quit]
       if flapopen then close #flap2
       close #flap1
       end

---

 

Technical Corner

PROFESSOR B.I. SMART and his Teknikul Staff

This time we wus inspared by watchin a movie called, "WEERD SCIUNCE", whar these two teenagurs tooked a Barbee Doll an brawt it tew LIFE! Well heck.., we jus had to git one of them babes fer our..., I mean.., we fer the inturest of sciunce an compooter programmin had tew see ifn this could be dun.

We spent bout two days writin a program in LB an gittin the hardwar tewgether fer this expuriment. That durn Daveman fergot tew get the Brars fer ar heds, but we did substute em with jock straps we barrowd frum the Football teems lockers.

We continude by hookin up lectrodes tew the Barbee dall's hed. Then we made all thuh settins fer her reel life counter part tew be made. Brains: Gorge Bush (counta we didn want a genus tew figure out thangs) Body: We combined, Raquel Welch wit Charro cause we wanted a wooman with looks an could shake .., I mean what could reference between languages of cultures.

Once we had it all set up, we put on ar straps an pressed the buttnin. Jus like in thuh movie, thangs started going
crazy. Thuh lab room started smokin an set off thuh spranklers, thuh buildin started shakin an all thuh powr went out all acrosst Hawg Town an Hawg County!!!!

When thuh smoke cleered, we looked a mess, with black soot all over us. We saw a figur movin in thuh bathroom.., an we waited ta see what hot ba.., I mean.., tew see ifn ar esperiement wurked like expected.

Big Burtha Brakowski walked in frum the bathroom.., which ment we shuld have worn thuh Brars instead!!! Ar summashun here is this... If ya try tew make a Wooman, DONT FERGIT THE BRAR!

Untill next time, remembur: "A Propur Edukasun is Impourtant!"

- Prof. IB Smart

By: David Henry
cobra@futura.net

---

 

Poll Results

What do you think of the Liberty BASIC book?

Like it! - 0%
Don't like it. - 0%
Provides solid introduction to LB. - 100%
It does not provide information on some of the subjects it needs to. - 0%

---

 

Snippets

From: smartestmanal1ve@n...
Date: Thu May 17, 2001 4:23 pm
Subject: Re: [lbnews] Digest Number 587

Hey,

Theres a difference between cursors and icons. icons are what u have on the desktop, cursors are what ur mouse controls. here is some help on cursors: Here is some code i did a while back for a lot more standard window cursors:

 

'Cursor Example by Mitchell Kotler 

'How to use LoadCursor and SetCursor to acces more Window's Cursors
       'No more flickering!

'BEGIN
       open "user" for dll as #user

nomainwin

array$(1)="Cursor"
       array$(2)="Example"
       array$(3)="for"
       array$(4)="Controls"

timer 1000, [changeCursor]

statictext #1.s, "", 20, 20, 100, 20

button #1.b, "Push", [loop], ul, 50, 50, 100, 40
       texteditor #1.t, 50, 150, 200, 100
       combobox #1.c, array$(), [loop], 200, 20, 70, 200
       listbox #1.l, array$(), [loop], 200, 50, 70, 75

open "Cursor Example" for window as #1

hWnd=hwnd(#1)
       hBtn=hwnd(#1.b)
       hTxt=hwnd(#1.t)
       hLst=hwnd(#1.l)

call setClass hWnd'call sub to change the windows class
       call setClass hBtn
       call setClass hTxt
       call setClass hLst

       print #1, "trapclose [quit]"

hInstance=0 'Keep this set to zero to use Window cursors

CursorName=32511

goto [changeCursor]

[loop]

scan

'This changes the cursor
       calldll #user, "SetCursor",_
       hCursor as short,_
       result as short

wait

goto [loop]

[quit]

close #user
       close #1
       end

'This loads the cursor and returns the cursors handle
       [loadCursor]
       calldll #user, "LoadCursor",_
       hInstance As short,_
       CursorName As long,_
       hCursor As short
       Return

'This routine changes which cursor is loaded
       [changeCursor]
       CursorName=CursorName+1
       if CursorName=32517 then CursorName=32640
       if CursorName=32647 then CursorName=32648
       if CursorName=32663 then CursorName=32512

'the number you see is the current cursors "name"
       print #1.s, CursorName

gosub [loadCursor]
       goto [loop]

sub setClass h

index=_GCW_HCURSOR or 0 'which part to set
       value=0 'set it to null

calldll #user, "SetClassWord",_
       h as short,_
       index as short,_
       value as short,_
       result as short

end sub
       'END CODE

If you need hand made cursors, the way to do it is save the cursor as a .cur and load ot with LoadCursorFromFile. This is a 32-bit call and needs to be thunked though. I dont have any code handy for it right now, but if u need it let me know.

-Mitchell

 

---

 

From: "Eldron Gill" <egill@e...>
Date: Wed May 23, 2001 9:51 pm
Subject: Re: [lbnews] How to print by date

 
       Ben,
       I found this laying around. Don't know who it came from. Maybe you can use        it.
       
       later,
       Eldron
       
       ' convert date value to serial number
       ' based on 01,01,1900 = 1
       dim monthNo(12,1)
       gosub [SetMonths]
       
       Year=2001
       Month=5
       Day=23
       gosub [convertDate]
       
       print serial
       
       end
       
       [convertDate]
       serial=0
       leap=0
       if ((Year/4)-int(Year/4))=0 then leap=1
       leapNo=int(abs((Year-1900)/4)-.00001)+1
       if Year=1900 then serial=serial-1
       serial=serial+leapNo
       serial=serial+((Year-1900)*365)
       serial=serial+monthNo(Month-1,leap)
       serial=serial+Day
       return
       
       [SetMonths]
       monthNo(0,0)=0
       monthNo(1,0)=31
       monthNo(2,0)=59
       monthNo(3,0)=90
       monthNo(4,0)=120
       monthNo(5,0)=151
       monthNo(6,0)=181
       monthNo(7,0)=212
       monthNo(8,0)=243
       monthNo(9,0)=273
       monthNo(10,0)=304
       monthNo(11,0)=334
       monthNo(12,0)=365
       monthNo(0,1)=0
       monthNo(1,1)=31
       monthNo(2,1)=60
       monthNo(3,1)=91
       monthNo(4,1)=121
       monthNo(5,1)=152
       monthNo(6,1)=182
       monthNo(7,1)=213
       monthNo(8,1)=244
       monthNo(9,1)=274
       monthNo(10,1)=305
       monthNo(11,1)=335
       monthNo(12,1)=366
       return