mclock.doc

reduced python source for embedded apps

Newsgroups: cwi.sgi
Subject: Re: new clock
Distribution: cwi.sgi
References: <[e-mail]>

Last week I wrote:

>For your enjoyment I have implemented a colorful clock.

The clock has now been extended with some new facilities: a menu, an
alarm and a gong.  These may require some explanation beyond what's in
the usage message.

Menu
----
The right mouse button now pops up a menu that allows you to turn the
seconds hand on or off and to switch the alarm off.

Alarm
-----

The left and middle buttons set the alarm.  When it is on, the alarm
time is displayed as a time on a 24 hour clock in the bottom left
corner.  It is also indicated by two red triangles, corresponding to the
little (hours) and big (minutes) hand.  These hands can be moved around:
the left mouse button moves the minutes hand, the middle button moves
the hourds hand.  Watch out for differences of twelve hours (always
check the digital display); these can be corrected by dragging the hours
hand once around the dial.

When the alarm goes off, two things happen: a shell command specified on
the command line with the -a option is executed (in the background), and
the clock's colors change every two seconds, for five minutes.  You can
also turn the alarm off by using the menu accessible through the right
mouse button.

There is no default command for the -a option; if it is not specified,
only the changing of the colors happens.  If you have an 8 ohm speaker
connected to the audio output of your Personal Iris, a suitable command
would be:

	mclock -a '/ufs/guido/bin/sgi/play /ufs/guido/lib/sounds/alarm'

Gong
----

Some people like a clock that makes noises every hour, or even more
often.  This is supported by the -g and -G options.  With -g you specify
a shell command to be executed to sound the gong; with -G you can
specify the interval between gong calls, in seconds (default is one hour).
The shell command is executed in the background.  It is given two
arguments: the hours (on a 24 hour clock!) and the minutes.  The
executable Python script /ufs/guido/bin/sgi/chime is a suitable example.
Again, this only works if you have installed a speaker (I bet 8 ohm
speakers are going to be in demand!)

--
Guido van Rossum, Centre for Mathematics and Computer Science (CWI), Amsterdam
[e-mail] or ..!hp4nl!cwi.nl!guido or [e-mail]
"A thing of beauty is a joy till sunrise"