From vanderhyde at sxu.edu Fri Apr 9 11:36:40 2021 From: vanderhyde at sxu.edu (Vanderhyde, James) Date: Fri, 9 Apr 2021 15:36:40 +0000 Subject: alice-teacher Alice 3 bug: sluggish selection of TeenPerson Message-ID: <368BD43E-9F5F-4DE9-A5E6-C379D7AA1E06@sxu.edu> Dear Alice Team, I had a student show me a problem she was having today with Alice appearing to freeze when she selected a TeenPerson object in the scene. I figured out it was not freezing, but sluggish to respond, like almost 4 seconds. It happens whether you pick with the mouse in the scene, or select the object from one of the menus. Other objects in the scene are fine; just the TeenPerson is having this problem. I took one of the projects and deleted everything except the offending person, and the problem is still present, although less pronounced. You can click the ground and click back on the person to see the problem. The student was running Windows; I have a Mac. The problem was present in both. I am attaching the problem files. I am running Alice 3.6.0.1 build 500. I was not able to create my own project with this problem. James ? James Vanderhyde Associate Professor and Department Chair Computer Science Saint Xavier University 3700 W. 103rd St. Chicago, IL 60655 773-298-3454 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Horse Race2.a3p Type: application/octet-stream Size: 208904 bytes Desc: Horse Race2.a3p URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Casting a Pool Scene.a3p Type: application/octet-stream Size: 343395 bytes Desc: Casting a Pool Scene.a3p URL: From djslater107 at mac.com Sat Apr 10 19:52:58 2021 From: djslater107 at mac.com (Donald Slater) Date: Sat, 10 Apr 2021 19:52:58 -0400 Subject: alice-teacher Alice 3 bug: sluggish selection of TeenPerson In-Reply-To: <368BD43E-9F5F-4DE9-A5E6-C379D7AA1E06@sxu.edu> References: <368BD43E-9F5F-4DE9-A5E6-C379D7AA1E06@sxu.edu> Message-ID: James, We were able to reproduce the problem with both of the worlds you submitted. Like you, If we makde a similar world did not see the problem in it. These particular models were problems because of what they were wearing, separate top and bottoms instead of a single, complete outfit. There was a bug in the class that represents paired, individual pieces. This bug should be addressed in the next release. Until that next release we would recommend dressing sims in one piece outfits. Please keep us posted, All the best, Don Slater Alice Project > On Apr 9, 2021, at 11:36 AM, Vanderhyde, James wrote: > > Dear Alice Team, > > I had a student show me a problem she was having today with Alice appearing to freeze when she selected a TeenPerson object in the scene. I figured out it was not freezing, but sluggish to respond, like almost 4 seconds. It happens whether you pick with the mouse in the scene, or select the object from one of the menus. Other objects in the scene are fine; just the TeenPerson is having this problem. I took one of the projects and deleted everything except the offending person, and the problem is still present, although less pronounced. You can click the ground and click back on the person to see the problem. > > The student was running Windows; I have a Mac. The problem was present in both. I am attaching the problem files. I am running Alice 3.6.0.1 build 500. I was not able to create my own project with this problem. > > James > ? > James Vanderhyde > Associate Professor and Department Chair > Computer Science > Saint Xavier University > 3700 W. 103rd St. > Chicago, IL 60655 > 773-298-3454 > _______________________________________________ > alice-teachers mailing list > alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu > To change settings or unsubscribe visit: > https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From vanderhyde at sxu.edu Sat Apr 17 12:27:47 2021 From: vanderhyde at sxu.edu (Vanderhyde, James) Date: Sat, 17 Apr 2021 16:27:47 +0000 Subject: alice-teacher Screen flickers when moving accellerating camera Message-ID: Some of my students are making car race games. They came up with a way to do player control or the car using the COMBINE option on the keyboard event with a move forward duration 1. It actually has a very nice feel of acceleration, because the combined movement instructions stack up until a max speed is hit due to the fixed frame rate. However, something weird happens when you set the camera?s vehicle property to the car. The screen flickers as the camera accelerates. I?m attaching an Alice program that exhibits the behavior. Use up arrow to move forward and right arrow to turn. The flicker occurs sporadically, but more frequently if you try turning. The flicker also happens just moving the camera, so it does not seem to be connected to the vehicle. But the vehicle makes it worse, it seems. Alice 3.6.0.1 +build .500 MacOS Mojave 10.14.6 Intel Core i7 Intel Iris Pro graphics James ? James Vanderhyde Associate Professor and Department Chair Computer Science Saint Xavier University 3700 W. 103rd St. Chicago, IL 60655 773-298-3454 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: camera flicker bug.a3p Type: application/octet-stream Size: 118675 bytes Desc: camera flicker bug.a3p URL: From djslater107 at mac.com Tue Apr 20 08:51:09 2021 From: djslater107 at mac.com (Donald Slater) Date: Tue, 20 Apr 2021 08:51:09 -0400 Subject: alice-teacher Screen flickers when moving accellerating camera In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: James, From the development Team? > The key repeat speed of 30 per second (per key) combined with the default 1 second animation can stack up a few too many transformations. > They should get less flicker by lowering the duration of each animation to 0.25 or 0.1 second, or even 0. The effective motion won't be much changed. We are looking at some of the assumptions regarding our defaults. Thank you for bringing this to our attention? Take care and be well, Don Slater Alice Project > On Apr 17, 2021, at 12:27 PM, Vanderhyde, James wrote: > > Some of my students are making car race games. They came up with a way to do player control or the car using the COMBINE option on the keyboard event with a move forward duration 1. It actually has a very nice feel of acceleration, because the combined movement instructions stack up until a max speed is hit due to the fixed frame rate. > > However, something weird happens when you set the camera?s vehicle property to the car. The screen flickers as the camera accelerates. I?m attaching an Alice program that exhibits the behavior. Use up arrow to move forward and right arrow to turn. The flicker occurs sporadically, but more frequently if you try turning. The flicker also happens just moving the camera, so it does not seem to be connected to the vehicle. But the vehicle makes it worse, it seems. > > Alice 3.6.0.1 +build .500 > MacOS Mojave 10.14.6 > Intel Core i7 > Intel Iris Pro graphics > > James > ? > James Vanderhyde > Associate Professor and Department Chair > Computer Science > Saint Xavier University > 3700 W. 103rd St. > Chicago, IL 60655 > 773-298-3454 > _______________________________________________ > alice-teachers mailing list > alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu > To change settings or unsubscribe visit: > https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From vanderhyde at sxu.edu Tue Apr 20 09:49:58 2021 From: vanderhyde at sxu.edu (Vanderhyde, James) Date: Tue, 20 Apr 2021 13:49:58 +0000 Subject: alice-teacher Screen flickers when moving accellerating camera In-Reply-To: References:

Message-ID: Don, thanks. Decreasing the duration does cause less flicker. But it also changes the nice feel of acceleration and deceleration caused by the stacking up of the key events. The duration is the amount of time it takes to reach top speed, so setting the the duration to 0 causes instantaneous acceleration. It feels very different. I know Alice 3 is not a game engine, and using stacking up of key events to achieve acceleration is kind of a hack. I don?t know how the students came up with it. I will share this solution with them to see if it is acceptable. James ? James Vanderhyde Associate Professor and Department Chair Computer Science Saint Xavier University 3700 W. 103rd St. Chicago, IL 60655 773-298-3454 On Apr 20, 2021, at 7:51 AM, Donald Slater via alice-teachers > wrote: James, From the development Team? The key repeat speed of 30 per second (per key) combined with the default 1 second animation can stack up a few too many transformations. They should get less flicker by lowering the duration of each animation to 0.25 or 0.1 second, or even 0. The effective motion won't be much changed. We are looking at some of the assumptions regarding our defaults. Thank you for bringing this to our attention? Take care and be well, Don Slater Alice Project On Apr 17, 2021, at 12:27 PM, Vanderhyde, James > wrote: Some of my students are making car race games. They came up with a way to do player control or the car using the COMBINE option on the keyboard event with a move forward duration 1. It actually has a very nice feel of acceleration, because the combined movement instructions stack up until a max speed is hit due to the fixed frame rate. However, something weird happens when you set the camera?s vehicle property to the car. The screen flickers as the camera accelerates. I?m attaching an Alice program that exhibits the behavior. Use up arrow to move forward and right arrow to turn. The flicker occurs sporadically, but more frequently if you try turning. The flicker also happens just moving the camera, so it does not seem to be connected to the vehicle. But the vehicle makes it worse, it seems. Alice 3.6.0.1 +build .500 MacOS Mojave 10.14.6 Intel Core i7 Intel Iris Pro graphics James ? James Vanderhyde Associate Professor and Department Chair Computer Science Saint Xavier University 3700 W. 103rd St. Chicago, IL 60655 773-298-3454 _______________________________________________ alice-teachers mailing list alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu To change settings or unsubscribe visit: https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers _______________________________________________ alice-teachers mailing list alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu To change settings or unsubscribe visit: https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From ewbrown at andrew.cmu.edu Tue Apr 20 14:21:55 2021 From: ewbrown at andrew.cmu.edu (Eric Brown) Date: Tue, 20 Apr 2021 11:21:55 -0700 Subject: alice-teacher Screen flickers when moving accellerating camera In-Reply-To: References:

Message-ID: <9DC1D8CD-F287-4D9D-B3FD-A7433858B001@andrew.cmu.edu> James, They may have actually gotten it from this how to I created: http://www.alice.org/resources/how-tos/vr-locomotion-direct-control/ I have intended for a while to translate some of the VR how-tos back to just normal Alice animation and interactivity how tos as much of the programming is the same. This flicker issue is something we have had in our back log for a while and this has brought it back to the top of our list to see if we have more insight into how to fix it or if other things we are working on may alleviate it. Some of our dodge on addressing this was because we knew our player was going to handle some of this rendering better. This is a good example of something that may run a little rougher in the play window of the IDE but exporting it and running it in the player could have better results. So you may want to have your students give that a go. Don?t forget we also have a slight end around process that would allow them to take whatever they are building and make a standalone app with it: http://www.alice.org/resources/how-tos/making-an-alice-app/ I recently published an interactive narrative example that runs better in the player and has been wrapped as an example of a standalone Alice executable: http://www.alice.org/featured-projects/interactive-narrative-example-evergarden/ Sincerely, Eric > On Apr 20, 2021, at 6:49 AM, Vanderhyde, James wrote: > > Don, thanks. Decreasing the duration does cause less flicker. But it also changes the nice feel of acceleration and deceleration caused by the stacking up of the key events. The duration is the amount of time it takes to reach top speed, so setting the the duration to 0 causes instantaneous acceleration. It feels very different. > > I know Alice 3 is not a game engine, and using stacking up of key events to achieve acceleration is kind of a hack. I don?t know how the students came up with it. I will share this solution with them to see if it is acceptable. > > James > ? > James Vanderhyde > Associate Professor and Department Chair > Computer Science > Saint Xavier University > 3700 W. 103rd St. > Chicago, IL 60655 > 773-298-3454 > > On Apr 20, 2021, at 7:51 AM, Donald Slater via alice-teachers wrote: > > James, > From the development Team? > >> The key repeat speed of 30 per second (per key) combined with the default 1 second animation can stack up a few too many transformations. >> They should get less flicker by lowering the duration of each animation to 0.25 or 0.1 second, or even 0. The effective motion won't be much changed. > > We are looking at some of the assumptions regarding our defaults. Thank you for bringing this to our attention? > > Take care and be well, > > Don Slater > > Alice Project > >> On Apr 17, 2021, at 12:27 PM, Vanderhyde, James wrote: >> >> Some of my students are making car race games. They came up with a way to do player control or the car using the COMBINE option on the keyboard event with a move forward duration 1. It actually has a very nice feel of acceleration, because the combined movement instructions stack up until a max speed is hit due to the fixed frame rate. >> >> However, something weird happens when you set the camera?s vehicle property to the car. The screen flickers as the camera accelerates. I?m attaching an Alice program that exhibits the behavior. Use up arrow to move forward and right arrow to turn. The flicker occurs sporadically, but more frequently if you try turning. The flicker also happens just moving the camera, so it does not seem to be connected to the vehicle. But the vehicle makes it worse, it seems. >> >> Alice 3.6.0.1 +build .500 >> MacOS Mojave 10.14.6 >> Intel Core i7 >> Intel Iris Pro graphics >> >> James >> ? >> James Vanderhyde >> Associate Professor and Department Chair >> Computer Science >> Saint Xavier University >> 3700 W. 103rd St. >> Chicago, IL 60655 >> 773-298-3454 >> _______________________________________________ >> alice-teachers mailing list >> alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu >> To change settings or unsubscribe visit: >> https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers > > _______________________________________________ > alice-teachers mailing list > alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu > To change settings or unsubscribe visit: > https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers > > _______________________________________________ > alice-teachers mailing list > alice-teachers at lists.andrew.cmu.edu > To change settings or unsubscribe visit: > https://lists.andrew.cmu.edu/mailman/listinfo/alice-teachers From wbarnum at elmhurst205.org Sun Apr 25 22:56:42 2021 From: wbarnum at elmhurst205.org (Barnum, William) Date: Sun, 25 Apr 2021 21:56:42 -0500 Subject: alice-teacher Alice 3 Teacher For Summer School (Elmhurst, IL) Message-ID: Hey All, My current employer, York High School in Elmhurst, IL, is looking for a Programming 1 teacher this summer. It is planned as in-person instruction. It will run from June 14- Thursday, July 1, 7:40 AM - 12:50 PM. Normally, I'd teach it myself, but I can't this summer due to my wife's work schedule and the resulting child care duties. It will be a pleasant group of students. https://www.applitrack.com/Elmhurst/onlineapp/jobpostings/view.asp?category=Summer+School&subcategory=Summer+School+Teaching Regards, Bill -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: