Timer Clock : A count down timer/clock

Nihongo ha koko (In Japanese)
(Last update of this Page: )

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• Installation
• Run the Timer Clock
• Quick Tutorial How to set the timer.
• Functions
• Command Line Options
• Download
• License (under the GNU General Public License)
• Acknowledgements
• Contact Information

Introduction

Timer Clock is a count down timer/clock. This was originally made for the speakers of EuroGraphics 2002 tutorial sessions. It is used to let the speaker keep track easily of how much time is left. You can set any window size with automatic font resizing. Changing fonts and changing foreground/background color are also available. You can also set some actions at given times.

This program runs under Java environments like the ones in Windows, Linux, Solaris and so on. I've tested Windows98, Windows XP and Linux.

Keywords: count down, timer, clock, conference, time keeping, alarm, Java, resize window and font

Installation

• You need JDK 1.4 Standard edition runtime environment or later.
  
  • http://java.sun.com/ : Java page
  • http://java.sun.com/j2se/downloads.html : Download the standard edition (J2SE) for Windows, Solaris and other's links.
  • http://www.blackdown.org/ : For Linux

  You can find Windows, Solaris and Linux JRE (Java Runtime Environment) here, and there are also links for BSD (FreeBSD, NetBSD etc.), MacOSX and so on on java.sun.com.

• For Quick start, copy the file ``tc.jar'' somewhere on your machine. Or you can compile the program from the source code. Because this code use assert facility of Java 1.4 or later, please turn it on. More detail is in JDK release note and the manual.

Run the Timer Clock

• From the Desktop environment (For example: Windows): Double click the file ``tc.jar.''
• In your terminal emulator, type

        java -jar tc.jar [command line option]
        

Quick Tutorial (How to set the timer)

• Set the time. Ex. 1 min, and start and stop.
  • Show the Timer Setting Dialog with ``Setting -- Time''.
    
  • Set the timer at 1 min.
    
  • Then the timer will look like below.
    
  • To start the timer, select ``Control -- start.''
    
  • To stop the timer, select ``Control -- stop.''
    

Functions

• File Menu
  • File -- About : Show program descriptions (Version and Copyright).
  • File -- Exit : Exit the program.
• Setting Menu
  • Setting -- Font : Change the font. The number of available fonts is depends on the system. Ignore font size, as it is automatically set according to window size and font metric.
  • Setting -- default FG Color : set default Foreground color. When you select the Reset Color menu item, Foreground color will return to this.
  • Setting -- default BG Color : set default Background color. When you select the Reset Color menu item, Background color will return to this.
  • Setting -- Reset Color : Reset the color. When the color is changed with Actions, this reset the colors to default FG/BG colors.
  • Setting -- Time : Set the time. See Quick Tutorial
  • Setting -- Actions : Set the actions. You can set several actions. Notice : The time means elapsed time. So if you set the timer 3 min, and you want to set an action when the timer is 00:00, then you should set the elapsed time to 03:00.
    • No Action : nothing happen
    • Beep : beep when the time has come.
    • Color Change : foreground and background color will be changed when the time has come.
    • Popup a Window : popup a notify window. (I use this to cook a Pizza.)
• Control Menu
  • Control -- Start : start the count down.
  • Control -- Stop : stop the count down.
  • Control -- reset : reset the count down. This also reset the color and reset the actions.

Command Line Options

• -h --help
  print help message
• -V --version
  Show this version of this program
• -v --verbose
  verbose mode (for debugging)
• -p --period=int
  set the period (seconds)
• -f --font-name=string
  font family name
• -i --font-italic=boolean
  italic if true
• -b --font-bold=boolean
  bold face if true

Download

This program is distributed under GNU public license.

• Version 0.1.2
  • Jar file (tc.jar)
  • All files including Java source code and this document.
  • Changelog:
    • First release: 0.1.1
    • command line options available
    • add key acceleration with start, stop and reset menu item
• Version 0.1.3-current
  • Jar file (tc.jar)
  • All files including Java source code and this document.
  • Changelog:
    • add popup a window action

License

This program is under the GNU General Public License.

    Copyright (C) 2002 Yamauchi, Hitoshi

    This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
    it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
    the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
    (at your option) any later version.

    This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
    but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
    MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
    GNU General Public License for more details.

    You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
    along with this program; see the file COPYING.  If not, write to
    the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330,
    Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.

Acknowledgements

• Thanks to Yoshizawa Shin (shin " at " mpi-sb.mpg.de.kein.spam.delete.after.de) for teaching how to use the Java threads and several useful comments about Java programming.
• Thanks to Maeda Atusi for Option.java.
• GUIs were built with Forte for Java by Sun Microsystems.

Contact Infomation

Comments and suggestions are welcome. You can find how to reach me from my page. Or, email me:

hitoshi"at"mpi-sb.mpg.de.kein.spam

(Please replace "at" to @ and delete the .kein.spam part of the address when you send me an email.)