Message in a Bottle

About

This is a Message management library for LOVE 0.7.0. It aims to be unobtrusive and easy to use.

Download

Download the code or sample love from bitbucket.

This library requires MiddleClass. It is included.

Contact

See the forum post for public questions. Go to the Issue Tracker for bugs. Look around for TechnoCat if you have any further questions or concerns.

It would be cool if you told me if you use it in your project. I would love to see what this is used for.

Features

• StayBottle, bottles that stay until a button is pressed.
• TimedBottle, bottles that stay until a button is pressed or until a duration of time has passed.
• Ocean, a management object for Bottles
• Very (and hopefully easily) Configurable Bottles
• Sleek and Stylish Bottle defaults

Missing Features

Not implemented yet, but plan to.

• Boolean Bottles
• Choice Bottles

Configuring

Much of the configuration you are going to want to do will take place at the top of MessageInABottle.lua.

Usage

Setting up Ocean

require 'MessageInABottle.lua'

function love.load()
  ocean = Ocean:new()
end

function love.update(dt)
  ocean:update(dt)
end

function love.draw()
  ocean:draw()
end

Example

require 'MessageInABottle.lua'

function love.load()
  love.graphics.setBackgroundColor(255,255,255)
  
  --Initialize the ocean to manage the bottles.
  --It is going to act as a bottle queue.
  ocean = Ocean:new()
  
  --Create a timed bottle and add it to the ocean
  ocean:addBottle(TimeBottle:new(nil,"...",nil))
  
  --Create a stay bottle and add it to the ocean
  local bottle = StayBottle:new(nil,"What is this?")
  --Change some bottle settings to non-default ones
  bottle:setX(310)
  bottle:setVolume(0)
  ocean:addBottle(bottle)
end

function love.update(dt)
  --Required to update the bottles
  ocean:update(dt)
end

function love.draw()
  love.graphics.setColor(0,0,0)
  --This is showing some useful variables ocean stores.
  love.graphics.print(
      'last bottle return was: '..ocean.response..
      ' at '..(math.floor(ocean.responseTime*10)/10)..
      's from '..ocean.responseID,12,12)
  --This is all that is needed to draw the current bottle
  ocean:draw()
end

function love.keypressed(k,u)
  --You can add a bottle on the fly.
  if k=="d" then
    local x = math.floor(math.random(400))
    local y = math.floor(math.random(150))
    ocean:addBottle(TimeBottle:new("PRESSED_D","Timed Box!"))
  elseif k=="escape" then
    love.event.push("q")
  end
end

Constructors

Ocean

Ocean:new()

MessageBottle

Do not use this. It is the parent class of all Bottles.

MessageBottle:new(id, text)

string id

The unique identifier of the Bottle. e.g. "Open Door"

string text

The text to display on the Bottle. e.g. "Will you open the door?"

StayBottle

StayBottle:new(id, text)

string id

The unique identifier of the Bottle. e.g. "Open Door"

string text

The text to display on the Bottle. e.g. "Will you open the door?"

TimeBottle

TimeBottle:new(id, text, timeout)

string id

The unique identifier of the Bottle. e.g. "Open Door"

string text

The text to display on the Bottle. e.g. "Will you open the door?"

number timeout

The amount of time the bottle will display for.

Setter Functions

Timeout

TimeBottle:setTimeout(timeout)

number timeout

The time left for a TimeBottle

setX

MessageBottle:setX(x)

number x

The x position of the Bottle

setY

MessageBottle:setY(y)

number y

The y position of the Bottle

setPosition

MessageBottle:setPosition(x, y)

number x

The x position of the Bottle

number y

The y position of the Bottle

setWidth

MessageBottle:setWidth(width)

number width

The width of the Bottle

setHeight

MessageBottle:setHeight(height)

number height

The height of the Bottle

setButton

MessageBottle:setButton(button)

KeyConstant button

The button the Bottle will use.

setEase

MessageBottle:setEase(ease)

function ease

The ease function to use for easing-in.

setEaseTime

MessageBottle:setEaseTime(easeTime)

number easeTime

The time to spend easing-in.

setFade

MessageBottle:setFade(fade)

function fade

The fade function to use for fading-in.

setFadeTime

MessageBottle:setFadeTime(fadeTime)

number fadeTime

The time to spend fading-in.

setEnterCallback

MessageBottle:setEnterCallback(enterCB)

function enterCB

The callback function to call on opening a bottle.

setExitCallback

MessageBottle:setEnterCallback(exitCB)

function exitCB

The callback function to call on exiting a bottle. The return of the bottle is passed to the exitCallback.

setSound

MessageBottle:setSound(sound)

string sound

The location of a sound file.

setVolume

MessageBottle:setVolume(volume)

number volume

The volume of the sound. Normal volume is 1.0.

setIndicator

MessageBottle:setIndicator(indicator)

string indicator

The location of the indicator image file. The indicator is the icon that bounces up and down on certain bottles.

setFgColor

MessageBottle:setFgColor(r, g, b, a)

number r

The red value from 0-255.

number g

The green value from 0-255.

number b

The blue value from 0-255.

number a

The alpha value from 0-255.

setFont

MessageBottle:setFont(font, size)

string font

The location of the font file.

number size

The point value size.

setAlign

MessageBottle:setAlign(align)

AlignMode align

The align mode.

setBgColor

MessageBottle:setFgColor(r, g, b, a)

number r

The red value from 0-255.

number g

The green value from 0-255.

number b

The blue value from 0-255.

number a

The alpha value from 0-255.

setBgRadius

MessageBottle:setBgRadius(r)

number r

The radius of the corners.

setBgRadiusSegments

MessageBottle:setBgRadiusSegments(n)

number n

The number of segments to draw on each corner.