Die Ultimative Software-Pakete CD-ROM fur Atari Collection 1996 & 1997

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Text File | 1996-10-30 | 19.1 KB | 440 lines

World Clock 1.0a by Dan Wilga Copyright © 1995, Gribnif Software All Rights Reserved. This program may be distributed freely, provided it and this text file are unmodified. See the end of this file for the revision history. ChocolateWare ------------- This program is ChocolateWare. If you find it useful, you are encouraged to show your appreciation by sending a quantity of chocolate candy to the address below. What kind and how much are up to you. Please just limit yourself to chocolate, either with or without nuts. Dan Wilga Gribnif Software PO Box 779 Northampton, MA 01061 GEnie: GRIBNIF Internet: gribnif@genie.geis.com Too Much Time On My Hands ------------------------- I often need to call someone in some remote corner of the globe (I've always hated that expression because, as you probably know, globes don't have corners) and I find myself wondering if I'm going to be calling at some rediculously early (or late) time. Most of Europe is easy for me to remember, but I've already found out that calling an Australian at 5:00 on Saturday morning is not an acceptable thing to do. I looked around and could not find a program that suited my needs: I wanted a picture of the world, not just a text list of cities that are probably nowhere near the place I really want to call. Of course, in order to keep track of things accurately, a world clock also needs to have an idea about daylight savings, and not just assume everyone uses the same method. [Bored yet? If so, you can skip ahead to the next section. I would have already, y'know.] Well, I couldn't find anything that fit the bill, or even came close. So, I set about creating my own program. The first thing was to find a map. OK, that was the easy part. Next, I wanted it to be scalable to any size, so I used Convector Professional to vectorize the map and save it as a GEM file. Fortunately, the map I used employs what is probably the most common method for stretching the continents so that the map of our spherical globe will end up flat: it's called Mercator's Projection. Unfortunately, it took more hours of research in the local library than I care to mention to find out what the mathematical relationship between latitude and map location are when using this projection. But I finally found a simple formula. Along the way, I also came across an invaluable book called "The International Atlas" (see the bibliography at the end of this file), which not only gives the coordinates of thousands of cities in the world, but also gives very precise information about how each country (and even each region within the country) handles daylight savings. Now I just had to write a program to display the map in a useful way, and pop a list of cities into a text file. World Clock is the result. Setting it Up ------------- World Clock works as a program or a desk accessory. It works in any resolution, and probably with any graphics card. It also works with multitasking environments like Geneva, MultiTOS, and MagiC. To run it as a program, these files are necessary: WORLDCLK.PRG Program WORLDCLK.RSC Resource file WORLDCLK.DAT Data file with cities and other preferences WORLDCLK.GEM The map There is also a second map called DETAILED.GEM. You can use this in place of WORLDCLK.GEM by renaming WORLDCLK.GEM to something else (like LOWREZ.GEM) and then renaming DETAILED.GEM to WORLDCLK.GEM. The disadvantage to DETAILED.GEM is that it takes more memory to load (just look at the difference in the file sizes) and whenever the window redraws, it may redraw more slowly depending on your setup. To run it as a desk accessory, you would simply rename WORLDCLK.PRG to WORLDCLK.ACC and put it (along with the other files) in the same directory as all your other desk accessories. In order to prevent too much clutter, you can also put everything but the WORLDCLK.ACC file into a folder called WORLDCLK. For instance, if your desk accessories load from C:, you would put WORLDCLK.ACC in C:\, and put the rest of the files in a folder called C:\WORLDCLK\. The only functional difference between using World Clock as a desk accessory versus using it as a program is that when used as a desk accessory, World Clock will only allow you to add 10 places to the list in one session. Running it ---------- Once World Clock is running, there is one thing you need to do in order to configure it for the first time: IMPORTANT --------- Before World Clock can be of any real use to you, you need to tell it where you live. Do this by clicking on the "?" icon in the lower right of the window. This will give you a popup menu. Select the "Edit Places" option. In the "Edit Places" dialog, you will see that some information about the various places World Clock knows about by default. What you need to do is choose a place which is in the same time zone as you currently are, and uses the same method for daylight savings. Scroll though the list of places by using the "+" and "-" buttons next to the name of the current place. Don't worry if you live in Florida and the closest thing you can find is New York. That's good enough for now. To help you find a place which is close to you, here is a West to East list of some of the cities, presented by region: USA: Honolulu, HI Anchorage, AK Los Angeles, CA Denver, CO Dallas, TX Chicago, IL Indianapolis, IN New York, NY Canada: Vancouver, BC Edmonton, AB Toronto, ON Montréal, QC Halifax, NS St. John's, NF Europe: Reykjavík Belfast Glasgow Madrid London Paris Amsterdam Roma (Rome) Berlin Athinai (Athens) Helsingfors (Helsinki) Kijev Moskva (Moscow) Volgograd (Stalingrad) Australia: Perth Adelaide Melbourne Brisbane Sydney When you have found a place that is in the same time zone and uses the same emthod for daylight savings, select the "Here" button. This indicates that the place you chose should be used for computing other times in the world. When finished, select the "Done" button. If you can't find a place which is close to where you are, refer to the section about the "Edit Places" dialog, for more information on how to add new places to the list. Now it gets interesting. On the map you will notice that a number of locations have either a diamond (on a monochrome monitor) or a red plus sign (on a color monitor). If you move the mouse arrow over one of these markers and press the left mouse button, a dialog will pop up and tell you what time it is in that place. If you either let go of the mouse or drag the pointer away from a place, the popup will disappear. More Features in the Main Window -------------------------------- As you move the mouse around the main window with the left mouse button pressed, you may also notice a coordinate display in the lower right of the window. This tells you the latitude and longitude the mouse pointer is currently at, and gets updated as long as the mouse button is pressed. This feature can be turned off in the "Options" dialog (see below). By default, World Clock shows the local time in the mover bar of the window. This can be turned off in the "Options" dialog, as well. To conserve screen space, World Clock uses two icons in the lower right corner of its window. You've already seen what the "?" gadget does (it gives you a menu of choices), now it's time for you to try the resize gadget to the far right. To resize the window, grab the resize gadget and drag the outline which appears. You will notice that the horizontal and vertical directions always stay in a constant ratio. This is so that the map will not look distorted. When you let go of the mouse, the map will redraw at the new size. The Popup Menu -------------- The popup menu, which is accessed by clicking on the "?" gadget in the lower right of the window, contains several options: "Options..." ------------ o am/pm or 24-hour mode affects how time is displayed in the popup which appears next to a place, in the local time, and in the hours display. By default, World Clock tries to read an "_IDT" system "cookie" to determine whether 24-hour time is preferable for your country. o Show Day in Popup controls whether or not the place popup will contain an extra line which describes whether time at the place the mouse is over is "Yesterday", "Today", or "Tomorrow". o Show Hours gives you a bar at the top of the main window which contains the relative time at even increments along the map. Of course, many places differ from this number, but it is useful as a reference. Note that if the window is too small, some or all of the hours may not be visible because they do not fit. o Show Coordinates, as stated before, controls whether or not the latitude and longitude of the current map location will be displayed when the left mouse button is pressed in the main window. o Show Current Time controls the display of local time in the window's mover bar. "Edit Places..." ---------------- This is probably the most important dialog. As you've seen already, it can be used to look at the list of places that World Clock is displaying. It also lets you enter new places and edit existing ones. At the top of the dialog is the name of the current place. There are also "+" and "-" button which will cycle through the list of places. Below the name is where the longitude and latitude of the place can be changed. All coordinates are listed in degrees and minutes (60ths of a degree). This means that the largest number that can appear in the minutes section of a coordinate is 59. If you enter an incorrect value, you will be prompted to correct the error. Longitudes can either be east ("E") or west ("W") of 0 degrees, so you should select the appropriate button when entering a new coordinate. Otherwise, the marker for the place will not appear in the correct location. Latitudes can either be north ("N") or south ("S") of the equator. You can usually find the coordinates of a place by using an atlas or map. It is not necessary to be too accurate, unless you use World Clock with the main window at a large scale. Underneath the coordinates you should enter the number of hours and minutes that the local time of the place differs from Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). For example, New York is 5 hours 0 minutes to the West of GMT. Below this is where you can choose the type of daylight savings used at the place. When World Clock notices that the current day and time fall within the times of the year that daylight savings is present, one hour will be added to the local time of the place when it is displayed. If you are unsure what daylight savings method a particular place uses, you can just select "<None>" from the popup and no adjustment will be made. See the "WORLDCLK.DAT Format" section for information about how to add more daylight savings entries to the list. The "Attributes" section provides you with two options: o Here: In order for World Clock to be able to calculate the times of other places, it needs to know where you are located now. You can only select the "Here" button of one place in the list. Choose a place which is at least in the same time zone that you are in, and preferably one that uses the same method for daylight savings. o Show Marker: When this button is selected, a marker will be shown at the coordinates of the place on the main map window. Turning the marker off for a particular place can often help to make other markers more visible when they are tightly packed together. The list of cities can be sorted in one of three ways, either alphabet- ically by name, in a north to south direction, or in an east to west direction based on coordinates. The "New" button will add a new, blank place to the list. You must then edit the various parts of the place's description. When using World Clock as a desk accessory you are only allowed to add 10 places to the list in one session. You must "Save Settings" and reboot the computer in order to add more places. When using World Clock as a program, you can add as many places to the list in one session as memory permits. To remove the current place from the list, use the "Delete" button. Deleted places cannot be recovered, so use this button carefully. "Go To" will complete any changes you have made to the list, and return you to the main window. You will then be shown the location on the map of the place you were last looking at in the "Edit Places" dialog. The "Done" button completes changes to the list and returns you to the main window. If you have made any changes to the list when you quit World Clock, you will be prompted to save the changes before quitting. Note that you will only get this prompt if you are using World Clock as a program, not a desk accessory. "Set Date/Time..." ------------------ This feature allows you to change your system clock's date and time. The _IDT cookie is used here, too, to determine what order the month, day, and year are displayed in the date. "Save Options" -------------- This saves all configurable options, including the window size and position, and the list of places to WORLDCLK.DAT. If a change has been made to the list of places when you quit World Clock, you will be asked to save the changes. "About..." ---------- This dialog gives information about the version of World Clock you are using. Daylight Savings ---------------- Many locations change their method of daylight savings every few years. For instance, the USA changed their start to the first Sunday in April just a few years ago, and many older references on this subject are still not updated. If you find that one of the default cities is incorrect, please let me know at the address above and I will correct it in a future version. WORLDCLK.DAT Format ------------------- This section describes the format of WORLDCLK.DAT. You do not need to read this section unless you either want to add a large number of places without using the "Edit Places" dialog, or you need to add more daylight savings descriptions. The file is a regular ASCII text file. Any line beginning with a * can be in any order. The commands which follow a * can be one of these: *Window Window x, y, width, height *Sort 0=Name, 1=N->S, 2=W->E *am_pm am/pm or 24-hour time *DispCoords Display mouse coordinates *DispDay Show "Yesterday", "Today", "Tomorrow" in popup *DispHours Show relative time at top of window *DispTime Show current time in mover bar *Daylight A description of daylight savings: ---- start savings ---- ----- end savings ----- index hour which month day hour which month day change name index: a letter (case is unimportant) to be used in the flags field of places that use this method of daylight savings start savings: the day and time at which daylight savings begins hour: hour of the day, in 24-hour format which: if 0, then "day" is the date of the month when the change takes place, regardless of weekday. For instance, if "which" is 0 and "day" is 10, then the change occurs on the 10th. if >0, then "day" is the day of the week of the change occurs on, where Sunday is 0. When "which" is 1, that means the first "day" of the month, 2 means the second "day" f the month, etc. See the examples below. if <0, then it indicates the last "day" of the month (-1), the next-to-last (-2), etc. month: the month of the change, where 1=January day: see description of "which" end savings: the day and time at which daylight savings ends. In the northern hemisphere, this is usually later in the year than the starting date. In the southern hemisphere, like in Australia, it is earlier. change: the number of hours of offset from GMT during daylight savings. This is most likely always -1. name: up to 16 characters Examples: i h w m d h w m d c i 2 -1 4 0 2 -1 10 0 -1 Canada Daylight savings starts at 02:00 on the last Sunday in April. It ends at 02:00 on the last Sunday in October. i h w m d h w m d c a 2 -1 10 0 2 1 3 0 -1 Australia Daylight savings starts at 02:00 on the last Sunday in October. It ends at 02:00 on the first Sunday in March. i h w m d h w m d c k 0 0 4 1 0 0 10 1 -1 Former Soviet Daylight savings starts at 00:00 on April 1. It ends at 00:00 on October 1. Any lines not beginning with * are assumed to be places. These lines have the format: offset flags latitude longitude name offset: the hours offset from GMT during standard time. Locations that are East of GMT have a negative offset. flags: the first flag is "a" if the a marker for the place is visible ("active"), otherwise it is a "-" the second flag is "h" if the place was chosen as "Here". the third flag is a daylight savings index, or "-" if none. latitude, longitude: these are in the format "degrees.minutes". A negative latitude is south of the equator, and a negative longitude is west of the prime meridian. name: up to 27 characters Bibliography ------------ "The International Atlas, World Latitudes, Longitudes and Time Changes", Thomas G. Shanks, ACS Publications, Inc., San Diego, 1985. Revision History ---------------- 1.0a: It will no longer crash when loaded on a machine that does not have a cookie jar (like TOS 1.0 or 1.2). If you run it without a WORLDCLK.DAT, entering the Edit Places dialog to add new places now works. 12pm is now displyaed properly in the time that appears in the window's name bar