1. Alarm problems solved
- Posted by "Wallace B. Riley" <wryly at MINDSPRING.COM>
Sep 04, 1997
-
Last edited Sep 05, 1997
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To Robert Pilkington and anyone else who is interested:
I've attached several files that summarize my problems with an alarm
routine. The cover letter describes the general situation; then Attachment
#1 is a beep generator, from Pete Eberlein, sent to me several weeks ago.
Wally Riley
wryly at mindspring.com
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Attachment #2 is a 'beeptest' that uses Pete's 'beep' generator.
It beeps once a second, three times; repeats those three beeps
three times with short pauses between; then makes nine more beeps
twice with longer pauses; and so on for a total of 81 beeps
before it gives up. There's one more 'farewell' beep just before
the end.
That 'beeptest' is the basis of Attachment #3, the 'alarm'
routine that I wanted to incorporate in my program. That ran
well a few weeks ago, I recall, but I had a lot of trouble with
it today. It is supposed to stay in the second inner loop for 60
seconds, then drop out. At that point, if no key was pressed, it
should repeat the outer loop indefinitely. Pressing any key
would make it drop out.
But it wouldn't do that at first. It would make one set of five
beeps, then hang up. Nothing appeared to be wrong for a couple
of minutes, when I noticed that I should be getting groups of 5
beeps 1 minute apart, and I wasn't getting them. If I pressed a
key, again nothing happened, but if I didn't get antsy, the
program halted normally after another minute or so. I messed
around with this routine for a long time. Now it seems to work,
but I'm not sure what I did.
For reference, Attachment #4 is a corresponding 'alarm' routine
in QBASIC that works very well. (There's one thing I can say
about QBASIC: in spite of its obvious shortcomings, when I write
a program in that language, it usually works; and when it
doesn't, its bugs are fairly easily located.)
Now, all this came up because I tried to use the basic (not
BASIC) alarm routine in the program I am writing. That routine
is in Attachment #5. Look at these attachments, if you wish, and
if you see anything that looks shaky or out of line, I'd like to
know before the thing blows up in my face.
I won't take up any more of your time on this now, but I ran into
trouble on another matter which wrestling with the alarm routine.
I had some problems with the 'time()' command, which doesn't seem
to work the way the library document says it does. It's a side
issue now, but maybe I'll ask for assistance later.
Wally Riley
wryly at mindspring.com
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--Attachment #1:
--Pete Eberlein's beep generator
include machine.e
procedure beep()
sequence regs
regs = repeat(0, 10) --required by 'dos_interrupt' below
regs[REG_AX] = #0E07
regs = dos_interrupt(#10, regs)
end procedure
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--BEEPTEST
--Attachment #2
include machine.e
procedure beep()
sequence regs
regs = repeat(0, 10)
regs[REG_AX] = #0E07
regs = dos_interrupt(#10, regs)
end procedure
procedure beeptest()
atom j, k, m, n, loop1, loop2, loop3, loop4
j = 1
while j <= 3 do
loop4 = time() --interval between 27-beep clumps
k = 1
while k <= 3 do
loop3 = time() --interval between 9-beep sets
m = 1
while m <= 3 do
loop2 = time() --interval between 3-beep groups---
n = 1 -- /\
while n <= 3 do-- |
loop1 = time() --interval between beeps |
beep() -- |
puts(1," End loop1\n") -- outer loop
while time() - loop1 < 1 do -- in ROUTES
end while -- program
n = n + 1 -- |
end while -- |
puts(1," End loop2\n") -- \/
while time() - loop2 < 6 do ----------------------
end while
m = m + 1
end while
puts(1," End loop3\n")
while time() - loop3 < 36 do
end while
k = k + 1
end while
puts(1," End loop4\n")
while time() - loop4 < 72 do
end while
j = j + 1
end while
beep()
puts(1,"End of beep test")
end procedure
beeptest()
--=====================_873426147==_
--Attachment #3
include machine.e
procedure beep()
sequence regs
regs = repeat(0, 10) --required by 'dos_interrupt' below
regs[REG_AX] = #0E07
regs = dos_interrupt(#10, regs)
end procedure
procedure alarm()
integer u, i
atom inloop, outloop
inloop = 0
outloop = 0
while 1 do
outloop = time()
u = 1
while u <= 5 do
inloop = time()
beep()
while time() - inloop<1 do
end while
u = u+1
end while
while time() - outloop < 60 do
end while
i = -1
i = get_key()
if i != -1 then
exit
end if
end while
end procedure --alarm()
alarm()
--=====================_873426147==_
'Attachment #4 (QBASIC)
ALARM:
'DISABLE BEEPER BETWEEN 11:59:00 p.m. AND 12:01:00 a.m.,
'THAT IS, WITHIN 1 MINUTE OF MIDNIGHT, WHEN TIMER RESETS TO 0.
IF TIMER > 60 AND TIMER < 86340 THEN GOTO STARTBEEP
GOTO ALARM
'
STARTBEEP:
FOR U = 1 TO 5 'DEFINE BURST OF BEEPS
PRINT CHR$(7); 'BEEP ONCE WITHOUT LINE FEED
Interval& = TIMER
HOLD1:
IF TIMER - Interval& > 1 THEN GOTO TRYLOOP 'WAIT 1 SECOND
GOTO HOLD1
'
TRYLOOP:
NEXT U
Interval& = TIMER
'
HOLD2:
'BEEP 5 TIMES ONCE A MINUTE
IF TIMER - Interval& > 60 THEN GOTO STARTBEEP
E$ = INKEY$ 'PRESS ANY KEY TO STOP THE BEEPING
IF LEN(E$) <> 0 THEN GOTO STOPBEEP
GOTO HOLD2
'
STOPBEEP:
RETURN
'
--=====================_873426147==_
--Attachment #5
include machine.e
procedure beep()
sequence regs
regs = repeat(0, 10)
regs[REG_AX] = #0E07
regs = dos_interrupt(#10, regs)
end procedure
procedure alarm()
atom loop1, loop2
while 1 do
loop2 = time()
n = 1
while n <= 5 do
loop1 = time()
beep()
while time() - loop1 < 1 do
end while
n = n + 1
end while
while time() - loop2 < 60 do
end while
j = -1
j = wait_key()
if j = "Q" then
abort(0)
else
exit
end if
end while
end procedure
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