User manual

interaction allowed with cues. It was found that such a solution with “free” zoom may
confuse the users of that age – hence this solution (implemented after the major
redesign) includes both an overview of the entire class-allocated timeslot (through the
group timeline) and a fixed zoom view, large enough so the quantization steps are
visible, and implementing button interaction on the events makes sense. In that way,
the user should always have an overview both of “the big picture” as well as the fine
detail where cues are manipulated.
Talking about quantization steps, the system is limited to a quantization step of
250 ms; the detail timeline renders whole seconds as a full height black line, and 500
ms steps as half height black line, as a visual assistance to determining the
quantization steps. As mentioned before, the detail timeline allows interaction with
the cues – selection by clicking. Apart from that, the rest of the timeline also features
clickable functions, most notably the player buttons. In all, the functions performed by
the timeline can be summarized as (the indexes refer to Figure 48):
- Group zoom level functions (total [1] and group [2] zoom)
- Player time control functions (quantization step backward [s1], forward
[s2], previous group start [3], your group start [4], next group start [5],
rewind [6], fast backward [7], previous cue [8], play [9], next cue [10],
fast forward [11]) + the draggable current time marker on the group
timeline [t]
- Cue editing functions (delete [12], copy [13], paste [14] - in conjunction
with cue selection/interaction on the detail timeline)
- File (program archivation) functions (save [16] and load [17])
Additionally, the help button [18] can be seen as a category for itself. Let’s briefly take
a look at each of these groups.
"DMX Director" - Architecture of a 3D light-programming application, in a multi-user Internet environment
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