StarWarsUpscroller by Stefan Mateescu

StarWarsConfigurator

Follow these instructions to configure the applet with the StarWarsConfigurator. If you are not experienced with Java-Applets see also the StarWarsScroller-Manual!

Contents

General information about the Configurator
How to configure
Finish your project
See the demo HTML
See the applet manual

General information about the Configurator

Next you see a screenshot of the program with descriptions of some portions of the interface:

To set a value click on the lower list and edit the value in the edit field - then push the SET THIS VALUE button. You can also use the helper-dialog (where available) to set up the value... Check it out.
By clicking on the Test it! button the program will create a file called output.html which includes the actual configuration.

The Configurator works on Win95/98/NT!

How to configure

Follow these steps to configure the applet:

Step 1: Have a look at the example configurations from this package

Start the StarWarsConfigurator program
click on Open
select an example file with the suffix .stwcfg and open it
click on Test it!
repeat this procedure until you have seen all available examples

Step 2: Make your own configuration

You can either use the default configuration (by pressing the New button) or load an example configuration (like shown in Step 1) to start with
click on the textfile parameter in the lower blue section -> the textfile that will be used will appear in the edit field above the parameter list
type in the filename for your text (e.g. "mytext.txt") and click on Set this value - now the filename you have entered should appear in the lower list
press the Textfile button in the upper toolbar and edit your text - when you are finished press Save
now you can test your project by pressing the
test the applet with the new value(s)

Step 3: Edit parameters

click on the desired parameter in the lower list
edit the value in the edit field
press the Set this value button (if the value is not valid you will receive a notice which tells you what's wrong)
for some values (like colors, integers, boolean values) press the button beside the edit field for easy setup!
test the applet with the new value(s) using the Test it! button
repeat this procedure until the applet looks like you want it to!

After you worked through these 3 steps go on to the next chapter: Finishing the project.

Additionally you can save this project to be able to change some things later... Click on Save and edit a name for the project file.

Finishing the project

Assuming you have configured the applet, edited your text and are ready to go for your homepage integration, follow these instructions:

Push the Test it! button to update all changes. Now have a look at the output.html in the StarWarsConfigurator directory. It should look like this: (this is a demo-output! yours should look different - the values and the filenames of the font and textfile should differ from this version)

Now copy the whole applet block from the output.html and paste it into your final HTML-file (that is the web-page you want to have it in!).
After this is done you are ready to upload everything to your webspace. You will have to upload following FOUR (!!!!) files:

(1) your final HTML which includes the applet block
(2) the StarWarsScroller.class (this file includes the Java-code and is absolutely neccessary!!!)
(3) the textfile: this file contains your scrolltext - if you don't know which file it was, look it up from the textfile param in YOUR output.html
(4) the fontfile: this file contains the selected font

Some words about directories:

The easiest way is to upload everything to the same folder in your webspace. If this is not possible because you maybe have a lame webspace, you will have to add some paths to the params. For example...

if the class-file is in a folder called "images" and all other files are in the root directory you will have to add the codebase directive to the applet tag like shown here:

original applet tag was:

<applet code="StarWarsScroller.class" width=400 height=250>

after adding the codebase directive:

<applet codebase="images/" code="StarWarsScroller.class" width=400 height=250>

if your text and fontfiles are also moved to the images directory, then you would have to add the relative path from the html-file to them:

original parameters:

    <param name="fontfile"         value="font02.txt">
    <param name="txtfile"          value="example1.txt">

fixed parameters:

    <param name="fontfile"         value="images/font02.txt">
    <param name="txtfile"          value="images/example1.txt">

...if the applet turns red and tells you something about "...check your files..." then it is not crashed - you have made something wrong while uploading the files or setting the paths!!!