A long time ago, in the forest across the river, where fiery leaves danced upon the crisp winds of pseudo-winter (or in other words: back in the 0.2 release) I finished porting boolean(), a function that converted primitive types to either true or false, over to Processing.js (Pjs). As it transpires, boolean() was just one a gaggle of conversion functions, many which continue to seek the company of a code monkey willing to give them a boost over the wall from Java-land into JavaScript-land.
Yesterday evening, at the behest of The Powers That Be, and against the questionable judgement of my lazy self, I tentatively picked up the rest of these converters. And as I told Anna, the recently promoted Fearless Leader, I'd try to get one of them done for 0.5, whose deadline is today. So, without further ado, I present to you int() for Pjs.
Who wants to write the thousand words?
Lo, see now int() in action in Pjs, and compare it to how the same code renders in Processing:
Your eyes do not deceive you: Pjs' int() fails a test. But don't break out the torches and pitchforks just yet! There's a good reason for this. int() may take a byte or an array of bytes as an argument. In Processing, a byte may have a value from -128 to 127, but more importantly: byte is a static type. Through overloading this allows Processing methods, written in Java, to behave differently to accommodate different variable types.
Things are not so simple in JavaScript. In Pjs a Processing byte and int gets converted into a JavaScript 'number'; effectively there is no distinction between a byte and an int in Pjs. Since there's no distinction, int() cannot be tailored to behave differently when it receives bytes. (floats and doubles are different since you can always check if there's a decimal point in there somewhere.) Therefore, the test fails.
A possible solution may be to add a second parameter to int(), a flag called 'isByte' or something. That might be something to bring up in next week's telephone conference.
int() links
- Lighthouse ticket #220 int(), float(), str(), et al are suppose to work on all primitive datatypes including arrays
- GitHub commit
A Quick Recap of 0.5
Just for the record, here are the links to the rest of the stuff I did for 0.5:
- Enhance existing min() and max() implementation
- Implement String::equals()
- Enhance existing nf() implementation
I'll be making a (hopefully) shorter post soonish outlining what I hope to accomplish for 0.6. But for now, it's time to switch gears and call it a morning.
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