hi,

I'm pretty new to processing and I would like to include into my program an adaptation of a gradient descent.
I have a spring system; I find each time two points and then I am trying to connect them with a spring, which according to the initial distance between the two points will try to reach one out of three possible lengths. The thing is, that instead of having "if" clauses, I want to differentiate the strength and the possibility of each of the three lengths' occurence..

It would be greatly appreciated if anyone could offer any piece of advice.

thanks!


a part of pseudocode is included:


//....
//float drive=1.5; // the ideal length
//
class Spring
{
 Node node1;
 Node node2;
 float d;  // the each time nodes' distance
 //...

 Spring(Node nodei, Node nodej)
 {
   node1 = nodei;
   node2 = nodej;
 }


 void create()
 {
   Vec now1;
   Vec now2;

   d = disto (now1,now2);  

   //...
   if (d<0.9*drive)    
   {
     d = (drive * 0.4)-d;
   }

   if (d>1.5*drive)    
   {
     d = (drive*1.01)-d;                        
   }

   if (d>=0.9*drive && d<=1.5*drive)        
   {
     d=drive-d;    
   }
   //...
 }
 //...
}

Thanks for the advice!
I'll search for the libraries. Actually I am not using them  for experimenting reasons and I think I found an easy way to do so..But there are some parts, like some unwanted line crossings that need to be figured out..