Processing 1.0 - Processing Discourse - using random for something other than int

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Index › Programming Questions & Help › Syntax Questions › using random for something other than int

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using random for something other than int (Read 608 times)

ilikebagels Junior Member Offline Posts: 56	using random for something other than int May 11^th, 2009, 2:55am Can you use random() for a string? im wanting to display a shapes that i have loaded in so instead of having PShape bot PShape ant etc shape(bot,x,y) is it possible to have it pick one at random and display the shape attached to the definition of PShape? does that make sense

Cedric

Re: using random for something other than int
Reply #1 - May 11^th, 2009, 3:39am

dont know how much shapes you have to choose from. One way woult be to simple name your shapes 0,1,2,3 etc. but you can also store all the names in an array of strings, lets say.

String[] names = { "ant", "bot", "xx", "yy", };

and then randomly pick one string out of the array

String a = names[int(random(names.length))];
shape(a,x,y);

hope that helps

twitter.com/CedricKiefer

PhiLho

Re: using random for something other than int
Reply #2 - May 11^th, 2009, 3:42am

You want to randomize a shape, not a string...

Anyway, that's the same technique (both are objects).
The simplest way, since I suppose you have a limited, known number of objects, is to put them in an array, then to generate an integer random number between 0 and the max index.

String[] shapeNames = { "bot.svg", "ant.svg", "foo.svg" }; PShape[] shapes = new PShape[shapeNames.length]; for (int s = 0; s < shapes.length; s++) { shapes[s] = loadShape(shapeNames[s]); }

then

PShape shapeToDraw = shapes[int(random(shapes.length))];

(untested)

Cedric YaBB Moderator Offline Posts: 1838	Re: using random for something other than int Reply #3 - May 11^th, 2009, 9:03am thats almost the same but you should go with PhiLhos example, its more detailed then mine
	twitter.com/CedricKiefer

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