Exp_2_Research_Assignment

 sandbox 2_How to make time travel with xml reading 

Flow graph:

500 Words:

In this research task, the tutorial is addressing on how to make a time travel effect by taking xml data from its file. What nodes will be needed and what parameter needs to be changed are clearly explained in this tutorial step by step. Xml document reading is quite significant for the experiment 2, analytics engine. Especially for after getting the data from xml document, implement them into the environment. Therefore this tutorial is very helpful for this point. From the flow graph in the tutorial, it tells people how to get the value from the xml document, how to show the data on the screen and implement the data into the environment such as a certain object to do some typical responses. There has two key points: one is the customise model, another key point is the about the analytics engine how to analysis the data. From the experiment one, we had learned how to make the model suits the real time environment, implement the theme into the model and create customise flow graph to help the model. So, the tutorial is designed for the second key. After people understanding this tutorial, they could use the flow graph as a reference or template, to develop another advanced effect or movement to make the analytics engine work properly. This tutorial is based on another tutorial from Week 6 task, experiment two. After understanding how to get a flow graph to read data from pachube feed via xml from Rosamond’s tutorial, using the data as a trigger or value to assign on the object and make it to do some typical responses to stand for and synchronise the variation of the data from pachube feed. The viewer therefore can understand what the analytics engine is and what they do. 

In the flow graph, the proximity trigger node is actually a trigger, and there has two parts left, the xml document reading and the object movement. The xml:OpenDocument node is linking to Xml:GetRoot, it opens the xml file when the player get close enough to the trigger. The Xml:GetRoot is pointing out the root form xml document, Xml:GetChild nodes are getting the child from the root, they link to Xml:GetChildAt node, and then the Xml:GetValue node is getting the value, the last one, HUD:ShowHUDMessege will show the value on the screen. The second part is the changing of time and the object movements. Using the ProximityTrigger node, we can get the trigger from the node, it is linking to the Math:ToBoolean and the Movement:Rotation (it could be other movement). So that when the local player get close to or far away from the trigger, those assigned object will do some movements as response. The Time:TimeOfDay nodes are linking to the Xml:GetValue and the ProximityTrigger, they can modify the time speed to achieve the time travel effect in game.