October 11, 2000 - Deriving HTML+TIME's Active Time

October 11, 2000
Deriving HTML+TIME's Active Time

Tips: October 2000

Yehuda Shiran, Ph.D.
Doc JavaScript

The HTML+TIME capability in IE 5.5 and up is based on the timeline principle. Some applications require that you know exactly the time you are at. You do it by using the currTimeState object, which is a property of any container that participates in the HTML+TIME behavior. One of currTimeState's many properties and methods is the activeTime property. The activeTime property reports the exact time the script is on. The following example (based on a Microsoft script) demonstrates the usage of activeTime. When you click the button, we print the active time. Since it is instantanous, you will see a larger number every time you click the button. Here is the function that prints the active time of the timeline:

function printTime() {
  var now = parallel.currTimeState.activeTime;
  alert(now.toFixed(2));
}

And here is the Demo:

Heading 1

Heading 2

Heading 3

Heading 4

Heading 5

Heading 6

Here is the HTML code:

<INPUT TYPE="button" value="Show Active Time" onclick="printTime()">
<t:PAR CLASS="time" ID="parallel" REPEATCOUNT="indefinite">
    <H1 ID="hdg1" CLASS="time" STYLE="color:red;" 
	TIMEACTION="style" BEGIN="0" DUR="3">Heading 1</H1>
    <H2 ID="hdg2" CLASS="time" STYLE="color:red;" 
	TIMEACTION="style" BEGIN="0" DUR="3">Heading 2</H2>
    <H3 ID="hdg3" CLASS="time" STYLE="color:blue;" 
	TIMEACTION="style" BEGIN="3" DUR="3">Heading 3</H3>
    <H4 ID="hdg4" CLASS="time" STYLE="color:blue;" 
	TIMEACTION="style" BEGIN="3" DUR="3">Heading 4</H4>
    <H5 ID="hdg5" CLASS="time" STYLE="color:green;" 
	TIMEACTION="style" BEGIN="6" DUR="3">Heading 5</H5>
    <H6 ID="hdg6" CLASS="time" STYLE="color:green;" 
	TIMEACTION="style" BEGIN="6" DUR="3">Heading 6</H6>
</t:PAR>

Learn more about HTML+TIME in Column 67, Introduction to HTML+TIME.