One Time Polygon Hotspot Flash on Load

[Mehelle]

Hi all,

I have the polygon hotspots in my tour set to "Show Current" so they only appear on mouse hover. This is great and I like that they are invisible most of the time, but it can also make it hard to find them all within a pano. I would like to make it so that when a pano (or image) loads in all the polygon hotspots light up for a second to give the viewer an idea of where they are.

I have an idea of the elements I need to accomplish this, but am unsure how to put it together in the skin. In particular I'd like to avoid creating a skin element for each polygon in the tour and instead create something that applies to all the polygons at once. Any suggestions on how I could get this done?

Thank you!

[Hopki]

Hi,
You can use a timer.
For example, set the polygons in the output properties to Always visible.
In the skin, add a timer set to
Type: Start
Timeout: 2
Repeat: One Time

Give the timer the action:
Source: Deactivate
Action: Player Settings
Type: Set Polygon Mode
Mode: Show Current

What will happen is that on output open, the polygons will show as the default is Always visible, and the timer in the skin will be active.
But after 2 seconds, the timer will deactivate, setting the Polygon Mode to Show Current.

Regards,

[Mehelle]

Hi Hopki,

This worked like a charm, thank you! What I'm trying to do now it make it so the timer resets every time a panorama is changed, a gallery is closed/reopened, or an image changes. I've experimented with adding a second timer that sets the polygon mode back to Show Always on 'player inactive' and set both timers to 'toggle'. This caused a looping blinking polygon. I imagine what I have to do is use a manual 'set value' action on the second timer so that it activates on image changing / mouse click / or something else but I'm lost on how to write that out. Do you have any suggestions on how I could get this done?

Thank you!

[Mehelle]

Hi all,

I've been playing with this today and still having no luck on resetting the timer. To reiterate: The method Hopki laid out worked well, right now when I load an image it shows the poly hotspot for 2 seconds then they disappear. However it only does this once ever for the entire tour each time the tour is loaded. Other images with poly hotspots will not flash, and even the initial image with a flashing poly hotspot will not flash again when navigated away from and returned to. What i'd like to figure out is how to reset a 'one time' timer so that it activates every time a poly hotspot is loaded in the tour. I'm sure there is a way to do this using a manual timer, but I've had no luck with it as of yet, I think it part because working with polygon actions can be a bit tricky. One possibility might be creating a container for each polygon and creating actions that tie them to the timer that way, but because some of the tours I'm working with have so many polygons I'd much rather control them all together if feasible. Any ideas or insights on how I could get this done?

Thank you!

[Hopki]

Hi,
As a hint, a Node Changed source action triggers on open and on node change.
So this can be used to set a value to the timer.

As above, have the Polygons showing on open.
Then set the timer set to manual.
Then give it the action, Node Changed, Set Value, 2 seconds, self.

So on node open and node changes it will reset the timer to run for two seconds.
Regards,

[Mehelle]

Hi Hopki,

Thank you so much, this worked perfectly!

The final Timer settings were:
Type: Manual
Timeout: 2
Repeat: One Time

First timer action:
Source: Deactivate
Action: Player Settings
Type: Set Polygon Mode
Mode: Show Current

Second timer action:
Source: Node Changed,
Action: Set Value,
2 seconds,
self.

I really appreciate the help in getting this done!

[Mehelle]

Hi,

Thank you again for the help so far. One last question for this. Rather than switching immediately from visible to invisible, is there a way to have the polygon hotspot fade out when the timer triggers and it changes modes? Everything is functional right now, but just aesthetically and from a UI perspective I'd like to have a fade to communicate the skin isn't breaking when the hotspots disappear. Would this be possible using expert mode or maybe a skin variable?

Thank you!