Multiple Key Detection

If you frequent the Source/Experiments forum, chances are that you have run into Michael Avila's (MichalxxOA) experiments. This tutorial is based on Michael's Multiple Key Detection script, and by reading this tutorial, I hope you will learn not only how Michael created the multiple key detection functionality but also tips on how you can use it and modify it for your own projects.

Whenever you use keyboard shortcuts, you are holding and pressing several keys consecutively. Have you ever thought about how this functionality actually works? What causes your computer to realize that when you press the N key while holding down the Ctrl key, you meant to type Ctrl + N as opposed to each key separately?

While the answers to the above questions depend largely on the implementation of the multiple key detection, the overall idea behind them is the same - keep track of keys pressed and check whether the pressed keys map to a valid shortcut.

The following is an animation implementing the Multiple Key Detection script you will learn about in this tutorial. Click on the GO button in the animation below and press the Ctrl + K keys to randomly keep displaying the letter K:

Beyond explaining how to detect multiple keys, this tutorial also covers the following high-level topics:

• Accessing Data stored in Multidimensional Arrays
• Using Classes
• Understanding Somebody Else's Code

If you are a beginning Flasher, this tutorial might be a little complicated. Don't worry though, the following tutorials on Object Oriented Programming and Arrays should prepare you well for what lies ahead in the following pages. I will also provide enough tips and clarifications so that you won't be lost.

The tutorial is broken into the following sections:

1. How to Use
2. Code Explanation
3. Conclusion

The following pages will take you through each of the sections and hopefully teach you something that you might not have known about before.

Onwards to the next page!

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