Learning Outcomes

When you have completed this assignment, you should understand:

• How to break down a problem into parts using Classes.
• How to write your own Class.
• How to use your own Classes in a client program.
• How to use 2D arrays and text files to store data.
• How to print a text art image using 2D arrays and Objects.
• Some basic procedural distribution in graphics.

You will write a program that draws a ascii text art picture to the console. Download the template files Picture.java and Sprite.java from Assignment #6 on conneX, along with the other files Screen.java and Point.java. Write the missing code for the methods in the Sprite.java template, then use it to complete the client program Picture.java, and as usual, compile and test your code often as you write it up.

The template in Sprite.java is set up so that you will write code to read in the lines of a text file that contains some small 2D ascii art. The format of the file should read in two numbers first, the number of lines followed by the maximum number of characters in a line. For example:

There should be no extra spaces at the end of any line, and note that you will be writing code that reads files one line at a time, instead of one token at a time. The reason for this is so that you can clearly see the ascii text art in the file you will be using, and allows you to read in space characters. Remember, that Java has a small issue with Scanner calling nextLine after nextInt, and you have to make one extra call to nextLine because of it, as weve seen before.

The Sprite.java class has a 2D char array called art to hold the characters read in from your

text file. Make sure when you fill it with the file information that you finish each row of the 2D array by filling it with any necessary space characters. There is also a Point field called p that should tell a Sprite instance where to draw the bottom-left corner of the 2D array to an instance of a Screen (called panel).

The draw method should only set a char value to the panel if it is not a space character. The get method is only to make accessing the 2D art array avoid the confusion of using indices out of order with typical coordinate systems (x for horizontal, then y for vertical). Use the get method in the draw method to make your code easier to read.

The setCorner and put methods can be written in one statement, and are very simple. Do not overthink them. They give their corresponding field variables an instance of an object from the parameter. You need to use variable shadowing in put.

Use the Sprite class to create three instances in your Picture.java client code, with three corresponding text files that each contain ascii art like the cat shown above. Please stick to art that is within 15 rows by 30 columns. Feel free to use something you find on the Internet or make your own. When you initialize a Sprite using the constructor, make sure to pass in the filename so it knows where to find the data it needs to create itself.

You need to make sure to call put for each Sprite instance so that it knows which Screen to draw itself. You also need to call setCorner so it knows where on the Screen to draw itself. You can reset the corner and call draw as many times as you want to have the Sprite appear in different places on the Screen.

Repeat the three different instances of Sprite each in three random places drawn on the Screen using an instance of Javas Random class (so you will have nine images in total). Restrict the placement so that none of the Sprite instances draw over the edge of the boundaries of your Screen instance. It is okay if the copies draw on top of each other when randomly placed.

Part of procedural graphics (generating images from math) is a concept called Barnacling. It is a design choice to randomly distribute smaller objects nearby larger ones, because nature tends to do this naturally on its own instead of being completely random.

Use Barnacling to draw, for each copy of your Sprite drawings, 20 asterisk (*) characters placed randomly nearby the copy (approx. at most 5 chars away from its border). Use whatever formulae you feel will do the best to achieve this. It is okay for some of the asterisks to print on top of each other.

Your finished code should output something similar to the image on the next page.

Please submit both your finished Picture.java, Sprite.java, and your three sprite text ascii art files to conneX.