Keypress to run a macro whilst on DoEvents

Z

Zygorf

New Member
Joined
Apr 27, 2004
Messages
2
I currently have a little excel snake game made which uses a variable called 'direction' which can have the value left, right, up or down to determine direction the code below shows basically how the code presently works:

Code: 
Sub snake()
start:
if direction = "left"
'move left
end if
if direction = "right"
'move right
end if
if direction = "up"
'move up
end if
if direction = "down"
'move down
end if
'wait for x seconds
doevents
goto start
End sub

'the below is repeated for left, right. up, down
Sub left()
 direction = "left"
End sub

The macro "left" is assigned to a command button which when pressed obviously changes direction variable, this works fine. Is there any way to do this on a keypress of the left arrow. unfortunately as I have seen from searching there appears to be no way to get an onkey command to run during a DoEvents break.
 

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DoEvents in itself does not create a delay. You will see that I have used Sleep here to stop things happening too fast. I guess that as you add more code - which will slow things down - the onetenth second delay can be reduced. You will also see that I have had to use it more than once with NT4/XL97.

To register keypresses we have to use an API call. Here is some experimental code I have written. Using API gave rise to strange behaviour here. This is why I have used a named cell range instead of ActiveCell. The Delete key is used to end the macro, but obviously you can use any other.

Things might be different with your setup.

Code: 
'------------------------------------------------
'- Keypress Up/Down/Left/Right gaming experiment
'- moves selection & colours cells to show path taken.
'- Brian Baulsom October 2004
'------------------------------------------------
Declare Function GetKeyState Lib "user32" _
    (ByVal nVirtKey As Long) As Integer
'-----------------------------------------------
Const MePressed = &H1000
Dim Direction As String
Dim BackGround As Boolean
'- cell position
Dim rw As Long
Dim cl As Integer
Dim Here As Range
'-------------------------------------------------

Sub aKeyLoop()
    '- initialise
    BackGround = False
    rw = 1
    cl = 1
    ActiveSheet.Range("A1:Z37").Interior.ColorIndex = xlNone
    Set Here = ActiveSheet.Range("A1")
    Here.Select
    '-------------------------------------------------------
    '- Press Delete key to end loop
    While (GetKeyState(vbKeyDelete) And MePressed) = False
        '- check keys
        If GetKeyState(vbKeyLeft) And MePressed Then
            Direction = "Left"
            If cl > 1 Then cl = cl - 1
        ElseIf GetKeyState(vbKeyRight) And MePressed Then
            Direction = "Right"
            If cl < 26 Then cl = cl + 1
        ElseIf GetKeyState(vbKeyUp) And MePressed Then
            Direction = "Up"
            If rw > 1 Then rw = rw - 1
        ElseIf GetKeyState(vbKeyDown) And MePressed Then
            Direction = "Down"
            If rw < 37 Then rw = rw + 1
        Else
            Direction = "None"
        End If
        DoEvents
        '------------------------------------------------
        If Direction = "None" Then
            '- see loop is working
            BackGround = Not BackGround
            Here.Interior.ColorIndex = _
                             IIf(BackGround, 50, xlNone)
        Else
            '- move
            Here.Interior.ColorIndex = 50
            Set Here = _
               ActiveSheet.Range(Cells(rw, cl), Cells(rw, cl))
            Here.Select
        End If
        DoEvents
        '------------------------------------------------
        '- end loop
        Sleep 100       ' delay 1/10 second
        '-------------------------------------------------
    Wend
    '- exit
    MsgBox ("Finished.")
End Sub
 
Upvote 0
Sorry - you need this declaration to have it work :-
Code: 
Public Declare Sub Sleep Lib "kernel32" _
(ByVal dwMilliseconds As Long)
 
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