A table is one way to go. The programming required to cycle through an array of data, picking out each value in turn, is quite straightforward, but the process needs careful design. If you think about the process as a series of steps through the swing, then at any one time each LED will have a colour (including black, or off). Obviously you can’t describe the whole string at each instant, but you can describe the time at which any change occurs. The question is, what information do you have to maintain in the table to describe that change?
If the display was just a band of lighted LEDS running from one end of the strip to the other, then the process is fairly simple. The table contains a list of events describing the time at which the event needs to occur, the LED involved and the new colour information for that LED. Each time around the loop you look at the next item in the list and compare it to the clock. If its time has arrived you set the indicated LED to the indicated state, and check the next event. In the simplest version this state would be on or off.
The display strip is controlled by an array with one element for each LED. To change the display you adjust the array element to its new state and transmit the entire array, so if you know the new colour for the LED that just changed, that part is easy.
With careful calculation of the table values you can have a display in which the lighted band of LEDS moves at a particular speed along the strip, and also changes in length. As the lighted band simply moves from one end to the other, you have two table entries for each LED. That’s probably a manageable table.
If the display is a little more complex, such as a length of white LEDS indicating speed and a section in the middle of red LEDs indicating the position of the putter, then each LED could change state four times (white, red, white, off), and the table of events is twice as large. If you want the LEDS to fade in and out (for example) then a table becomes impractical.
The alternative to the table is an algorithm that calculates putter position and speed at each tick of the clock and uses that data to select the required colour for each LED based on the relationship between the LED position in the string and the parameters - that is, colour for each LED is selected based on the LED distance and direction from the putter position and the current putter speed. If you want to also display the position of the ball, that becomes an additional calculation. That’s probably how the product you have referenced does it, and is effectively what you describe for making the Excel table. It provides the greatest flexibility, but as every LED is recalculated at every tick of the clock, you would need a fast processor.
thanks!
