Trivia Overdrive is a fun and simple terminal-based trivia game intended for my final project of the Microprocessors I course. It also utilizes ncurses for UI, as an extra fun attempt at UI/UX eye-candy and a personal challenge for bettering my skills. Due to some weird issues with attempting to include the PDcurses libraries on our Windows 11 lab computers, I opted to write this on Linux and potentially set up a github workflow to build the application automatically and perhaps have it compile a Windows-compatible version.

The following are my goals with this project, as for what I can achieve by the submission date or beyond.

• Write the core functionality: the main functions that allow me to track scores, hold the questions, etc.
• Write the curses UI: the primary UI of the project
• Automatically port to Windows: As explained above, we were technically required to build these applications on Windows to streamline the grading process, however it has evidently not been super possible to do. This is likely to be a github workflow.

The project was subjected to several requirements as to allow for streamlined grading guidelines by the professor. Such requirements were (but not limited to):

• Utilizing arrays for storing the questions;
• Randomizing the array index to present a different question each time;
• Ensuring that input types align with the specifications (strings, integers, etc);
• Implementing sound effects using WAV files for various stages (game start, right/wrong answers, score display, ambient music, etc);
• Offering an option to quit the game or continue for more questions during gameplay;
• Implementing a score counter to track progress

The following information is required as part of the submission process, as to prove that I have a deep understanding of the project, testing it and verifying it works before submission.

As per how Trivia Overdrive works in general, the following mermaid chart summarizes the paths the program goes through based on user input.

graph TD;
    m{ExecInit}-->IntroSequence;
    IntroSequence-->MainMenu;
    MainMenu-->Session_TopicSelect;
    MainMenu-->ShowLicense;
    ShowLicense-->MainMenu;
    MainMenu-->u{ExecTerm};
    e(KEY_F1)-->u{ExecTerm};
    Session_TopicSelect-->TopicRandom;
    TopicRandom-->ACTION_SelectRandomTopic;
    Session_TopicSelect-->TopicButchery;
    ACTION_SelectRandomTopic-->TopicButchery;
    Session_TopicSelect-->TopicCitiesOfCanada;
    ACTION_SelectRandomTopic-->TopicCitiesOfCanada;
    Session_TopicSelect-->TopicSocialMediaPlatforms;
    ACTION_SelectRandomTopic-->TopicSocialMediaPlatforms;
    Session_TopicSelect-->TopicElementsOfTheEarth;
    ACTION_SelectRandomTopic-->TopicElementsOfTheEarth;
    Session_TopicSelect-->TopicWebBrowsers;
    ACTION_SelectRandomTopic-->TopicWebBrowsers;
    TopicButchery-->Session_StartGameSession;
    TopicCitiesOfCanada-->Session_StartGameSession;
    TopicSocialMediaPlatforms-->Session_StartGameSession;
    TopicElementsOfTheEarth-->Session_StartGameSession;
    TopicWebBrowsers-->Session_StartGameSession;
    Session_StartGameSession-->Session_QuestionPrompt;
    Session_QuestionPrompt-->CHECK_IsGameFinished;
    Session_QuestionPrompt-->Check_IsGameRunning;
    Check_IsGameRunning-->i(1-2-3-4);
    i(1-2-3-4)-->CHECK_AnswerCorrect;
    i(1-2-3-4)-->CHECK_AnswerWrong;
    CHECK_AnswerCorrect-->ACTION_AddPointToScore;
    ACTION_AddPointToScore-->DisplayVerdict;
    CHECK_AnswerWrong-->DisplayVerdict;
    DisplayVerdict-->ACTION_IncreaseQuestionStep;
    ACTION_IncreaseQuestionStep-->Session_QuestionPrompt;
    CHECK_IsGameFinished-->ShowScore_WinOrLose;
    ShowScore_WinOrLose-->PromptUserContinue;
    PromptUserContinue-->PromptYes;
    PromptUserContinue-->PromptNo;
    PromptYes-->MainMenu;
    PromptNo-->u{ExecTerm};

The following describes in brief detail the way we achieve audio with the taken approach. As I had limited time, I needed to make sure I could play sound effects asynchronously to enhance feedback to the player. This is the approach I came up with, by creating a child process and passing off sounds to VLC:

graph LR;
    l{MainProcess}-->b(playAudioFunction);
    b(playAudioFunction)-->c{fork}
    c{fork}-->v{ChildProcess};
    v{ChildProcess}-->d(system->vlc);
    d(system->vlc)-->j{TermChildProcess}

Note that during all animations, keypresses are put into a queue until arriving to a getch() call, which unless looped, will only take one from the queue. All getch()-based calls are either checked for valid input or used as a press any key to continue prompt. For this reason, all input scenarios are not prone to unexpected behavior. Also note that many navigation menus in this game use a loop that relies on getch() not reading KEY_F(13), which is not a standard key available on standard keyboards. If you use a custom keyboard which does use the additional Function keys such as KEY_F(13), you may encounter unexpected behavior that would result in a segmentation fault. As of the time of writing this report, I do not know of a standard key that would never make it on keyboards, so this solution works for me.

Trivia Overdrive allows you to quit immediately without effort via KEY_F(1), which is the F1 key. The following scenarios are all places where the key can be used and is tested.

Trivia Overdrive makes use of 3 different navigation menus which makes use of the arrow keys for movement. This makes for an interesting test case as the way it was programmed would only allow it to choose the action once you press the ENTER key. Note that wrap-arounds are trivial and essentially check if the position is lower than minimums or higher than maximums in the grid and sets it to the maximum or minimum respectively, hence the simple test case.

As described previously, Trivia Overdrive allows you to navigate the options before you select it. The following table assumes that with each scenario, you navigated to the button on screen before pressing the ENTER key.

Trivia Overdrive makes use of shuffled arrays via the Fisher-Yates shuffle algorithm. This makes testing each individual case impossible for a test case sheet for each possible question and answers (As it stands, the game totals 75 total questions and 300 total answers, not to mention each session being shuffled randomly for a unique order every time). However, the approach taken for input keys lies in how we compare answers. The last character of a string in each array is set to a number between 1 to 4. This results in the unique opportunity for comparing directly the user input to the answer. So therefore, the following mermaid chart describes this visually:

graph LR;
    q{UserInput};
    q-->Input:1;
    q-->Input:2;
    q-->Input:3;
    q-->Input:4;

    w{Answer};
    w-->Answer:1;
    w-->Answer:2;
    w-->Answer:3;
    w-->Answer:4;

    e{CompareInputAndAnswer};
    Input:1-->e;
    Input:2-->e;
    Input:3-->e;
    Input:4-->e;
    Answer:1-->e;
    Answer:2-->e;
    Answer:3-->e;
    Answer:4-->e;

    r{InputIsSameAsAnswer};
    t{InputIsDifferentFromAnswer};

    e-->r;
    e-->t;

Finally, note that all other input types not indicated with the hints on the footer of the primary window are ignored by the menus. Testing these everywhere is essentially futile as it by design does not care unless it's defined as a switch case.

I'm a huge proponent of free and open source software, regardless of how bad or stellar the quality of my work is. I know that my work may help someone with a similar idea or is just generally trying to learn C on their own, which is why I decided to license it under the MIT license. I would suggest as courtesy to also have your derivative projects be open source, but since I understand that some projects may not be allowed that luxury, you have that freedom as a result of the chosen license.

The following is a copy of the license, which can also be found under the LICENSE file:

Copyright (c) 2023 Lexi Charron

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.