Debounce

A debounce system is a set of code that keeps a function from running too many times. It comes from the idea of mechanical switch bounce, where a switch bounces when pushed, creating multiple signals. In the context of ROBLOX, this problem occurs mainly with the Touched event, when a part touches another multiple times in a short space of time, but may be useful in other cases as well.

Theory

Let's say you have a button on the floor. When you jump on the button, it prints a message to the output. Your code would look like this:

<SyntaxHighlight code="lua"> Workspace.Button.Touched:connect(function(hit)

   print("Button pressed") --Print the message
   wait(1)                 --Wait for 1 second
   print("Hi :D")          --Print another message

end)

This will put this message in the output: <SyntaxHighlight code="lua"> Button pressed Hi :D The problem is that because of the way the physics engine handles the collision, it will not register just one collision, but may cause several Touched events to fire, so your output will look more like this: Button pressed Button pressed Button pressed Button pressed Button pressed Hi :D Hi :D Hi :D Hi :D Hi :D Rather than executing sequentially, all the event handlers execute at the same time.

Here is a possible scenario you may encounter:

If you're using a button to regenerate a model then it will make 5 of whatever you are regenerating. This is an issue because all 5 will be in the same spot causing all kinds of problems. This can problem can easily be avoided by using a simple debounce system in your code. Of course, you could use a ClickDetector for your button, which would correct the problem, but you can't always use ClickDetectors, so sometimes, a debounce would be useful.

This is how a basic debounce system works:

When an action happens, such as someone pressing your floor button, the script locks any new function calls until a time passes or the action is complete.

Use Case

It's fairly simple to convert an existing script to using debounce. Let's use the same script we had above, and add a couple of lines. In this case we will put in a time limit to wait for until the function can be run again.

<SyntaxHighlight code="lua"> local buttonPressed = false --Store whether the button is pressed in a local variable

Workspace.Button.Touched:connect(function(hit)

   if not buttonPressed then
   -- Is it not pressed?

       buttonPressed = true
       -- Mark it as pressed, so that other handlers don't execute

       print("Button pressed")
       wait(1)
       print("Hi :D")
       -- Do Stuff

       buttonPressed = false
       -- Mark it as not pressed, so other handlers can execute again
   end

end)

This will cause your output to look like this: Button pressed Hi :D

That's more like it! You can use this same concept, by adding the same 4 lines to different scripts, in most any script involving functions. It doesn't even have to just be touched objects, it can be used to keep people from pressing a button more than once, firing a weapon more often than you want, or preventing a new event from happening before the old one is done. Take a look at the next example.

Real World

Here's the Local Gui script of the Rocket Launcher tool:

<SyntaxHighlight code="lua"> enabled = true function onButton1Down(mouse)

   if not enabled then
       return
   end

   enabled = false
   mouse.Icon = "rbxasset://textures\\GunWaitCursor.png"

   wait(12)
   mouse.Icon = "rbxasset://textures\\GunCursor.png"
   enabled = true

end

When you fire a rocket, the script shows the reload icon. Then the function waits for 12 seconds. During this time, enabled is false, so if the player tries to fire another rocket, the script won't run because the function will just return right away. After the 12 seconds are up, the reload cursor goes away and enabled becomes true again, allowing the user to fire another rocket.

Advanced notation

After a while, it might get tedious defining a separate debounce variable for each event handler. Instead, you can write a debounce function, that returns a debounced copy of its first argument.

<SyntaxHighlight code="lua"> function debounce(func)

   local isRunning = false    -- Create a local debounce variable
   return function(...)       -- Return a new function
       if not isRunning then
           isRunning = true

           func(...)          -- Call it with the original arguments

           isRunning = false
       end
   end

end

Applying this to the original code:

<SyntaxHighlight code="lua"> Workspace.Button.Touched:connect(debounce(function(hit)

   print("Button pressed") --Print the message
   wait(1)                 --Wait for 1 second
   print("Hi :D")          --Print another message

end))