Make text appear then disappear

How can I have text appear for a few seconds on the screen then disappear?
does it have to be done through a script, or does the engine handle it?

 

yes.

 

wow, very elaborate answer

 

This probably works. Haven't tested; just wrote straight into the forum post.

Code (csharp):

1. public Text WhateverTextThingy;  //Add reference to UI Text here via the inspector
2. private float timeToAppear = 2f;
3. private float timeWhenDisappear;
4.  
5. //Call to enable the text, which also sets the timer
6. public void EnableText()
7. {
8.     WhateverTextThingy.enabled = true;
9.     timeWhenDisappear = Time.time + timeToAppear;
10. }
11.  
12. //We check every frame if the timer has expired and the text should disappear
13. void Update()
14. {
15.     if (WhateverTextThingy.enabled && (Time.time >= timeWhenDisappear))
16.     {
17.         WhateverTextThingy.enabled = false;
18.     }
19. }

Though when I do this kind of thing in my own games, I usually go more elaborate. Such as moving the text up the screen while I lower the text color's alpha to have it fade out instead of disappear. And I have some manager doing all this for multiple text objects, and flow control of messages so they aren't displayed on top of each other. Not exactly sure what you are going for though.

 

Thanks a bunch Joe!!! Wow, that is amazing, wish I could just program out of my head like you do.

does that script go on the Text object or the canvas?

very new here, look a fade in and out would be great, and a management system (i have one for my audio) would be great, but im not sure how, looked on youtube, no tutorials.

 

this was awesome

 

The short script I posted just needs to be on some active gameobject with a reference to the Text component. It could be on the same object as the Text component.

 

Where do I put my text and or my text name in UI I can't figure that out for some reason.

 

I'm not exactly sure what you're asking. A UI Text is a component you put on a GameObject. See any basic UI tutorial for dealing with the placement of these objects.

 

Very cool, Thanks.

 

If you'd have to move the text up the screen, how would you do that?
Would you do that using Animation (Animating UI Text) or some sort of script?

Actually, I'm trying to find how to move the text up the screen while lowering it's Colors alpha value.

 

I think I was talking about just changing the text object's position every frame.

 

How do I need to reference Text on line one in order for unity to know what the code is addressing?
Is there a certain script I need to write in order to declare Text?

 

Text in this example refers to a Text component. You'd have the Text component attached to a GameObject, and set the reference for this script to it by just dragging it over in the Inspector.

Unity moved all the UI stuff into its own package for Unity versions from the past couple years, which is why UI.Text is absent from the official scripting reference unless you go back to somewhere around 2017.x versions. I believe this is the package documentation though:

https://docs.unity3d.com/Packages/com.unity.ugui@1.0/manual/UIVisualComponents.html

 

Alright I'll try it out real quick!

 

I tried doing what you suggested and I'm still getting a compile error.

 

The portion of the script I posted isn't a complete script. You'll need the UI package installed, and you'll need the following line at the top of the script, in addition to all the other stuff you need to make a complete script.

Code (csharp):

1. using UnityEngine.UI;

 

For anyone still looking, Invoke is another easy way to set a timer to make text disappear:

Code (CSharp):

1.  
2. using UnityEngine;
3. using UnityEngine.UI;
4. public class CanvasScript : MonoBehaviour
5. {
6. public Text canvasText1;
7.    void Start ()
8.    {
9.       Invoke("DisableText", 5f);//invoke after 5 seconds
10.    }
11.    void DisableText()
12.    {
13.       canvasText1.enabled = false;
14.    }
15. }
16.  

(Work smart not hard)