@database "Interplay V4.1" @width 80 @wordwrap ## $VER: Interplay V4.1 © February 1996 ## Copyright (C) 1994/95/96 Stian André Olsen & Espen Skog ## ## Interplay Guide documentation ## ## ## Contents ## @node main "Interplay Documentation" @{u} I N T E R P L A Y V E R S I O N 4.1@{uu} @{fg highlight} © 1994/95/96 Stian André Olsen & Espen Skog SilverHawk Software @{fg text} @{" Read this first " link READTHIS} @{" About this program " link About} @{" Why we made it " link Why} @{" System requirements " link Requirements} @{" How to install " link Install} @{" Credits for Interplay " link Credits} @{" Legal information " link Legal} @{" How to contact the authors " link Authors} @{" Distribution " link Distribution} @{" History " link History} @{" Known bugs " link Bugs} @{" GUI explanation " link GUI} @{" The ARexx Interface " link ARexx} @{" Interplay supporting programs " link SupportProgs} @{" The menues " link Menues} @{" Final notes " link FinalNotes} @{" Greetings & Thanx " link greets} @endnode ;============================================================================================================ @node About "About this program" @{u}What is this ?@{uu} This is an Audio-CD player program for the Amiga. It was designed to work with the Archos Overdrive CD-Rom that has been very popular on the A1200, but it should work on other drives aswell. @{fg highlight} Amiga Computing: "This is one of the best CD players for the Amiga" Amiga Shopper: "Interplay 3.1 is an excellent audio CD player..." Amiga Shopper: "Rolls Royce's of CD players" @{fg text} Interplay should work fine with the following setups: * Archos' Overdrive * Zappo CD-Rom * SCSI CD-Rom drives under Kickstart 3.1 * HiSoft's Power CD-Rom (Using squirrel pcmcia scsi-2 interface) * Commodore CD32 (with SX-1 Module present) * Commodore CD32 (with ProModule present) * Other SCSI CD-Roms connected to the Squirrel scsi interface. * SCSI CD-Roms connected to a Dataflyer SCSI+ Interplay is reported to be working on these setups: * Archos' Overdrive * Zappo CD-Rom * SCSI CD-Rom using the Squirrel (tm) SCSI controller. * SCSI CD-Rom and Kickstart 3.1 * Commodore CD32 (using the SX-1 module) * Commodore CD32 (using the ProModule) * HiSoft's Power CD-Rom (Using squirrel pcmcia scsi-2 interface) We've not had the possibility to check Interplay on all the systems, but if you find out that it won't work properly on your setup, please report it to us and we will try to find the bug. @endnode ;****************************************************************************** @node Legal "Legal information" @{u}Legal information@{uu} Interplay V4.1 software and documentation is copyrighted 1994/95/96 by @{"Stian Andre Olsen" link Authors} and @{"Espen Skog" link authors}. All rights reserved. We take no responsibility for any damage that may appear after using this program. The software is provided "as is" and we reserve the right to update the software and documentation without notice. You may @{b}not@{ub} sell this program to gain personal profit what so ever without a written permission from the authors. @endnode ;****************************************************************************** @node Install "Installation of Interplay 4.1" @{u}How to install Interplay 4.1@{uu} Installation of Interplay is quite easy. Double-click on the Installer icon which came with this archive. It is using Commodore's Installer (tm). If you already have a Interplay.list installed (default is s:), the installer-script won't install the list which is provided with this archive. Threfore, if you want to replace it with the one you have on your disk, you should copy the file manually. @endnode ;****************************************************************************** @node Credits "Credits for this program" @{u}Credits@{uu} Credits for this brilliant Audio-CD player are as follows: All programming by @{"Stian Olsen" link Authors} who also stood for the user-support and collect bug-reports from various users around the world. Also, some bugtesting done by Stian. Installer-script done by Stian. The GUIs was made by@{"Espen Skog " link Authors} using GadtoolsBox. Bugtesting also by Espen. Document was written by Espen using Cygnus Ed Professional V3.5. Designing and the look of the player and its windows by Espen. @{fg highlight} Interplay is written in C, and some routines in Assembler, using SAS/C. @{fg text} @endnode ;****************************************************************************** @node Authors "Contact the authors" @{u}Contact us for suggestions and/or bug-reports:@{uu} Stian André Olsen Espen Skog Orrelia 2 Heer Allé 8 N-1440 Drøbak N-1445 HEER Norway Norway Email: stianol@ifi.uio.no Email: espen.skog@infolink.no WEB : www.ifi.uio.no/~stianol WEB: www.skolesjefen.oslo.no/skole/sofienberg/espen/espen.htm IRC : Decoy IRC: Palm Official Interplay-Homepage: http://www.ifi.uio.no/~stianol/Interplay Also try our BBS @{"SilverHawk BBS" link SilverHawk} at +47-64934100/80 (28k8,14k4) Amiga+C64 @endnode ;****************************************************************************** @node READTHIS "Information from the authors info..." @{u}Information@{uu} Welcome to another version. The previous version was just a beta-version and it had alot of bugs. Hopefully, this version is bugfree. At the moment, more than 20 bugs are removed, and therefore this version should be a much more stabile one to use. Maybe the biggest change this time is that we have added an @{"ARexx interface" link "arexx.guide/main"}. Due to some major changes to come in the player, the next real release may not come until april/may because it will have so many new features that we need alot of time to finish it. However, bug-fixed releases will of course be released as they are ready. So, keep those bug-reports coming. Without them, no bug-fixes would have been released. Please send us feedback so we can make Interplay an even better player. Send the bugreports to one of the @{"authors" link authors}. @endnode ;****************************************************************************** @node Distribution "Distribution of this software" @{u}Distribution@{uu} Interplay is Gift-Ware, and you may use it for free and make copies Interplay may be put on non-profit PD archives like Fred-Fish, AmiNet etc, but you must contact us if you do wish to include it in your compilation (And that goes for all you CoverDisk-Makes who doesn't seem to bother to read the distribution-notices). If you like this program and want to see future development, please mail us and tell us you like it. Or you could call, snail or even send us a postcard, or a little cool thing from your country. The important thing is that you let us know you use the program. This program package must only be spread with its full contents. You may _not_ delete any parts of this archive. /Interplay4.1/@{b}Interplay@{ub} /Interplay4.1/@{b}Interplay.guide@{ub} /Interplay4.1/@{b}Arexx.guide@{ub} /Interplay4.1/@{b}Interplay.Install@{ub} /Interplay4.1/Env/@{b}IPlay.prefs@{ub} /Interplay4.1/Env/@{b}IPlay2.prefs@{ub} /Interplay4.1/Env/@{b}IPlay3.prefs@{ub} /Interplay4.1/s/@{b}Interplay.list@{ub} @endnode ;****************************************************************************** @node history "History of Interplay" @{u}History@{uu} Version 4.1: * ARexx interface included (18/02/96) * Fixed a but with the iconify vs. screemmode * Updated Loop/TimeMode after an Iconify * Fixed the error with the StopMotor bit * After pressing Add Track in the program-editor, the number will not be reset to zero * Now only one copy of Interplay can be started. * Fixed an error with the Open Listview function * Corrected a little bug with the Pause button * If "Load specific Program" was on, and a cd had no program made for it, the cd wouldn't play :-) This is of course fixed. * Eject is now ghosted on CD32 systems after re-iconifying. * Fixed up alot of bugs when using a CD32. * Preview & Play should ve ghosted on CD32 when the tray is opened (not tested). * Fixed a problem with the Minimize button * Finally the SpeedSearch-Slider works * "Load Program" now works ok * Document rewritten and ARexx document added Version 4.0ß: * Programming mode made. (29/10/95) * Lots of minor bugs fixed. * Added joystick support. * Now remember the state of the window when iconified. * X-coordinate and Y-coordinate for the window was mixed up :) * When de-ticking the "Update/use Interplay.list" gadget, the artist and song gadgets was ghosted! Now fixed. * The skip buttons will also work in random mode. * Made installer script for the program. * Minimize window added. * User-defined Public-screen Version 3.2: * Not released due to lack of time. (xx/xx/xx) * Programming GUI implemented, and almost programmed. * Some new configuration-flags added. Version 3.1: * Fixed an error in the save-prefs routine which caused (03/09/95) the window to position wrong after the prefs was saved. * Corrected the bug that caused the name-of-track to to bug when registering a new cd. * Corrected the version number in the GUI :) Version 3.0: * GUI was again changed (I like to change GUI's :) ) (27/08/95) More room for track-names in the strinboxes now. * Hi-lighted the trackname in the List window. * Added a Speed Search slider, if you don't like searching that much. Now you can jump to the desired place in the track by just sliding the speed slider. * Added preference window. A lot of new features in this window is available. Read doc for more info.. * Checks the Vertical Blanking so the timer will work correctly on non 50 Hz screens too. * Made the speed search work correct. * Fixed some minor bugs when pressing the listwindow button. * When re-iconifying, the window will show up on the old location * Fixed a bug causing the artist database becoming corrupted. CD's with just one track will NOT be saved in the database. Will try to fix so it will recognise CD's with just one audio track also. * Wrote a completly new routine for search buttons. The speedsearch made the whole thing a bit more complicated so the easiest was to rewrite it. Looks like the new routine is a bit better than the old, but still you might get some seconds wrong on the counter. Version 2.0: * We changed the GUI a bit. It's now smaller and it (09/04/95) doesn't take up so much of the wb-screen as before. Some buttons (which where ghosted) are gone since we solved the problem with the CD-recognition in another way. * GUI for the Artist-editor was also designed. We had to make it small so that it wouldn't take up so much of the screen. * Iconify is now possible. Some guys reported it was neccesary so we just had to add it :-) * The special feature which recognizes CD's and leaves the user free to write name for the tracks and enter name of the artist/group is now included. This routine was originally in the previous version, but we decided to ghost it since it wasn't really finished. Now it is. * There was a problem if the timer got stressed so that the song wasn't finished before the timer reached 00:00:00 and then it went below zero. This is fixed now. Check out the cool comment in the timer when this occurs :-) * Removed some enforcer hits that made the player guru when iconified. * Fixed some minor bugs occuring on the CD32. * Stops the motor when Stop is pushed. * Search implemented. * Menues implemented. Version 1.0ß: * First release, but has been under development and (25/2/95) bugtesting for quite some time. Project first started when trying to control cd.device. This turned out to be working, and we made a GUI. Changed GUI about 3-4 times before we made the one you see in this version. GUI will probably change throughout future versions. Program-mode was designed, but not implemented in this version due to lack of time. Released 'cos of lack of interest to continue....bye @endnode ;****************************************************************************** @node Why "Why we made this program" @{u}Why did we make this ?@{uu} When I first got my Overdrive CD-Rom I looked at the CDDA player that Archos made, but I was not quite happy with how it worked and looked. Therefor we decided to make a new player based on the Gadtools library from Commodore. This gave the player a much better look and it didn't open a whole new screen like the one Archos made did, therefor it was very handy to have in the back of the workbench window. We also thought that the Archos player lacked quite a few features, plus that it bugged a bit :) The reason we made the version 2.0 and up was because we got quite some support from the users around the world. Without knowing someone was using our program, we would never had bothered to continue the project. But we did, and we thank you all who sent us letters and mail. Again, we would like to thank all the users around the world who has sent us positive reports aswell as bugreports. We are now closing up on the final release which will be V5.0. That version will have ALL the features you need for a cdda player, so when it is ready, you won't need to fiddle with any other players, because Interplay 5.0 will be @{b}THE@{ub} cdda player of the century. @endnode ;****************************************************************************** @node Bugs "Known bugs" @{u}Known bugs@{uu} Timer-Bug: There may be some errors in the timer when it's stressed alot. For instance, if you search back and forth and pause alot it may show ±1 second from the original time. Since this is such a small problem, we decided not to do more about it. If, for some reason, we find out that a 100% correct timer is needed, we will try to fix it. But in the meantime, this will do. Over-Cd: We've had trouble using Interplay with V11.3 of over-cd.handler, but it has been reported to work with v11.2! CD32: Some CD32 users has reported that the "Time left of track/cd" is always tilted. Could someone confirm this? Sliderbars: The number next to the sliderbars does change only the first times (when the slider is pressed down). I do not know what's wrong with this. We are using gadtools.library routines, so so they should work. If anyone got a solution to this problem please conntact us. @endnode ;****************************************************************************** @node Requirements "System requirements" @{u}System requirements@{uu} o Amiga with kick 3.0 or higher (preferably 3.1 if you use SCSI) o Overdrive CD-Rom or compatible (or SCSI CD-Rom drives, CD32 etc.) o About 90KB of free memory @endnode ;****************************************************************************** @node SupportProgs "Other programs that supports Interplay..." @{u}Support programs@{uu} We meant to make a program to merge two, or more, Interplay.list-files so that you can join your own Interplay.list with a friends list. Since someone already made this program, we decided not to make it. @{u}Here are the programs that are Interplay-compatible:@{uu} @{"Interplay CD-Editor" link Support_Editor} @endnode @node Support_Editor "Interplay CD-Editor..." @{u}Interplay CD-Editor@{uu} It is actually made explicitly for Interplay, and it works fine. You can merge lists, find errors and correct them, save them as Interplay-format and even ascii format. This program is called Interplay CD-Editor. The author is called Steven Ross and he contacted us and sent us a copy of this program and it worked perfectly. If you want to take a look at it, you can download it from AmiNet, or from the @{"Interplay Support BBS" link Silverhawk}. The most recent version of the Editor today is V1.08. Find it on AmiNet if you want to check your interplay.list files. @endnode ;****************************************************************************** @node gui "Description of the buttons" @{b} ============================================================== @{fg highlight} Documentation of the control-panel in Interplay@{fg text} ============================================================== @{ub} .---------------------------------------. |@{" Stop " link Stop}@{" Play " link Play}@{" Pause " link Pause}@{" Prev " link Prev}|@{"Counter " link Counter}| |@{"< Skip" link Skip}@{"Skip >" link Skip}@{" Track slider " link TrackSlider}|@{" Eject " link Eject}| |@{"< Back" link Search}@{"Forth>" link Search}@{"Search slider " link SpeedSearch}|@{"Minimize" link Minimize}| |@{"