home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
17 Bit Software 6: Level 6
/
17 Bit - Level 6 (1998)(Epic Marketing)[!].iso
/
quartz
/
p058.dms
/
p058.adf
/
JamCracker.doc
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1990-09-18
|
11KB
|
274 lines
JamCracker V1.0 is Copyware, written by M. Gemmel.
Therefore, it should be copied to many others, spreading
it over the entire world. It may be modified, cracked,
recracked and messed up as long as it remains clear that
the author, M. Gemmel has nothing to do with such
modifications and is in no way responsible for any
resulting physical and/or mental damage.
JAMCRACKER V1.0 FUNCTIONS
¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨
Make sure you have read the ReadMe file on this disk too.
This is not an official manual. As you read this, features could have
been changed, added or removed. Don't expect this document to be
complete.
All numbers displayed by JamCracker are hexadecimal. This document
will not teach how to interpret hexadecimal numbers, so if you're not
familiar with this representation of numbers, please refer to the
appropriate literature. In this document, hexadecimal numbers are
preceded by a $.
SONG CONTROL
¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨
This is the window where the song table can be altered, the song can
be played, and where errors are displayed.
- LENGTH indicates the current song length in patterns. The length
of a song can be max. $FF patterns. It is always > 0.
- POSITION indicates the current position in the song table. 0
Means the start of the table, $FE is the end.
- PATTERN is the pattern number at this POSITION. You can change it
to play a different pattern at this POSITION. You can't make it
larger than the highest pattern number you've allocated.
- SIZE displays the size of the song in bytes, as it will be when
saved.
- FREE MEM shows the amount of free CHIP memory. All memory
allocated by JamCracker is CHIP memory.
- PLAY plays the song, starting at this POSITION. When the last
position is done, it restarts at position 0.
- STOP stops playing the song. (See STOPPING PLAY)
- LOAD loads a song. (See THE FILE-REQUESTER)
- SAVE stores a song. (See THE FILE-REQUESTER).
- CLEAR clears the song and all patterns and instruments. It will
ask you to confirm this choice.
- QUIT quits the program. It will ask you to confirm this choice.
- ABOUT shows some information about the program.
- SHOW will let you take a look at the files, without doing anything
with them. (See THE FILE-REQUESTER).
- DELETE lets you delete a file. (See THE FILE-REQUESTER).
- The ERRORS area displays any errors you have made/caused. Along
with an error message, the screen is flashed to get your attention
for the error.
CUSTOM WAVEFORM
¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨
Here you can edit/load/save your own waveform, which can be used as
an instrument. Custom waveform sizes are $40 bytes. They are much
smaller than the common digitized instruments, and therefore, you can
use a lot of them without wasting much memory.
- To edit a waveform you just move around in the editor with the
left mousebutton pressed.
- ZERO clears this waveform.
- SINE generates a sine-waveform.
- TRIANGLE generates a triangle-waveform.
- SQUARE generates a square-waveform.
- SAW generates a sawtooth-waveform.
- RANDOM generates a randomly shaped waveform.
- FLIP X flips the waveform over the Y-axis.
- FLIP Y flips the waveform over the X-axis.
- DOUBLE doubles this waveform, which means it will sound an octave
higher.
- HALVE replaces this waveform with its first half.
- UNDO lets you undo any of the above functions, as well as UNDO
itself and LOAD.
- LOAD loads a waveform. (See THE FILE-REQUESTER)
- SAVE stores a waveform. (See THE FILE-REQUESTER)
INSTRUMENT
¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨
In this window you can determine which instrument to use for editing
a pattern and playing notes directly.
- NUMBER shows the current instrument number. You may have up to
$100 instruments in memory (if they fit), but you can't increase
the NUMBER if the current instrument is not used (empty).
- SIZE shows the size of the current instrument in bytes.
- TYPE shows either '(None)' if there is no instrument here,
'Normal' if you've loaded a common digitized instrument here, or
'Custom' if this instrument is a custom waveform.
- NAME is the (displayable part of the) name of this instrument.
- LOAD loads an instrument. (See THE FILE-REQUESTER). Note that if
you've saved a custom waveform, and you load it here, it will
become a 'Normal' instrument automatically.
- CLEAR removes this instrument from memory.
- ONCE/LOOP lets you determine if this instrument is played once,
or repeated at the end. 'Custom' instruments are always set on
LOOP.
- COPY FROM WAVEFORM makes the current custom waveform in the
Custom Waveform window the current instrument. Although custom
waveforms are $40 bytes, SIZE will display $180 which is the amount
of memory a custom waveform consumes when it's made an instrument.
- COPY TO CUSTOM copies this instrument to the Custom Waveform
window. You can do this only if the TYPE is 'custom' or if the
SIZE is $40.
- OCTAVE can be UPPER or LOWER. It is the octave at which notes are
edited or played directly.
PATTERN EDITOR
¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨
In this window you can edit all patterns used in a song. Patterns are
groups of 4 channels, and each channel is a group of notes. Patterns
can be max. $40 notes long, and min. 1 note. When you click in this
window, the pattern cursor becomes visible and you can start or
continue editing notes.
You use the cursor keys to move the cursor in any direction.
<Left shift> in combination with <cursor up> or <cursor down> will
move the cursor $10 notes at a time.
The format of a note is: XX YYY IISAAVVPVVVPPP
where: IISAAVVPVVVPPP are the note's info-numbers.
and: XX is the note number (which cannot be changed like the rest);
YYY is the note itself. It is '---' if there's no note here;
II is the instrument used to play this note;
S is the pattern play speed;
AA is the arpeggio info;
VV is the vibrato info;
P is the phase-shift speed;
VVV is the volume info;
PPP is the portamento info;
To enter a note, position the cursor over YYY and type a 'note key'.
The same for all other info numbers; position the cursor, and enter
the data.
S - The play speed is a number from 0-$F. It is the time in
1/50th of a second to wait between two notes. If it is 0, the
speed will remain unaffected.
AA - These are two number from 0-$E each. They set the arpeggio
notes. Arpeggio is the rapid change of pitch of one note, so
that it will sound like two or three notes played
simultaneously. Each number represents the YYY note number +
the number. For example, if YYY is C-2, and AA is 30, the
notes C-2 and D#2 will be played.
VV - These are two numbers, from 0-$E, and from 0-$F. The first
number is the vibrato size, the second is the vibrato speed.
P - The phase shift speed is a number from 0-$F. It will have
effect only on custom instruments. What is does is to shift
the phase of the played wave at a certain speed, which makes
the tone sound kind of special.
VVV - The first V of the volume info is S, U, or D. The next VV is a
number from 00 to $40. If the first V is S, it means the volume
will be set at level VV. If the first V is U, the volume will
slide up to level $40 with speed VV. If the first V is D, the
volume will slide down to 0 with speed VV.
PPP - The first V of the portamento info can also be S, U, or D. The
next PP can be a number from 00 to $7E. U means the pitch will
slide up with speed PP, D lets the pitch slide down, and for S
to have effect you must have entered a note YYY. S will then
slide the pitch to the pitch of the note YYY with speed PP.
All effects except arpeggio will stay in effect as long as possible,
once they've been activated.
The TAB key, pressed at any position in AAVVPVVVPPP will enter one or
more '-'. It means that the current effect (for which you have
pressed the TAB) will stop. Pressing the TAB key over YYY will
either make the current note the last note of this pattern (place a
'pattern break') or it will make the size $40 again if you press it
over the last note of this pattern.
To insert a note, press RETURN. All notes starting at the current
position will be moved down.
To delete a note, press BACKSPACE. All notes starting at the next
position will be moved up. The last note becomes 'empty'.
To delete a note without moving notes, press DEL.
When entering a note YYY, it will sound. When entering an
info-number, you will hear nothing (special).
- PATTERN displays the current pattern number. You may have up to
$100 patterns in memory (if they fit). You can't increase the
PATTERN number if the current pattern is not yet used. Note also
that you can't clear a pattern from memory like an instrument.
- CUT, COPY, and PASTE cuts, copies or pastes a pattern.
- CHANNEL lets you change the channel you want to edit. You can
edit max. 4 channels of notes.
- CUT, COPY, and PASTE cuts, copies or pastes a channel.
- AUDIO can be ON or OFF, which means this channel will be heard or
not when playing the pattern or the song.
- PLAY plays this pattern.
- STOP stops playing. (See STOPPING PLAY)
- LOAD loads a pattern. (See THE FILE-REQUESTER)
- SAVE stores a pattern. (See THE FILE-REQUESTER)
STOPPING PLAY
¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨
The STOP gadgets are actually dummies. You do not have to click them
to stop playing. To stop playing, just do anything that would get
JamCracker's attention, like pressing any key or clicking any gadget.
THE FILE-REQUESTER
¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨
When choosing LOAD, SAVE, SHOW or DELETE, you will be prompted for a
file with JamCracker's file requester where all files/directories in
the specified path are displayed alphabetically; .info files are
ignored.
DF0:, DF1:, DF2:, DF3:, DH0:, and the parent directory can be chosen
with the gadgets at the bottom. You can click a file and then OK to
do what you wanted to do, or you can click a directory to see its
contents.
The file requester can create its own little file called '.beepdir'.
If the disk is write-enabled, and there is enough room, all names
will be saved in the file .beepdir in this path. This is extremely
time-saving when you're working with large directories (like
instrument disks/directories). When the file requester finds a
.beepdir file, it will load it and assuming it is complete, the names
will be displayed. The only way to read the full directory without
reading .beepdir is to select the path-stringgadget (by clicking in it
and pressing return).
CANCEL cancels the operation, and nothing has happened.
SPECIAL KEYS
¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨
When you're not editing info-numbers in the Pattern Editor, the
following keys will generate a tone:
ZSXDCVGBHNJM (lower octave), Q2W3ER5T6Y7U (upper octave)
The F1-key will change the octave (displayed in the Instrument
window).
The F10-key will toggle the titlebar.
The left shift key will not only move the pattern cursor by $10
notes, but when clicking an arrow-gadget, the number will increase or
decrease by $10, if possible.
One final note about this version: if the beep font is not in FONTS:
or if there is insufficient memory, JamCracker will just exit without
a warning. A number of (semi-) bugs are known, but should not prevent
'normal' use of the software.
M. Gemmel, author