The filename you give SonixPeek should be the name of a Sonix score file. If you don't specify any additional options, it just scans that file building a list of all the instruments found, and then outputs this list to the screen.
If you specify a directory instead of a file, then SonixPeek scans all the score files in that directory, building a list of instruments in each file. When it's finished, it outputs this list, minus duplicates. This lets you see the minimum set of instruments you need to have available to play all of those scores.
You can include more than one file and/or directory on the command line. In this case, all the files and directories included are scanned.
SonixPeek has a number of options which can be used to alter its behaviour. These are as follows:
-h@ @ Normally, SonixPeek outputs a header at the start of the list of
instruments, showing which files the instruments come from. This option
stops the header from being printed.
-i@ @ This option makes SonixPeek prompt you for confirmation for each score
file it finds, before including its instruments in the instrument list.
This is useful if you have a directory containing a large number
of score files, and you want to find out the instruments in about half
of them, since it saves you having to type each name out seperately.
-n@ @ SonixPeek normally prints out a list of files scanned and instruments
found as it is building the main instrument list (unless only a single file
was specified on the command line). This option suppresses the list.
-oF@ This option makes SonixPeek output the final list of instruments to the
file F, rather than standard output. This provides an alternative to
redirecting standard output with >F. There is a small difference between the
two however - the list of files mentioned in the discussion of -n is always
sent to standard output, so using -o has no effect on it.
-xD@ This option can be used to help simplify moving the instruments for
a set of scores to another disk. When specified, SonixPeek outputs a script
file suitable for use with AmigaDOS's EXECUTE command. This script file
copies all the instruments for the files scanned to directory D. Before
executing the script file, you should change your current directory to the
directory where all the instrument files are stored.
You can get a brief summary of the options available by invoking SonixPeek with no parameters. CTRL-C can be used to abort SonixPeek at any time.
The solution is less than elegant but it works; SonixPeek assumes that ALL instruments have a .ss file, and sets the failat level for the script file such that any copy commands which fail don't make the script file abort. The only alternative to this would be to allow an instrument directory to be specified as an option, and it would then be possible to determine what type each instrument was. This seems too much like hard work :-)
EMAIL: ecarroll@@cs.tcd.ie