From saz@tapetracker.com Wed Apr 10 11:22:40 1996 Message-Id: <2.2.32.19960410182323.006e4160@well.com> Date: Wed, 10 Apr 1996 11:23:23 -0700 From: Steve Zimmerman Subject: TapeTracker Information Here is the lastest info on TapeTracker. *************************************************************** *********** SoftSell Systems Information Server ************* *************************************************************** * SoftSell Systems * * Attn.:Steve Zimmerman * * 300 Drakes Landing Road * * Suite 100 * * Greenbrae, CA 94904 * * Email: saz@tapetracker.com * * http://tapetracker.com/ * * ftp.tapetracker.com/pub/sssystems * * Phone: (415) 461-2440 Ext. 209 / Fax: (415) 461-2270 * *************************************************************** Thank you for using the SoftSell Systems' Information Server. Following is information regarding SoftSell Systems' TapeTracker for Windows product. If you need more information please feel to contact us directly by email, phone or fax. If you have a Web browser, take a look at our home page located at "http://tapetracker.com/". This home page includes a Virtual Tour of the TapeTracker program by means of GIF screen shots. The remainder of this document covers the following topics: - What is TapeTracker? - Major Features - System Requirements - Distribution - Pricing - Legal Stuff What is TapeTracker? -------------------- TapeTracker for Windows is a cataloging and reference system for collectors of live musical recordings. TapeTracker was born out of dissatisfaction with existing products that perform similar functions and is designed to serve the needs of both the casual collector and insatiable trader. The program is available for a 30 day evaluation period free by download or for a nominal shipping and handling charge (just covering costs) if mailed on disk. TapeTracker handles an unlimited number of artists and listings. For each "Listing" (recording of a musical performance) you can store the following information: - Artist - Date - Venue - City - State - Source - Media - Noise Reduction - SCMS Status - Sound Rating - Generation - Set 1,2 and 3 set lists - Running times for each Set - Comments (Inserted on J Cards) - Notes (Not inserted on J Cards. Used for technical info) - Date Added (to your collection) - Microphones used - Trader (Who the recording was acquired from) - Attendance (Whether you attended the show) - Favorite (To tag your current favorite recordings for easy lookup). You can use as many or as few of these fields as you like. Manipulation of Listings occurs within the three distinct "views". - Summary View - Detail View - Add/Edit View All views are initially filtered by whomever you set as your Current Artist. The Summary View shows Date, Venue, City, State, Sound Rating, Noise Reduction, Media, Source and Generation and displays ten listings per page. The Detail and Add/Edit Views include all available information for a single listing. The Summary and Detail views are read-only. Major Features: --------------- Perhaps the most daunting problem facing anyone starting to use a program designed to track tapes is the inital process of data entry. Within TapeTracker, every effort has been made to ease this burden. * Importing from an Existing Tape List * If you have a tape list in the form of a text file, you can import this list directly into TapeTracker. All you have to do is to get the file into an appropriately formatted tab delimited text file. * Importing from the Show Databases * TapeTracker includes a database of all known Grateful Dead shows and a Phish database is available free to registered users. Other Show databases, including Jerry Garcia Band and Allman Brother Band, will be available soon. To import Venue, City, State and Set List information into your tape database, all you do is enter the show date and press the GD Import button, at which point the relevant information will be inserted automatically into your tape listing. All that is left to do is to edit the data to match the specifics of your recording of the show. For example, add filler, etc. Using this import function will also insure that all songs are entered identically, which in turn, will result in accurate song string searches (See Filtering Capabilities below, for more information). The show databases are fully searchable and can be filtered just like your tape list. The show database also provides a field for tracking your attendance of shows and another for tagging shows for which you are looking for recordings. There is an update facility to easily update the show databases for new shows. Update files will be made available free of charge to registered users via anonymous ftp or for a nominal shipping and handling charge if sent by mail on disk. The data in the show database can be deleted easily to save disk space if it is of no use to you. * Entering Listings from Scratch * You have imported your old tape list and your Grateful Dead material, what about everthing else? TapeTracker once again comes to your rescue. 1) The Add/Edit View uses dropdown lists and supplemental databases whenever feasible so that you can pick information from lists, which greatly reduces required typing. For example, when you pick a venue from the drop down list, the Venue, City and State are all inserted into the listing automatically. Drop down boxes are also autofill enabled, which means that as you enter information the closest matching entry will appear in the box as you type. Finally, the dropdown lists for Source, Media, Sound Rating and Microphones are all user definable. In other words, you choose the items that you would like to appear in each of these lists. 2) Default values can be set for most fields, so that each time you call up a new listing, the "most likely" values for each field will already be in place. 3) The Set List Helper feature allows you to insert songs from your song database directly into your set lists. As you enter songs for the first time they are automatically added into the song database for future access. You can also track the the following information for each song that you enter: Short Name (Working name), Long or Other Name, Author, Vocalist and Date First Played. 4) The Duplicate function lets you create a new listing using all information in the currently displayed listing except for date and song lists. This is very handy when you are entering recordings from multiple days from the same venue using the same Source, Media, etc. * Navigating through Lisitings * You can jump to a particular listing from any view by means of two dropdown boxes, the first of which displays listings sorted by date and the other sorted by city, state and venue. You can also step through listings one at a time in chronological order. * Filtering Listings * TapeTracker provides extremely powerful filtering capabilities. The Detail and Summary Views can be filtered to show only those listings that match the criteria that you set. Filtering can be performed based on the value(s) in a single or multiple listing fields. Complex search criteria can be created by selecting options on an easy to understand Filter Form. So, if you want to know which shows you have on DAT with an "A" rating where SCMS is set to OO, recorded using Schoeps mics, added to your collection in the last year, where the Grateful Dead played the Supplication Jam in the first set? No problem. After Listings are filtered according to the criteria you set, they can be viewed, exported or serve as the basis for reports. * J Card Module * TapeTracker can print J Cards (tape case inserts) for both DAT and Cassette tapes, each with a variety of layouts options, and allows you to select fonts, font sizes and add graphics (some supplied) if you choose. The program will automatically pull data from listings stored in the system or you can manually enter information for recordings not in the system. You can currently print two J Cards per page. These cards can be from Set One and Two of the same show or can be from two different shows. In addition you can put two shows on a single J Card. A three show J Card is in the works. The program includes a graphics library where you can store your own graphics images to be used on the J Cards. Before printing, the program presents a fully editable Print Preview version of the case to inspect. If you tape on DAT, but ocassionally make copies for on cassette, you will appreciate the manner in which TapeTracker handles the marking of flips. You can enter a backslash within a listing to mark where the flip occurs on a cassette. While this is not necessary, because the program will ask you where the flip occurs if it does not find backslash, entering these flip marks will speed up the J Card printing process because you will not have to indicate the flip each time you print a cassette J Card for the listing. TapeTracker will use the flip marks that you set up when printing cassette J Cards, but will hide them when printing DAT labels. When printing DAT J Cards, you can choose to list songs either horizontally across the J Card or in two vertical columns. * TraderBase * The TapeTracker TraderBase is used to store contact information for your trading partners. People entered in the TraderBase show up on a dropdown box in the Add/Edit Listings View, so you can easily track which tapes you received from which trader. If anything ever happens to your copy of the recording, you will always know where to get another copy. You can also use this information to print mailing labels directly from the J Card Module when you need to send tapes to any of the individuals. If you have a trader's tape list on your system in the form of a text file, you can link that file to the trader's record in the Trader database and access the tape list by a button on the trader form. * Reporting * TapeTracker provides full reporting capability in both summary and detail formats. You can choose to report on all listings, all listings for the current artist or those listings matching the current filter criteria. You can also choose to include or exclude a legend of abbreviations, your contact information and notes about your collection. * Exporting * The TapeTracker export facility that allows you build templates for creating text files. You can choose exactly what fields you would like to include and the type of file to create; Fixed Width, Delimited or HTML. You can also choose to include or exclude the same supplemental info that you can on reports; a legend of abbreviations, your contact information and notes about your collection. The HTML export format lets you create a fully hyperlinked World Wide Web displayable version of your tape list with a push of a button. All you have to do is upload it to a server. Sample formats for common uses such as inclusion of your tape list in an email message are included. Absolute Minimum System Requirements ------------------------------------ o Microsoft Windows 3.1 or later o PC with 486 microprocessor o 8 MB or more of RAM o 10 MB free hard disk space o EGA or higher resolution monitor Suggested System Configuration ------------------------------ o Microsoft Windows 3.1 or later o 486 PC with 16 Megs RAM or Pentium PC with 8 Megs RAM o 10 MB free hard disk space o VGA or higher resolution monitor o Desk Jet or Laser Printer Distribution: ------------- TapeTracker is a Microsoft Access 2.0 database application, but it is available with a *complementary* copy of the runtime version of Microsoft Access, so purchase of the full database application is not required. Following are instructions for retrieving the the newest version of TapeTracker via FTP. If you do not have FTP access, see the section on Pricing below for information on costs for having an evaluation version mailed to you. You can always get the most recent version of TapeTracker via FTP from ftp.nbn.com/home/softsell/ftp/ as follows: - File: TAPETRAK.ZIP (if you HAVE Access 2.0 or a previous version of TapeTracker) * OR * - File: TTFULL.ZIP (if you DO NOT HAVE a previous version of TapeTracker or Microsoft Access 2.0) The software, whether downloaded or sent by mail, arrives in the form of a 30 day "Evaluation" version. The evaluation version contains all of features of the registered version, except that key features become disabled if the product is not registered within 30 days of the installation date. The evaluation version and can be unlocked into a full version by entering a registration key code which you can get from SoftSell Systems over the phone. An "Evaluation Kit", which includes everything you need to try out the program, including the Access runtime files, is available for a nominal fee (that just covers the costs of producing and shipping the product). See the Pricing section below for details and be sure to remember that multiple people can share the set of distribution disks included in the Evaluation Kit. As long as the program is distributed in its entirety, not changed in any way and not resold, you can create and distribute as many copies of these disks as you would like. (Please review the Legal Stuff section for a more detailed discussion on what you can and cannot legally do with this program.) Once you have registered TAPETRACKER, you will receive all minor version updates to the application (e.g. From version 1.0 to 1.1 to 1.2 and so on) and regular Grateful Dead show updates free of charge by download or for a nominal shipping and handling charge if mailed on diskette. Major version updates (e.g. From version 1.0 to 2.0) will be available at a significantly discounted price.When updating from a previous version, the update routine will backup your current version and then transfer the data to the new version, so you will have the chance to test drive each major version update for 30 days before deciding whether to purchase the upgrade. If you don't think that the upgrade is worth the cost, you can simply revert back to your old version. Pricing: -------- The pricing for TapeTracker is as follows (Pricing is subject to change without notice): $65 - Registered Program (distribution disks with runtimve version of Access, shipping included) $59 - User License (includes Registation Key to unlock TapeTracker into a fully registered version, but does not include distribution disks) $10 - Evaluation Kit (distribution disks with runtime version of Access, shipping included, NOT REGISTERED) $10 - Replacement Disks (same as above) $10 - Overnight shipping Ordering Or Questions: ---------------------- Call Steve Zimmerman at (415) 461-2440 ext. 209 or email him at saz@well.com. The IMPORTANT Legal Stuff: -------------------------- TapeTracker is copyrighted and all rights are reserved by SoftSell Systems. This TapeTracker software is owned by SoftSell Systems. SoftSell Systems grants the user a nonexclusive license to use this TapeTracker software solely for the user's personal use. The user shall not commercially distribute, sublicense, resell, or otherwise transfer for any consideration, or reproduce for any such purposes, the TapeTracker software or any modification or derivation thereof, either alone or in conjunction with any other product or program. Further, the user shall not modify the TapeTracker software, other than for the user's own use. THIS TAPETRACKER SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED TO THE USER "AS IS". SOFTSELL SYSTEMS MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EITHER EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, WITH RESPECT TO THE USER, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND AGAINST INFRINGEMENT. LIMITATION OF LIABILITY - SOFTSELL SYSTEMS SHALL NOT BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIMS OR DAMAGES WHATSOEVER, INCLUDING PROPERTY DAMAGE, PERSONAL INJURY, INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY INFRINGEMENT, LOSS OF PROFITS, OR INTERRUPTION OF BUSINESS, OR FOR ANY SPECIAL CONSEQUENTIAL OR INCIDENTAL DAMAGES, HOWEVER CAUSED, WHETHER ARISING OUT OF BREACH OF WARRANTY, CONTRACT, TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE), STRICT LIABLIITY, OR OTHERWISE.