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- ===============================================================================
- CD-V ver 1.6
- ===============================================================================
-
- An Audio-CD VGA Player
-
- Itamar Grutman
- Israel
- 1994
-
- ===============================================================================
-
- This program was put as Public Domain by the author and may be distributed
- freely. It may not be sold, nor be made part of anything that is sold.
-
- ===============================================================================
-
- Description
- ===========
- This program was written to fulfill my need for a VGA-based audio-cd player
- for DOS. It seemed that all the nice CD players were written for windows and I
- found nothing for DOS. Since I don't like using the mouse in text mode, I wrote
- a graphic player.
-
- The program has a very simple interface and includes all the buttons one
- would expect to find in an advanced CD player as well as a blank screen saver.
-
- The bottom row of buttons corresponds to usual commands (e.g. stop,play)
- where the play button serves also as pause (toggle).
- The eject/close-tray button is on the right of the time display. When
- ejected or not ready, all buttons (except eject and PWR) are grayed (whited).
- The top row of buttons contains special purpose buttons, which are (from
- left to right) : Power, Track display(enables to select a track), Statistics
- display(Show totals and progress bars), Direction(Toggles between increasing or
- decreasing time),Play mode (sequential, ordered or loop),Volume control,Mute and
- finally - About.
- All the top row buttons are togglers (except PWR, of course).
-
-
- NOTE : Volume control will work only for those devices that support it. It does
- not make use of the sound card, therefore, the sound card itself should
- be set to it's maximum level to get the full scale of the volume bar.
-
-
- Instructions
- ============
- I will provide instructions only for what isn't obvious.
-
- Screen saver
- ------------
- Will either operate after a specified time (see configuration) of no
- movement or when the mouse is moved to the upper-left corner of the screen and
- remains idle there for 1 second.
- Moving the mouse or pressing a letter key on the keyboard will shut off the
- screen saver and return the program to the screen.
-
- Configuration
- -------------
- Run cdconfig to change your defaults. Note that cdconfig modifies your
- executable, so don't run it after compressing cd-v.exe.
- When in color configuration, you will have to specify your prefered colors
- for every item in cd-v. Most names in the configuration may not be obvoius and
- may need some explaining :
-
- Button Face - Button surface
- Frame Face - Frame surface
- Background Color - Background color for entire screen
- Screen Color - Color for main data screen
- Title Color - Color for background of the titles of boxes
- Active Text - Color for active text and buttons (titles, time and
- sometimes buttons).
- Inactive Text - Color for inactive text and buttons.
- Info Text - Color for misc. info (play mode)
- Box Background Color - Color for box background (volume, track, order, about)
- Main Color - Color for main screen background (main screen is the
- screen containing all vital buttons and the main data
- screen - It is what is left when all options are set
- to "off").
- Lighted sides - Color for lighted sides of buttons and frames. Swapping
- it's value with that of "Dark sides" causes the 3d-look
- to be reversed.
- Dark sides - Color for dark (unlighted) sides of buttons and frames.
- Border color - Color for border of buttons and frames. Every button and
- frame is surrounded by a 1-pixel width line, which is
- normally black.
-
- NOTE - keeping button face and frame face at light-gray, and not changing dark
- and lighted sides ensures that the 3d-look is maintained. All other
- colors may be changed freely and satisfactory results can easily be
- achieved.
-
- Track order selection
- ---------------------
- Press the Play-Mode button (drawn as 1-2-3 on diagonal) until ORD mode is
- indicated in the main window, and the track order list should appear as well as
- the track selection box (if it wasn't visible). The track list box will appear
- a bit different in this mode - instead of the heading ("Tracks"), there will be
- 2 buttons which functionality will be explained below.
- If this is the first time this mode is selection during a run of the
- program, the list would be almost empty and the first entry whould appear as a
- pressed button with the value of 1.
- Selection of a track from the track list changes the number in the currently
- pressed button in the order list and depresses the next slot on the order list.
- A specific slot in the order list can be selected by the mouse, and it's track
- number can be changed by the same way. Pressing the key '+' (or the key selected
- in the config file, defaulted to '`'),or the button marked '+' at the top of the
- track list, or the right mouse button when the cursor is positioned on the track
- list box, will depress a new empty slot in the bottom of the order list, if
- there is an empty one.
- When choosing from the order list, you can always choose one of the tracks
- previously selected or the next-to-last selected track. You can't choose a
- specific button from the order list if there is an empty slot above it.
- To erase the last entry to the list press the button marked '-' on the top
- of the track list, or press the RIGHT mouse button when the mouse pointer is
- positioned on any of the buttons of the order list. Keeping the button pressed
- longer the 2 secs will activate the autorepeat feature which will erase an entry
- every 0.2 secs as long as the button is pressed.
- If your have a 3-BUTTON MOUSE, pressing the middle button while the cursor
- is positioned on the track list box, will cause the slot above the currently
- pressed to be active.
- When leaving this mode, the track selection box will disappear if it wasn't
- visible when you entered the mode, or remain visible if it was visible before
- entering the mode.
- Entering this mode another time will display the previously set list. The
- mode is NOT functional, however, when the list is not DISPLAYED.
- The about box will disappear and not return (unless pressed again) if it was
- visible before entering the mode.
-
- AutoRepeat
- ----------
- When pressing a button longer than 1Sec, it gets released and if still
- pressed, will activate every 0.1Sec. Thus allowing true FF ,REW ,SKIP and PREV.
- The volume control autorepeat is faster ; The delay is only 0.5Sec and then then
- the button gets pressed every 0.01Sec (which is actually zero) and the volume is
- changed by a larger amount (10 levels instead of one with single press).
- Note that some buttons have other delay values (see above).
-
-
- Requirements
- ============
- The program expects to find the following :
-
- - Mouse (3-Button mouse is prefered)
- - MSCDEX version 2.20 or up
- - VGA adapter
- - 386
-
-
- Author
- ======
- The author can be reached by e-mail address :
-
- igrutman@bguee.bgu.ac.il
-
- Please send any observation, remark or suggestion you might have.
- I will try and code your suggestions if I like them and have the time.
-
-
- Thanks
- ======
- To Paul <something>, for being the first to contact me about the program.
-
-
- History
- =======
- 0.1 - First version.
-
- 0.2 - Fixed bugs :
- 1. Font and screen drivers not found when run from another directory.
- Fixed by moving them into the code thus leaving the only necessary
- file to be cd-v.exe
- 2. Track length not updated in statistics window when track was changed
- indirectly (by ff, rewind, or track finish).
-
- 1.0 - Added Track order selection for playing and indication of play mode
- at the top-right corner of the time display.
-
- 1.1 - Fixed bugs :
- 1. Memory access violations causing strange screen behaviour.
- 2. When clicking on a blank slot from the track list, a number appeared.
- 3. Incorrect disk length when playing entire disk.
-
- 1.2 - Fixed bugs :
- 1. When entering without a CD and the tray is closed, the button would
- operate properly (not operate) but would not get whited.
- 2. Tracks higher than 19 caused trouble due to incorrect BCD to decimal
- conversion.
-
- Added features:
- 1. Added the ability to exit with the ESC key. ESC now functions as PWR.
- 2. Added AutoRepeat feature. When pressing a button longer than 1Sec, it
- gets released and if still pressed, will activate every 0.1Sec. Thus
- allowing true FF ,REW ,SKIP and PREV.
- 3. Added screen-saving ability.
- 4. Added configuration file cd-v.cfg
-
- 1.3 - Added features:
- 1. Added volume control.
- 2. Added the ability to change the system palette from the configuration
- file.
- 3. Added the ability to change the initial state of commonly used
- togglers.
-
- 1.4 - Added features:
- 1. Added mute button.
- 2. Added "sleep now" corner.
- 3. Ablitity to erase last entry from order list.
- 4. Use of the keyboard key '+' to add an empty entry to the order list
- thus enabling faster filling of the list without running the mouse
- back and forth.
-
- Arbitrary changes:
- 1. Swapped places of the buttons SKIP with PREV and FF with REW.
-
- Fixed bugs:
- 1. The program would terminate when pressing SKIP or PREV in ordering
- mode and with the list empty. The list is now never really empty.
-
- 1.5 - Added features:
- 1. Added an entry in the config file to select one more key to function
- as the key '+'.
- 2. Added two buttons on the track order selection buttons : Add new
- entry and Remove last entry.
-
- 1.6 - Added features:
- 1. Added loop mode.
- 2. Added extensive color configuration.
-
- Arbitrary changes:
- 1. Choosing from the track list while in ORD mode causes the currently
- pressed slot to descend.
- 2. In ORD, Pressing the middle button (on a 3-button mouse, and an
- appropriate driver), while positioned in the track list box, causes
- the currently selected slot to ascend.
- 3. In ORD, Pressing the right button, while positioned in the track list
- box, causes the currently selected slot to descend.
- 4. When in SEQ mode, selecting a track from the track list starts
- it, whether the player was playing before or not.
- 5. Changed length of "sleep-now" duartion from 2 to 1 Sec.
- 6. Removed configuration of system palette.
- 7. Move "+" and "-" buttons from the order list to the track box, during
- ORD mode.
-
- Fixed bugs:
- 1. When in ordered mode, and the last selected track has finished, the
- player would return to track 1 instead of the first selected track.
-
-