SoundMaster installs code into your Mac during startup which can play sounds when various things happen.
To select a sound, first click on when you want the sound to be played. Next, select the file containing the sound you want. Then select its playback rate and the volume you want it played at. Click on the big speaker icon at the top of the window to make sure that it sounds right.
None of the selections you make will take effect until you restart your Mac.
System requirements:
• System 6.0.2 or later, preferably 6.0.7 or later.
• At least one megabyte of memory, preferably at least two.
The controls:
• Sound selection list
This selects which sound you want to change. Each sound has its own playback rate, volume, off/on status, folder, and file name. If the 'Return key', 'Space key', 'Tab key', 'Delete key', or 'Enter key' sounds are turned off, the 'Key click' sound is used for them instead.
The little speaker is shown with sound waves if the sound is turned on. Click on it to turn the sound on or off. If the sound doesn't have a file set for it yet, you'll get beeped at.
You can also type in the first few letters of the sound or folder you want to select or use the up and down arrow keys. Pressing return or enter will either play the selected sound or open the selected folder.
Note: The 'Disk insert' and 'Disk eject' and other sounds may sound a bit scratchy because the Disk Driver turns off interrupts when using the floppy drive, and this can interfere with the Sound Manager keeping the sound going. This can also happen during AppleTalk operations such as printing to a LaserWriter or using an AppleShare server.
The beep sound will override the system beep sound set with the "Sound" icon in the Control Panel. If there is no beep sound set in SoundMaster, it will use the system beep sound instead.
• Memory size indicators
The 'Memory used' number indicates the amount of memory that will be used by SoundMaster to keep the sounds in memory. The 'Size' number indicates how much sound the selected sound takes up. The startup sound is disposed of after being played and is not counted in the 'Memory used' total. The sample sound is not used at all, and is not counted either. Any sound that is used two or more times is counted only once.
You need to keep the total size (memory used + startup sound size) of your selected sounds to somewhat less than half of the memory installed in your Macintosh due to the memory constraints of the startup environment. If there isn't enough memory to load one or more sounds, a small red 'X' will be drawn through the icon during startup.
If the small red 'X' shows up, your Mac may bomb with an ID=33 later in the startup sequence. If this happens, you will need restart and hold down the mouse button to prevent SoundMaster from loading. Then call it up in the Control Panel and turn off some sounds.
• Preferences
Initially all of these options are turned on:
•• Show icon during startup:
If this is checked, SoundMaster's icon will be shown on the bottom of your screen when it is installed during startup. If you don't want SoundMaster installed, hold down the mouse button or the shift key during startup. The icon will have a large red 'X' drawn through it. A small red 'X' means there wasn't enough memory for one or more sounds.
•• Disable sounds when volume is zero:
If this is checked, setting the control panel volume to zero will completely disable all SoundMaster sounds from playing.
•• Disable key click during chime sounds:
If this is checked, key click sounds will not play during (and not mess up) the chime sounds.
•• Disable key click during other sounds:
If this is checked, key click sounds will not play during any other sounds except for other key click sounds.
•• Disable other sounds during chime:
I this is checked, no other SoundMaster sounds will play during the chime sounds.
•• "Squish" long file names:
If this is checked, file names too long to be displayed in the file list are displayed "squished" in an attempt to show as much of the name as possible.
• About SoundMaster…
Displays this text in a dialog box.
• Speaker icon
This plays the currently selected sound at the selected volume and playback rate. If there isn't enough memory to play the sound (or if you don't have a sound selected), it won't play anything. After the sound is read in (and uncompressed if necessary), it will play in the background, allowing you to do other things. You can even click on the speaker icon again and it will keep playing the old sound until the new one is ready. Keep in mind that each copy of the sound being played has to be in memory, and if you are using MultiFinder, you can easily make the system heap memory grow to an enormous size by playing large sound files this way.
• Playback rate control
This selects the playback rate of the sound file. Some sound files have the rate stored somewhere within them, most notably compressed SoundCap files, but also some of the newer sound programs include info resources containing the playback rate. If the playback rate can be determined, it is automatically clicked when you select a sound file.
If you don't like dragging the control around to change the playback rate, you can click on the numbers to the left of it and set the rate directly.
• Volume control
This selects the volume for each sound. Initially, the Sample, StartUp, Restart, Shutdown, and the various key click sounds are set at 7, and all other sounds are set to '*'. The '*' means to use the volume currently set in the Control Panel. You can also click in the area to the left of the control to set the volume directly.
• File list
This selects the file to play for a sound. When a file is selected, the playback rate (if available from the sound file) is also automatically clicked.
Double-clicking on a file name plays the sound, just like clicking on the speaker icon. Double clicking on a folder opens up that folder. To go back a folder level, use the pop-up menu above the file list.
If you move everything to another disk or after you reinitialize your hard disk and then restore it from a file-by-file backup, the ID's of the folders will change. Call up SoundMaster as a control panel and it will attempt to find the folders containing your sounds. To make this possible, it saves the names of all the folders needed to find each sound file.
The only types of sound files currently recognized are SoundCap/SoundEdit files (type 'FSSD'), System 7 sound files (type 'sfil'), and files of type 'snd ' containing exactly one resource of type 'snd ' (not that I've ever seen any such files). If you have any "sound suitcase" files and are using System 7, you can change their type & creator to 'zsys' & 'MACS' with the suitcase's folder window closed. You can then double-click on them and drag the sounds out.
Here is a list of the sounds supported, and when they happen:
• (Sample) - not attatched to any events; for you to play sounds in the Control Panel without affecting any of the other sounds
• Restart - when you select Restart from the Finder's "Special" menu
• Shut Down - when you select Shut Down from the Finder's "Special" menu
• Disk insert - when the system gets a disk inserted event (usually from actually inserting a phyisical disk, sometimes from a virtual disk such as a RAM disk) This will play when the Finder starts up because all your hard disks are "inserted" during startup.
• Bad disk - when an error occurs while trying to mount an inserted disk
• Disk request - when the "Please insert the disk" dialog comes up
• Beep - when the beep set in the "Sound" control panel would normally be played
• Key click - when you press any key on the keyboard. Any of the following key click sounds that have no sound attached will play this sound instead.
• Return key, Space key, Tab key, Delete key, Enter key - when the appropriate key is pressed.
• Chime count — after the Chime :00 sound, this plays one as many times as the hour (1 to 12 times in a row)
• Chime :00, :15, :30, and :45 — on the quarter hour
• Alarm Clock - when the alarm clock goes off.
• Empty Trash — when you select "Empty Trash" from the Finder's "Special" menu
• Zoom open — when the Finder does the enlarging zoom effect
• Zoom closed — when the Finder does the shrinking zoom effect
• Grow window — when you resize a window
• Copy done - when a file copy is finished in the Finder (Note: if you are using a foreign language version of the System 7.0, you will need to use ResEdit to put STR -4048 into your Preferences file. This string should contain the name of the Copy window in the Finder.)
• Upgrading from previous versions of SoundMaster:
If you were using version 1.4 or later of SoundMaster, you will need to first open up SoundMaster as a control panel. Then close it and open your System Folder. Then make sure that there is not a file named "SoundMaster settings" in the System Folder (throw it away if you find one), and that there IS a file named "SoundMaster settings" within a folder named "Preferences" within the System Folder.
If your old copy of SoundMaster was older than 1.4, you'll have to set up your sounds all over again.
Q: How do you make sound files?
A: The way most people do it is with a Farallon MacRecorder. You should be able to get it from your favorite mail-order company.
Please don't ask me for sounds. I don't make any serious effort to collect them. Not only that, but how would I decide which ones you would like the best? Try companies like Diskette Gazette (1-800-222-6032, 1-408-262-6660) and EduCorp (1-800-843-9497, 1-619-536-9999), which make a living selling disks full of sounds and other goodies. User group libraries are also a good place to look.
Q: I want the DOS version of SoundMaster. Please send 360k disks.
A: (Yes folks, it's sad but its true. There are people out there who believe you can just slap Windoze onto a PC and get a Macintosh.) There is not now, nor will there ever be a program like mine for DOS, Windoze (spelled that way because it's so slow it makes you doze), or OS/2! It can't be done, at least not without a LOT of work. If anyone wants to TRY and make something similar for PC's, be my guest. (Go ahead. Make my day.)
--- Traps patched ---
(for those who Want to Know)
SysBeep, for the beep sound.
Eject, for the disk eject sound.
SystemEvent, for the key click sounds and the disk insert sound.
MountVol, for the bad disk sound, tail-patched.
SysError, for the disk request sound.
SystemTask and jGNEFilter, for the chime sounds.
NMInstall, for the Alarm Clock sound.
FrameRect, for the zoom open/closed sounds.
MenuSelect and MenuKey, for the empty trash sound, tail-patched.
GrowWindow, for the grow window sound, tail-patched.
SndDisposeChannel, in case the application quits while a sound is playing.
KillIO, to watch for KillIO calls to the Sound Driver.
ShutDown, because the Shutdown Manager in System 6 isn't as smart as I need it to be.
GetNewDialog, SetWTitle, and CloseWindow, for the Copy Done sound. (GetNewDialog is only patched under system 6, and is tail-patched only for the Finder's file copy dialog; SetWTitle is only patched under system 7)
Launch is patched under System 6 to avoid a crash when not running MultiFinder and a sound is playing during a launch or quit.
A shutdown and a restart procedure are installed for the shutdown and restart sounds.
The size of the installed code is a mere 2746 bytes.
This is a shareware program. If you like it, send $15 to the address below. If you're already registered for ten bucks as of April 15, 1990, it's a free upgrade, but you still have to send the $5 for the disk. Don't forget to tell me what version you have and where you got it (if you want to). If you want a copy of the latest version of my programs (US & Canada only, please), send a disk with SASE, or $5 to cover postage and handling and disk.
Canadians, please don't send personal checks. Because they don't have a US bank number on them (looks like a fraction of the form '12-3456/7890'), my bank doesn't even want to look at them.
Bruce Tomlin
15801 Chase Hill Blvd. #109
San Antonio, TX 78256-1037
GEnie: BTOMLIN
Applelink: bruce@f555.n387.z1.fidonet.org@INTERNET# (direct, but it'll cost you 50 cents each way)
AppleLink: D4872 (occasionally; do not send Internet mail to this address)
Internet: bruce@f555.n387.z1.fidonet.org
America Online: BTomlin
••• DISCLAIMER: I am not responsible for anybody else's lack of taste in sound choice.
