IMPORTANT: When we release new versions, we occasionally need to change the file type resources (the "Finder Info") of easy beat, the easy beat file format, or the EasyNotes font. When you install a newer version, we recommend that you compare the version number with that of the previously installed version and check this document if any of these significant changes have been made between the old and the new version. The changes are marked with red capital letters under the heading Format Changes. The following paragraphs summarize the consequences of these changes:
FINDER INFO CHANGED:
If the "Finder Info" has changed, you should remove all older copies of the easy beat application (use Sherlock or "Find File" to search for all files starting with "easy beat") and install the new version of easy beat on your hard disk. Then rebuild the desktop files. To do that, restart and press the option and command keys when the Finder loads at the end of the startup process. When the Finder asks for confirmation, click "OK" to rebuild the desktop files of your disks. If you omit this step, easy beat files will not show up correctly in the Finder and the file types in the "Save As╔" dialog will be wrong when navigation services are being used.
NEW FILE FORMAT:
If the file format has changed, you will still be able to open easy beat documents created with older versions. easy beat automatically converts documents into the new format when it opens them. When you save the file, older versions of easy beat will not be able to open the new document format. easy beat warns you in this case and gives you a chance to save the file under a different name.
EasyNotes CHANGED:
If the EasyNotes font has changed, you should reinstall the font file in your Fonts folder. Quit all running applications, then drag the font file over the System folder icon. Click "OK" when the Finder asks you to put the font file into the Fonts folder.
When the font is missing in the Fonts folder or when the installed font doesn't match easy beat's built-in font, easy beat will warn you and suggest that you install the proper version of the EasyNotes font. If you skip this step, printed scores may contain wrong or garbled symbols.
easy beat 1.1 (March 2000)
Format Changes:
Ñ NEW FILE FORMAT
The internal instrument numbering scheme was extended to allow non-General-MIDI
instruments, and longer notes are supported now. The 1.1 file format requires about
15% more disk space than the 1.0 format.
The new format also affects MIDI mapping files, which now include the "Jazz" and
"SFX" drum kits.
New Features:
Ñ easy beat now has an "Inspector": a floating window that shows various properties
of the current selection (notes or controller transistion).
Ñ A new "Playback Options" dialog (accessible from the Music menu) lets you specify
MIDI initialization messages if you're using an external synthesizer. You can also
adjust the delay when a song starts playing. A short delay can help to repair timing
errors at the beginning of a song with certain external synthesizers.
Ñ A new "Recording Options" dialog (accessible from the Music menu) lets you control
how notes are recorded from a MIDI instrument. Separate options are available for
each MIDI channel.
Ñ The General MIDI "Jazz" and "SFX" drum kits are now available in the "Drums" section
of the instrument menu.
Ñ Bank select messages (controller #0 and #32) are now recognized when easy beat
imports MIDI files and created when a song is saved as a MIDI file.
Ñ The instrument pop-up menu has two additional items that let you use the
QuickTime instrument picker and manually enter MIDI bank and program numbers.
Ñ MIDI mappings include the "Jazz" and "SFX" drum kits. Replacement instrument
numbers can now be edited in MIDI terms (controller #0, #32, and program number),
which allows MIDI mappings to replace General MIDI instrument numbers with
arbitrary instruments available on a given synthesizer.
Ñ The instrument menu can be configured with instrument description files. These
are simple text files that describe which instruments should be mapped to which
MIDI programs and banks. This feature lets you use easy beat with external
synthesizers which have instruments that are not part of the General MIDI or GS
sound sets (such as XG synthesizers).
Ñ The keyboard view now has a piano keyboard in the border area. You can click the keys
to play notes. This also works in other views; click on note names or in the right side
of the track border.
Ñ Controllers can now be edited numerically by selecting a range and typing the new
value(s) or a scaling factor, such as:
75 -- 75% of the maximum value
100-50 -- slope, starting at 100%, ending at 50%
*1.5 -- scale by factor 1.5
*3/2 -- same effect, specified as a fraction
/2 -- scale by factor 0.5
Ñ The right border of a controller view now displays the current controller value
during playback. If a range is selected, a bracket indicates the minimum and
maximum controller values in that range. The values can be modified by dragging
the whole bracket or the top/bottom limits.
Ñ The Scale╔ menu command now also works with a selected range in a score, keyboard,
TAB and drum view. The operation affects both the notes and all controller values
within the selected range.
Ñ Option-selecting a view type from the Track menu adds that view type to all tracks.
Ñ Option-selecting a controller type from a controller pop-up menu sets all currently
visible controller views to that controller.
Ñ Option-clicking a view's close box hides this type of view from all tracks.
Ñ Option-selecting a key from a key pop-up menu changes the key of all tracks.
Problems Fixed:
Ñ MIDI import: ╥meta tags╙ in MIDI files are now treated more carefully. In version 1.0,
incomplete meta events and certain meta events in the middle of a track resulted in
error messages and occasionally in corrupted song files. This should now be a thing of
the past.
Ñ easy beat crashed when importing MIDI files that contained invalid note or controller
numbers.
Ñ A visual glitch with abrupt controller changes from the initial value (gray line) to a
different value (black line) was corrected.
Ñ Long track names overlapped with the transposition field in the track header.
Ñ Some controller changes caused a crash when an infinite range was selected.
Ñ The "Reverse" checkbox in the "Scale╔" command (controller view) caused strange
results when an infinite range was selected. The checkbox is now dimmed in this case.
Ñ Drum sets in a MIDI Mapping window were played as regular instruments.
Ñ The last notes in a track were sometimes not turned off when a song was saved
as a MIDI file.
Ñ Notes in a score view could not be selected if they started slightly before the
beginning of a measure.
Ñ When importing a MIDI file, excessively long notes (more than 8 measures in 4/4)
caused an overflow and resulted in notes with negative duration.
Ñ Under certain circumstances, the Play button appeared hilited when it shouldn't.
Ñ Fixed a memory leak that left about 100 bytes allocated after each "Save As╔".
Ñ easy beat crashed when Scale╔ or Copy/Paste with a range selection resulted in
more than 1000 notes within a measure.
Ñ A double-click anomaly was corrected. Double-clicks on notes are now recognized
only when the same note is clicked twice.
Ñ The Music menu was active only when a song window was in the front. Now it is
always active, but the song-specific items are available only when a song window
is active.
Ñ The pitch bend range was not correctly determined for MIDI export when the maximum
negative bend exceeded the maximum positive bend.
Ñ A rightmost panning was sometimes translated to "leftmost" during MIDI export.
Ñ Fixed a screen refresh problem.
Other Changes:
Ñ The display of note and drum names in the status bar was made more consistent with
the current instrument.
Ñ Controller values are now shown in percent of the maximum range in the status bar.
Ñ The special keys ╥=╙, ╥*╙, ╥-╙ and ╥+╙ are now accepted only if they are pressed on
the numeric keypad. This restriction was necessary to avoid confusion with numeric
editing of controller values.
Ñ The Remove Overlaps menu command was renamed to Clean Up Notes. The new name
better reflects what the menu command does, as it also gets rid of empty notes.
Ñ The display of drum names has been simplified.
Ñ Available controllers now appear in alphabetic order in the controller pop-up menu.
Ñ When a controller view is opened the first time after importing a MIDI file, it shows
the first actually used controller instead of the default setting "Volume".
Ñ The start bar and loop range are now adjusted after inserting or deleting measures
in all tracks.
Ñ Power chords (first and fifth, without a third) are now shown as C5 instead of C*
in the chord view.
Ñ After reading a MIDI file, easy beat now cleans up unneeded and misplaced controller
events.
Ñ easy beat now asks for confirmation when you attempt to save a song over an existing
document of a different file type and when you save a song or MIDI mapping in a new
file format. In each of these cases, you can choose to replace the file, cancel the
operation or save the file under a different name.
Ñ The key defined in the score view is now used in all views wherever a note name
is displayed.
Ñ The playing position is now updated when a dialog is open while a song plays.
Ñ When moving notes in a score view, you must now move the mouse by a few pixels
before the selected notes are actually changed. This fixes a problem where selecting
notes by clicking them could change the notes' pitch.
Ñ Expanding all views (by option-clicking an expansion triangle) now expands everything
except the metronome track (unless you option-click the metronome's triangle).
