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Atari Mega Archive 1
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Atari Mega Archive - Volume 1.iso
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fort100.lzh
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README
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1993-02-27
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FORTUNE V1.0 beta
by Harald Schönfeld and Bernd Spellenberg
2/26/93
Fortune is a program to play and create sound cites on your ATARI FALCON.
Like on big UNIX computers, your computer will welcome you at boot time by
telling you a cite of a VIP. While the cites are only written on other
computers, the FALCON's sound system makes it possible for you to hear the
original cite.
This program is Public Domain in this version. It may and shall be copied
and spread under the condition that all program- and text- files of this
archive are included.
Cites consist of sound data, cite text and eventually more additional
information about the cite. In boot mode the cites are simply played with or
without texts. If the program is launched later by double-clicking on it, it
allows you to create and change cites from samples.
A nice feature of Fortune is its ability to import and convert many
different sample file formats.
1. System requirements
Fortune runs on all FALCON computers, no matter if MultiTOS is installed or
not. As the cites include sampled sounds they need a lot of space on the
mass storage unit. So a harddisk is required. Fortune needs about 500 KB
free RAM. To hear the cites you should either use the internal speaker, the
speaker of the monitor or connect the FALCON to a stereo amplifier. You can
use a headphone, too.
2. Installation
Copy the program (FORTUNEG.PRG=german, FORTUNEE.PRG=english) onto your
harddisk. Copy the cite files (*.CIT) onto your harddisk into a separate
folder. At the moment our (about 40) cites need about 5 MB on the disk.
Install FORTUNEx.PRG as an application. To do so, select FORTUNEx.PRG with
the mouse and choose "Install Application" in the Desktop Menu. Type in
MANAGE as parameter. If you want that FORTUNE plays a cite during boot
time, select the "Auto" boot status. Save the desktop configuration.
Start FORTUNEx.PRG now and select the menu item "Config/File format...". You
can choose the folder that contains the cites: Click onto the popup "Cite
folder" and select the right path in the file select box. If you already
have a special folder for samples you can select it in the same way.
Save the configuration with "Config/Save".
Now select "File/cite". Fortune will now play a randomly chosen cite. If you
don't hear anything, check the installation again.
3. Usage
a) Boot mode
In boot mode fortune will only play one cite (and will eventually show some
text) and terminates right after that. If you press a SHIFT-Key during the
program start, fortune will start in Manage mode.
b) Manage mode
After a normal program start the Fortune menu appears. There are the
following menu items:
Desk/about FORTUNE...
Informs about the current version number.
File/cite
Randomly plays a cite. According to "Config/Play mode...", the text will or
will not be shown. The sound data will be loaded in real time therefore only
very little memory will be needed. You can also play very long cites (or
music). If other programs are running in parallel it is possible that the
data could not be loaded fast enough.
File/Manager...
Here you can select samples for import, edit sound data, export samples and
load/save cites. You can further edit the text information of the cites.
At the beginning you have to select a sample or an existing cite:
klick onto the popup Import/Sample or Import/Cite. The file will be loaded
and scanned, the filename appears in the popup. You can select EITHER a
sample OR a cite for input.
If Fortune is unable to recognize any header, a dialog appears, where you
can select the format of the sample to load:
- The frequency
- The pack/data format
- The number format: Signed or unsigned
many old ST samples are 8 Bit Mono unsigned.
The text information of the cite can be edited by "Cite", "Source" and
"Remark". When selecting one of these buttons, a box appears in which you
can write the text. Use our cites as guidelines. You can also select the
language of the cite.
If you import a sample file and there exists already text data of a former
cite, you can choose to keep them.
In "Edit" you can pinpoint the beginning and the end of the cite within
your sound data up to 1/100 second. The left four buttons are used for the
beginning, the right ones for the end. "Play" plays the current cut.
It is important to choose the cut properly to avoid any disturbing noise
and - even more important - every useless 1/100 second costs up to 2000
Bytes of harddisk space.
"Info" shows informations about the current input file. Please pay
attention to the fact that length is the length of the raw sound data
without any headers.
"cite" plays the current cite sound
Saving the samples and cites:
In the box "Save" you find two buttons and to popups for saving.
Normally you will first klick on the popup to type the filename in the
following file select box. The data will be saved and the name appears in
the popup.
If there already is a name in the popup, you can just klick on the according
button to save the data under this name.
If import and export cite (or sample) have the same name, a temporary file
will be created on the harddisk. Therefore it is possible that the data
could not be saved even if there should be enough space on the disk.
File/Quit
Terminates the program.
Config/File format...
First, you can type the default paths for your sample and cite files. Klick
on the according popup and select the folder.
Select sample format
Fortune can read and write samples in 5 different formats:
- DVSM: For Fortune and WinRec
- AVR: Many ATARI St/Falcon Programs
- SND: Sun, NeXT, Mac
- WAV: PC
- Raw data: Raw data for many programs
Select pack format
Moreover, you can choose in which pack format the cite sounds should be
saved and the samples sould be exported. Basically the following formats are
possible (not all are implemented in every case):
- Keep: the sound data will not be changed.
- 16 Bit Stereo: save in 2 channels with 16 Bit each.
- 16 Bit deltapack: save as logarithmic compressed data, that needs 50%
less memory but sounds nearly like 16 Bit.
- 16 Bit µ-LAW: Only needs 8 Bit, sounds better than 8 Bit, but worse than
deltapack. Used on Sun and NeXT.
- 8 Bit Stereo
- 16 Bit Mono: if stereo data should be saved as mono, both channels are
added together.
- 16 Bit Mono deltapack
- 16 Bit Mono µ-LAW
- 8 Bit Mono: Better use deltapack!
Notice that it is almost useless to convert a worse format to a better one.
It only requires more memory but sounds the same. But it is possible that
other programms support only some formats.
Converting µ-LAW to deltapack can result in slightly worse sound quality,
although deltapack is the better format.
Cites can only be written in µ-LAW if the input data is in the same format.
To do this, select "Keep".
Save options
When saving samples and cites, fortune can maximize the volume of the
sample. But this is always done relative to the peak of the whole input
sample, not to the part you have possibly selected in the edit dialog.
Therefore it is possible that the sample's volume is not 100%.
You can select a fade in/out effect, too, which ranges over the first and
last 0.2 seconds of the selected part of the sample. You should use this
effect only once with the same sample. This effect can not be heard until
the sample is saved and reloaded.
Config/Play mode...
You can determine how to cite
- "cite without text": no text will be shown. In MultiTOS, that means the
other programs execute undisturbed.
- "cite with text": during playing, the text is shown in a box and
dissapears automatically.
- "cite with dialog": the text resides on the screen. Now you can select
"Remark" or "Source" to get further information about the cite. Quit with
"OK".
Most of the dialogs are "fly dials". Just klick on the background of the box
to move it while pressing the mouse button. Some of the other dialogs are
placed in windows so you don't have to close them to go