lmbailey@vela.acs.oakland.edu (Laurana Bailey) (05/24/91)
I have a question on Experiment IV? How stable is it? The reason I ask is because I listen to alot of MOD files and quite often will move them to casette tape for enjoyment in the car. EVERY tracker player I have used will CRASH after loading between 10-15 different modules. I have used Intuitracker (Latest version which fixed many a bug), Module Master, UltraTracker, and more recently XTPlay. ALL of them would crash after loading 10-15 modules almost as though they weren't releasing memory properly. XTPlay works the best out of the lot and has a CLEAR button to clear memory, and if used, will load between 20-25 modules before crashing. These crashes occur even though the memory appears to be released fine. Is this a flaw in the MOD format or in the programs themselves? -- /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ |Just another lemming... | Yet another Amiga maniac set loose | | | on the world...and you thought things| |lmbailey@vela.acs.oakland.edu | couldn't get any worse. |
espie@egret.Stanford.EDU (Marc Espie) (05/24/91)
In article <6547@vela.acs.oakland.edu> lmbailey@vela.acs.oakland.edu (Laurana Bailey) writes: > >I have a question on Experiment IV? How stable is it? > Pretty much stable, bare improvements to come :-). >The reason I ask is because I listen to alot of MOD files and quite >often will move them to casette tape for enjoyment in the car. EVERY >tracker player I have used will CRASH after loading between 10-15 >different modules. I have used Intuitracker (Latest version which >fixed many a bug), Module Master, UltraTracker, and more recently >XTPlay. ALL of them would crash after loading 10-15 modules almost as >though they weren't releasing memory properly. XTPlay works the best >out of the lot and has a CLEAR button to clear memory, and if used, >will load between 20-25 modules before crashing. It has proved able to load the ~150 modules on ab20 in one round without crashing. > >These crashes occur even though the memory appears to be released >fine. Is this a flaw in the MOD format or in the programs themselves? > Well, considering that the mod format is a simple binary dump, you have to be VERY conservative when loading these beasts. The mod format doesn't include any error-checking, you have to add yours. Anyway, it's also a pretty non-sensical format. Guess that comes from adding kludge after kludge to a small assembly program without ever designing anything 1/2 :-). About memory recovery: I've used a personal technique to keep track of any allocations in a sensible way. Nothing revolutionnary, but it DOES appear to be much simpler to debug than other techniques. I guess that checking the program with the Enforcer/memoration/mungwall did help too ! ---- Marc Espie (espie@flamingo.stanford.edu)
lmbailey@vela.acs.oakland.edu (Laurana Bailey) (05/24/91)
Thanx for the prompt reply. I have DLed your program and will be putting it through the torture test. :-) I also appreciate the source code as I have been looking for examples so I might use MODs in my own programs. MOD would be a great new IFF music standard if we could get Commodore to sit down and standardize it. It shouldn't be too difficult and it shouldn't take much modification to the current music programs already out (SoundTracker, Star Tracker, Noise Tracker, and more recently Power Tracker) to at least get them to agree to the IFF standard. Any new features for a MOD creator program could be submitted to CATS for approvial into the IFF standard. Perhaps this is more work than it sounds like, but it's better than the crummy .SMUS IIF standard currently out on the Amiga. The Amiga is noted for it's sound abilities and I have yet to see any music program short of some MIDI stuff that really makes the Amiga shine like the MOD writers do. Perhaps someone at Commodore can speak up on the subject and perhaps offer a way to submit it to the powers that be for consideration? -- /\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ |Just another lemming... | Yet another Amiga maniac set loose | | | on the world...and you thought things| |lmbailey@vela.acs.oakland.edu | couldn't get any worse. |
espie@ibis.Stanford.EDU (Marc Espie) (05/25/91)
In article <6562@vela.acs.oakland.edu> lmbailey@vela.acs.oakland.edu (Laurana Bailey) writes: > > >MOD would be a great new IFF music standard if we could get Commodore >to sit down and standardize it. It shouldn't be too difficult and it >shouldn't take much modification to the current music programs already >out (SoundTracker, Star Tracker, Noise Tracker, and more recently >Power Tracker) to at least get them to agree to the IFF standard. > >Any new features for a MOD creator program could be submitted to CATS >for approvial into the IFF standard. > >Perhaps this is more work than it sounds like, but it's better than >the crummy .SMUS IIF standard currently out on the Amiga. The Amiga is >noted for it's sound abilities and I have yet to see any music >program short of some MIDI stuff that really makes the Amiga shine >like the MOD writers do. > >Perhaps someone at Commodore can speak up on the subject and perhaps >offer a way to submit it to the powers that be for consideration? > Having played with the soundtracker format for a while, I would definitely NOT consider it for an IFF format. It is a very simple binary dump, highly amiga-dependent, very unflexible, and full of stupid quirks. It is completely contrary to the IFF zen. Now, designing a real music format with the same capabilities is very feasible. SMUS is not so crummy, it has some capabilities for extension (which soundtracker-like stuff sorely lacks). BTW, the player I've put into experiment iv is a very simple one. I left it that way so that it could be used as a simple basis for people who need to understand soundtracker format. The next generation of player will most definitely compile the soundtracker binary dump to its own internal format. Update: right now, I've had some reports of problems with Experiment IV. There seems to be a problem with the say command. Strangely enough, it appears that it is the say command which hangs. Experiment IV does release the audio device and exits as expected. Is there a known bug in the narrator.device ? I'm not quite sure the audio.device lock capability is so bug-free as I expected... more about that later. ---- Marc Espie (espie@flamingo.stanford.edu)