Welcome to the mTropolis v1.0 Product Sampler! This document provides late-breaking information about this release, supplementing the information contained in the mTropolis Developer Guide and mTropolis Reference Guide.
Reporting Bugs
While we have put a lot of energy into making this release as bug-free as possible, some little glitches inevitably sneak by in a version 1.0 release. If you happen to find one, we want to fix it for you as soon as possible! If you have purchased technical support, please report any bugs you find through the normal support channels. Otherwise, you can always send your reports by email to:
bugs@mfactory.com
Thank you! Your feedback plays a critical role in shaping future releases of mTropolis.
Tips, Known Bugs, and Workarounds
As you work with this mTropolis product sampler, you should be aware of the following:
• The save-disabled mTropolis editor does not give you an option to cancel when you close a project. Be careful not to close your projects unintentionally by pressing command-W or closing the Layout Window.
• To do a "Save As..." or to build a title, mTropolis currently reads the entire project into memory. If the project is too large to fit in memory, portions of the file might not be saved. With the default memory settings, the mExamples project cannot be saved as a new project or built to a title file. Increase mTropolis's memory partition if you want to perform these operations on the mExamples project (15000K definitely works; much less memory is actually required).
• For best performance, file sharing should be turned off before running a mTropolis project or built title. Animations play more smoothly if file sharing is off.
Cross-Platform Development
Not all of the features provided in the Macintosh version of the mTropolis editor are supported in titles built for Windows. These features are listed below. These differences will be minimized in future mTropolis updates. Until then, if you need to deploy a title on both Windows and Macintosh, use these features with caution.
Windows player limitations and differences:
• Element Transition modifier does not show transition effect, but the element is concealed or revealed.
• Gradient modifier has no effect.
• Scene Transition modifier does not support "fade" and "zoom" transitions.
• Ink effects are limited to Copy, Background Transparent, and Background Matte
• Tinting (i.e., changing the foreground/background color of an imported image) is not supported
• Graphic modifier shapes are limited to Rectangle and Oval. Shadows are not supported.
• Image Effect modifier effects do not look exactly the same as their Mac counterparts.
• The Sound Fade modifier affects overall system volume, not the volume for individual sounds.
• Stereo sounds are played as mono.
• When unpaused, sounds always start playing from their beginning in title built for Windows platforms (instead of playing from the position at which they were paused).
• Playing Macintosh SND files used in a title built for Windows platforms causes the mTropolis player to crash. Use only AIFF files in projects that will be built for Windows.
• Windows 3.1 player is limited to 8-bit graphics.
• The Save and Restore modifier always presents a file-selection dialog, even if "Preferences" or "Title Folder" is selected as the location for the file.
• While video is playing, no other sounds can play.
• QuickTime videos set to be "paused" initially (by selecting "Paused" in the QuickTime element's configuration dialog) will also be hidden initially in titles built for Windows platforms.
• QuickTime movies linked to the scene do not play their video portion in titles built for Windows. To work around this problem, link the movie to a child element of the scene. Size the element to fill the entire scene.
• For performance reasons, avoid using custom palettes that contain duplicate entries.
• Use the Text Style modifier rather than the Format menu to change the style of text elements.
• Mac-specific text formats such as Outline and Shadow are not supported.
• Keyboard messenger does not support "Control" or "Command" key combinations.
• Messages sent from shared scene modifiers to their siblings (i.e., other modifiers on the shared scene) are not received properly. To work around, send the message to the shared scene and let it cascade/relay to the sibling modifier.
• The "Edit Element" and "Edit Done" messages are not currently supported. As a result, editable text elements will not function correctly under Windows.
• Press Alt-f, then x to exit a mTropolis Windows title.
