Amiga ISO Collection

home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search

/ Amiga ISO Collection / AmigaUtilCD2.iso / Misc / CD2MC.LZX / CD2MC / CD2MC.uk < prev next >

Wrap

Text File | 1996-01-19 | 12.7 KB | 266 lines

Why this program? The answer is very simple: I never found a program able to let you backup your CDs onto tapes for personal use. This one not only does this with a lot of feautres, but it prints out the tape cover too! In a few words, CD2MC provides the "Edit" function (and something more, I guess...) of the home stereos, so I think it could help a lot of people who, like me, have a poor stereo not provided with the Edit function; in any case, I suggest the "luck fellas" to just have a look at CD2MC, it could serve them well too... The use of CD2MC is easy: in fact, it needs no parameters, just launch it from the CLI or the Workbench; it was programmed under Kickstart 1.3 so it should be compatible with all the available types of Amiga, and with whatsoever version of Kickstart. The only attention arises from the fact that in the directory DEVS: there must be the "printer.device" driver with, in the directory "printers/", the filename of the own's printer, while in the FONTS: directory there must be the fonts Helvetica 9, Garnet 16, Ruby 15, Diamond 12, Times 13,available as default on the disks of the Amiga OS. The program needs at maximum 354 RAM Kb, but anyway there is a memory check, and for instance if there isn't the possibility of activating a requester, an alert will be displayed. But let's see now in detail the possibilities offered by this program: ============================================================================ *FIRST PART - INSERTING DATA* ----------------------------- *STRING GADGETS* ================ These gadgets allow the inserting both of the song title and the length of the songs and of the tape, the title of the album and the name of the singers. It is possible to insert up to 42 different songs, so to permit the backup of double-CD's or of CD particularly full of songs, and also allows the creation of multitapes (see after). Each time you press the carriage return key, the cursors will automatically move on the next string gadget. It is also possible to perform this operation by hand, although if not convenient. Just bear in your mind that empty spaces between the songs aren't allowed; in other words, as soon as there is an empty space, all what follows will be erased. On the left you can see the number of the song associated with its name, so that you'll be able to program your stereo with the right numbers. Would you want to skip some songs, it is possible to make the song name precede by a two digits sequence followed by a ".": for instance, if I want the songs number 1,3,4,5 I will regularly write the title of the first song, while in the next gadget I will write "03.Song number 3". Pressing the carriage return, on the left you'll see the number 3 instead of 2, and the string gadget will only contain the song name. From that point on, the count will go on regularly (i.e. 4,5,6 a.s.o.) till new order. As it regards timings inserting, times over 30 minutes aren't allowed, nor void times or empty gadgets. The separation sign between minutes and seconds is a ":", but while writing it is possible to insert whatsoever character you wish, as for example "," or ".", useful the latter in case you use the numeric pad. If a song length is lesser than one minute, you can just write the number of secs. A "00:" will be automatically added. Remember that for a perfect optimization you may need to check the song length by reading it directly from the CD, and not by taking for granted what is written on the cover, as often those data differ from reality. In case you write impossible values ("12:88") or alphabetic chars ("aa:bb") the program will signal the mistake. The tape-length gadget is a three-digits gadget in oder to also allow the (obsolete) use of 100 or 120 mins long tapes. The length is referred to both the sides of a tape, i.e. to what one can read on the tape itself. To end, the gadgets about author(s) and title(s) represent what will be shown in the cover, once printed. It is also possible to insert just one author and two titles (for very long album names) or two authors and just one title (for example, in case you backup classical music). *OPTIONS GADGET* ================ The options gadget, put near the tape lentgh one, are "A","B","3","M","C" and "+". -"A" Gadget: this one says that only side A is available; this function may reveal itself useful in case you already have an engaged side. -"B" Gadget: as for the "A" one, but this time the free side is the B one. -"3" Gadget: I've put this option as many CD readers have as an option the possibility of adding 3 secs at the end of each song. Thus, the optimization will also consider this factor. It is mixable with "A" and "B". -"M" Gadget: This one is useful to create more than one cassette, each one though all of the same length. Once optimized, the whole list of the cassettes will be shown. This way, one may have 42 particulalry interesting songs and the wish of recording them on a certain numbers of, for instance, 60 minutes tapes. With this option, this is possible! -"C" Gadget: this is a rather interesting function, as it allows to record the songs onto a tape of a length lesser than the one of the CD. Obviously, some songs will be erased, but only in as the lesser number as possible. It is mixable with "3", "A" and "B". -"+" Gadget: this function lets you consider songs as linked together, so that the optimization doesn't split them. It is useful if you need to backup a classical music CD, where the singles acts of an entire opera cannot of course be splitted! Just bear in your mind that if I want to attach the number 1 to the 2, and 3 to 4 I'll put the "+" on the 1 and 3; should I put it also on the 2, I'd get numbers 1,2,3,4 linked altogether. *CONTROL GADGETS* ================= The control gadgets are: "First Fit", "Best Fit", "Manual", "New", "Custom", "Next", "Previous"; -"First Fit" Gadget: with this option there will be the first available optimization, this means that the first useful possibility - so as the sum of the songs is not lesser than the length of side A minus 10 secs, nor greater than the same length plus 30 secs - will be shown. This means that if I have a 60 mins length tape, the first useful time in a range of 29:50 - 30:30 mins will be displayed. You don't have to worry about this overflow of time, as a normal tape contains a minute more per each side. This technique is particularly studied for those system with auto-reverse. -"Best Fit" Gadget: with this gadget there will be the computation that more gets near to the maximum length of a tape. Of course this method is slower, but better. As, for a high number of songs (see the "mathematics" chapter) this calculus may be extremely long (especially for a 68000), I've put a percentage bar, and the possibility of interrupting the calculus in every moment. In case you choose one the former gadgets, and the "C" gadget isn't activated, it is also possible to know the minimum length of the necessary tape. You just need to null (clear) the tape-length gadget and press either "Best Fit" or "First Fit". The cursor will activate the tape-length gadget, writing in it the minum time required. In Italy there are 46, 50, 54, 60, 64, 70, 74, 80, 84, 90, 94, 100 mins length tapes, and it's on these times that the routine is based. This routine is useful in case you attach songs and in case there are CD whose length is very close to that one of a tape (for instance, 61 mins CD). -"Manual" gadget: this gadget shows the first thirty available optimizations by using the "First Fit" option. Studied for the most exigents, it's useful in case the "Best Fit" is too slow; this way one can choose the most agreable songs combination. -"New" gadget: with this gadget everything is taken to default a part from the lentgh tape. I suggest you to wait for the cursor to appear in the first string gadget before going on. -"Custom" gadget: you may use it to skip the optimization in order to manually insert the data to print out on your tape cover. Useful in case you duplicate from tape to tape, or if the CD thoroughlly fits into just one side of a tape (as the optimization, even if possible, is unuseful). -"Next" gadget: to go from songs #1-#21 to songs #22-#42. -"Previous" gadget: to go from #22-#42 to #1-#21. ============================================================================ *SECOND PART - SHOWING AND PRINTING DATA* ----------------------------------------- *STRING GADGETS* ================ They exactly work as before. On the left there is the number of the song. You can change the songs names, or even add some other names. Anyway, no option lets you change the number of the song written on the left. If you also write the time length, the program calculates if really that songs fits (useful in case the side B isn't full and you may want to record another song). In case you simply press return on it, a "--:--" will be displayed, and the number of the fittable songs will be virtually unlimited. Useful in case you don't know the length of the song. *CONTROL GADGETS* ================= They are as follows: "Forth", "Back", "New", "Print", "Next", "Previous". -"Forth" gadget: in order to see the next tape, or optimization, in case you have pressed either "M" or "Manual". -"Back" gadget: same as "Forth", but it's the contrary. -"New" gadget: it erases all the songs you have written. The same thing doesn't happen if you close the window with the "close" gadget. This latter operation may come useful in case you want to change the name of the album or of the tape length. Pressing, at this point, "Custom", data will still be there. -"Print" gadget: this gadget prints out the cover with the data you wrote. In case one cover cannot fit all the songs (i.e. there are more than 16 songs per side) another one will be printed. The routine checks for the printer status before printing, so it warns you about off-line problems, or out-of-paper troubles and so on. -"Next" gadget: to go to the next page. -"Previous" gadget: to go to the previous page. ============================================================================ *SOME MATHEMATICS CONSIDERATIONS* ================================= These considerations just want to make the math-geek user how technically it is possible to know how to calculate all the possible combinations, and the mean user how much the use of the "Best Fit" gadget may result long and dangerous in some critical situations. Let's see the example of a 4 song edit: here there are all the possibilities: (let's call the songs with 1,2,3,4 and the symbols /,|,\ the links between the songs themselves) 1 2 3 4 (i.e.: /|\ / \ / 2 3 4 3 4 4 1; 1,2 ; 1,2,3; 1,2,3,4; 1,2,4; / \| / 1,3 ; 1,3,4 3 4 4 1,4 (=8) / 4 2; 2,3 ; 2,3,4; 2,4 (=4) 3; 3,4; (=2) 4 (=1) ------- (=15) As you can see, every single group is given by the combination of the number of songs (4) respect to the number of available groupings (from 1 to 4), i.e., called with n the songs number, and with k the possible groupings: n n ______ _____ \ n \ n! \ = \ ________ = 2^n-1 / k / /_____ /____ k!(n-k)! k=1 k=1 In the above example it's 2^4-1=(16)-1=15. So you see that the time doesn't grow linearly to the growing of the number of songs, but exponentially, and moreover this exponent depends on the number of the songs. So if for 10 songs (the mean deal in a normal CD) there are 1023 possibilities, for 20 songs there are 1.048.575 of them, and if we want to insert all the 42 songs we get 4.39 exp(12); let's say that for 10 songs the "Best Fit" needs .5 secs; for 20 songs, it will take 8 mins! Obviously this is a theroic calculus as not all the possibilities are taken in consideration, as, for instance, if I have 20 songs but the sum of the first 5 already overflows the maximum time, it's out of doubt that the sums (1+2+3+4+5+6, ... ,1+2+3+4+...+19+20) will not be considered, as they will surely give a negative result. This technique, in the above example, lets you save 2^(20-5)-1 possible combinations (about 16 secs, possibly to add to some other similar cases). Moreover, by using the "+" gadget, and vincolating thus some songs, it's possible to speed up the execution times. Generally, the "Best Fit" should be used for a number of songs lesser than 14 (that is, about 8 secs). *NOTES - HOW TO GET THE COMPLETE VERSION OF THE PROGRAM* ======================================================== The current version in the BBS is a demo, so that this means that some functions (the "+" gadget, the "M", "C", the "Best Fit" and the "Print" ones) aren't available. In order to use at 100% my program, which costed me a lot of fatigue, please send $15 or 20,000 Italian Liras to: MARCEGLIA LUCA VIA LA VIGNETTA 40 32100 BELLUNO ITALY