MUSIC MODULE COMPRESSOR version 1.34 Update Info Content: -------- - History & Updates - known bugs - To come in next releases History & Updates: Here's a brief history of what happened to MMCMP... Thanks to everyone who made suggestions and especially thos who reported 'important' bugs! (Their names should be included within < > ) IF I DON'T HAVE THE NAME ANYMORE PLEASE TELL ME AGAIN SO I CAN PUT YOUR NAME HERE! 5 Feb 96: VERSION 1.00 - Bug fixes: A LOT from the non-so-public beta versions. :] - New things: EVERYTHING! This is the first "real" version ;) Just check it out by yourself! 11 Feb 96: VERSION 1.10 Beta - Addition: 16 bits sample compression - Addition: .XM module format is now supported - Addition: MMTSR doesn't allow anymore to write directly into a compressed module, to prevent corruption. 13 Feb 96: VERSION 1.11 - Bug fix: Sometimes, both MMCMP and MMUNCMP didn't compress every files matching, for example, *.IT . Last file was often skipped... fixed that. - Addition: 16 bits sample compression is also supported in S3M (just in case...) 16 Feb 96: VERSION 1.20 - Bug fix: a few little things... - Change: Compressed modules now have a different header from previous version. This is to add flexibility to MMCMP and allow a lot of new feature to be added without any modification to the file format. This also prepare 'merging' with Impluse Tracker. So you MUST use MMCMP VERSION 1.20 OR NEWER. 11 Mar 96: VERSION 1.22 - Addition: Particular support for messages attached within IT modules. - Addition: ExPanded memory support for MMTSR. Expanded used as default, and ExTended must be specified on command line (MMTSR xms) - Addition: MMTSR is now removable from memory!! Usage: MMTSR rem (Thanks to Krynos a.k.a Robert Pouliot) 16 Mar 96: VERSION 1.22a - Bug Fixes: MMTSR was incorrectly checking if it could or not be removed from memory, and MMCMP/MMUNCMP sometimes 'forgot' to close files, and no other files could be opened. 18 Mar 96: VERSION 1.23 - Addition: MOD support!! Supports any MOD type from 4 to 32 channels, unless there's weird new things in MOD format. However, MMCMP doesn't recognize (yet) old MODs (those with only 15 instruments) Also, MOD compression is not as good as ZIP for example, because patterns data within MODs are VERY 'ZIP-appealing', and I have to keep the header uncompressed (MODs have a big header...) but I'll try to improve MMCMP... 28 Mar 96: VERSION 1.24 - Bug Fix (technical): MMTSR now correctly set CF when returning from INT 21h, AX=43xxh. - Bug Fix: MMTSR -may- not cause device errors anymore with applications such as DOS MEM.EXE with QEMM loaded. 8 Apr 96: VERSION 1.30 --==>> Addition: SAMPLE FILES COMPRESSION!! As for now, there's only support for Digiplayer/ST3 and IT sample format, but this is only the beginning! 16 Apr 96: VERSION 1.31 - Bug fixes: - 16 bits samples are now compressed correctly, and much better! - MMTSR 1.30 made a few programs (like IT) crash under various circumstances. Fixed. - MMTSR didn't decompress correctly HUGE modules. - Change: Destination verification on decompressing wasn't quite right, and the verification scheme is changed to something much better. What it means? DON'T CARE ABOUT "Check destination" ERROR messages if you're USING MMCMP 1.30 OR OLDER!! 14 May 96: VERSION 1.32 - Bug fix: On slower computers (like mine...) MMTSR could hang the computer if the player/tracker was VERY busy when MMTSR wanted to decompress a file. Should be better now. --==>> Addition: Added WAV and XI support!!!! Read MMCMP.doc for more details. - Addition: Added 'interrupt key' (ESC key) to stop compression/ decompression while in process. 21 Jul 96: VERSION 1.33 - Bug fixes: - Typing 'MMTSR rem' would load MMTSR if it was not installed. Fixed. - Stupid bug in the WAV compressor. Caused some file to be badly compressed, especially with 16 bits files. You should now get a very good compression ratio! 26 Sept 96: VERSION 1.34 - Bug fixes: - Under MS-DOS 7, if no expanded memory manager was loaded, MMTSR made the computer crash if the "xms" parameter was not specified. Fixed. =====> A very very stupid and naughty bug was introduced in version 1.33 of MMTSR. When checking for the version of MMCMP with which it has been compressed, it didn't check exactly the right thing. So in most cases, MMTSR didn't want to decompress file at all. - Notice: Due to the way Windows associate files with applications using their extensions, every .DOC files (documentation) which are often associated with MS-WORD, were renamed to .TXT files (plain DOS text files). ------------------------------ Known bugs: I will list here any bugs I shall fix in future versions, or "unharmful" bugs which I don't really know how to fix yet...: - With Cubic Player 1.666 and 1.7, computer may hang if CP attempts to decompress a module (in directory scanning ONLY) WHILE music is still playing. It -may- depend on computer speed. Should be fixed as soon as possible!!! ------------------------------ To come in next releases: Note: Due to an obvious lack of time (and sometimes information too), I may not be able to add new features as soon as I would like. However, bug fixes are to be expected right after they are reported to me. - MMCMP/MMUNCMP/MMTSR: - Other module format support: MTM, and maybe others... (any -good- idea?) - stereo compression support (if some module format *really* support it...) - Maybe some new compression schemes to improve compression ratio. --> A LOT of sample formats will be supported (including IFF, AIFF, etc.) as well as INSTRUMENT files (Gravis patches (PAT), IT instruments, etc.) VERY useful! especially for those 16-bit 44.1khz samples... IMPORTANT NOTE: If you happen to have descriptions of different file formats headers and are willing to give them to me, please do it!! You'll get at least the honor to be within theses docs, and probably more... See "How to contact the author" in MMCMP.DOC!! - MMTSR: - Setup utility to configure MMTSR (memory to be reserved to decompress, path and filename for temporary file, decompress only specific file extensions, etc.) If only I could manage to find some time... ------------------------------ (and don't forget to use this wonderful Impulse Tracker!) Emmanuel Giasson a.k.a. Zirconia