[terminatorX.git] / website / index.xml

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  <main>
    <general>
      <heading>Welcome to the terminatorX website!</heading>
      <subtitle>
        <nopara>Bookmark this site as 
        <link ref='http://terminatorX.cx'>terminatorX.cx</link>. It's
        located on 
        <link ref='http://42.fht-esslingen.de'>
        42.fht-esslingen.de</link></nopara>
      </subtitle>
      <text>
        <para>For those of you who drop by for the first time: terminatorX is a
        realtime audio synthesizer that allows you to "scratch" on digitally
        sampled audio data (*.wav, *.au, *.ogg, *.mp3, etc.) the way hiphop-DJs
        scratch on vinyl records. It features multiple turntables, realtime
        effects (buit-in as well as 
        <dblink id="ladspa"/> plugin effects), a
        sequencer and MIDI interface - all accessible through an easy-to-use
        gtk+ GUI. 
        <bold>This sofware is designed to run under Linux, FreeBSD and the
        like</bold>. If you have more questions read the 
        <dblink id='faq'/>/<link ref='doc/index.html'>Manual</link>/<dblink id='tutorial'>Tutorial</dblink>/<dblink id='license'>License</dblink> and if you have further questions,
        suggestions, patches, 
        <dblink id='scratches'>scratches</dblink> send me a 
        <link ref='mailto:alex@lisas.de'>mail</link></para>
      </text>
    </general>
    <news>
      <newsitem>
        <newsheader date='April 18'>
        <link ref='download.html#Current Version'>terminatorX 3.80</link> and 
        <link ref='aseqjoy.html'>aseqjoy 0.0.1</link></newsheader>
        <newstext>
          <para>This terminatorX release does a very good job at extinguishing
          points from my TODO-for-4.0 list. Among other things this release
          introduces: 
          <itemizedlist>
            <listitem>
              <para>Finally terminatorX has a 
              <bold>native</bold> <dblink id="alsa"/>
              <bold>backend</bold>. See the new 
              <italic>Preferences</italic> dialog and the online manual for
              details. The ALSA and the OSS backends now both support operating
              at an 
              <bold>arbitrary sampling rate</bold>.</para>
            </listitem>
          </itemizedlist>
          <screenshot filename='shot-3.80-1.png'>
            <nopara>Scrolling audio data, a menubar and even less space consumption
                for small displays.
            </nopara>
          </screenshot>
          <itemizedlist>  
            <listitem>
              <para>The audio data display is now 
              <bold>zoomable</bold>. This helps scratching large audio files
              (like complete songs) significantly. Use the slider on the right
              of the display area to adjust the zoom level. When playing the
              audio data will scroll in such a manner that the current position
              is always centered.</para>
              <para>To optimize playback performance terminatorX does a lot of
              "zoom" calculations in advance - so adjusting the slider will
              cause quite some amount of recalculation on large audio files.
              The focused turntable now has a blue background and a yellow
              audio signal instead of the old red border.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>A 
              <bold>MIDI interface</bold> thanks to a patch by 
              <person>
                <name>Arthur Peters</name>
                <email>amp@singingwizard.org</email>
              </person>. The MIDI interface is based upon the 
              <dblink id="alsa"/> sequencer API,
              so you'll have to connect terminatorX' input port to an output
              port of your choice with either 
              <screen>aconnect</screen> or for example the 
              <link ref='http://pkl.net/~node/alsa-patch-bay.html'>
              alsa-patch-bay</link>. To map a MIDI controller or note events to
              a turntable's parameter click the 
              <italic>MIDI Mapping</italic> button.</para>
              <para>In order to test the new interface I hacked a little tool
              called <dblink id='aseqjoy'/> that emits MIDI controller
              messages based on Joystick motion.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>I finally untied audio rendering and audio backend.
              terminatorX now operates at a 
              <bold>fixed internal blocksize</bold> of 1 ms. So now it doesn't
              matter anymore with which blocksize events were recorded - they
              will be played back correctly with any audio device
              blocksize.</para>
              <para>Note that a minor problem remains: the sampling rate has an
              effect on the blocksize, too. While there is no problem switching
              from 22 or 32 kHz to 48 kHz, there will be a slight rounding
              error switching from or to 44.1 kHz. So if you record and
              playback events I suggest you keep the sampling rate the same, or
              use "straight" sampling rates like 22, 32 and 48 kHz only.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>I added a little 
              <bold>pitch calculator</bold> that allows adjusting the playback
              speed of a turntable to that of the master turntable so it easy
              very easy to synchronize (<italic>precisely cut</italic>) loops now. 
              Note that this feature is
              probably useless with large audiofiles (like complete songs).</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>Advancing the use of XML: many XML-related bugs have been
              fixed, and I moved the 
              <bold>set file format to XML</bold>, too. The MIDI mappings of
              parameters will be stored within set files, too. As XML set files
              with a lot of sequencer events can grow quite big tX supports
              writing 
              <bold>gzip compressed set files</bold> through the use of 
              <link ref='http://www.zlib.org'>zlib</link>.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>Thanks to a suggestion by 
              <person>
                <name>Darrick Servis</name>
                <email>darrick@dcn.davis.ca.us</email>
              </person> terminatorX 
              <bold>no longer clips audio</bold>. If the generated amplitude
              goes beyond the maximum it will simply be cut off.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>Further cleaning up the layout for small DJ laptop
              displays: moved some buttons to a 
              <bold>menu bar</bold> to waste less space. Addtionally you can now
              hit 
              <screen>F11</screen> to enter 
              <bold>fullscreen</bold> mode - if your window manager supports 
              <italic>NETWM</italic>.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>Dropped support for the old gtk+ 1.2 - you have to use gtk+
              &gt;= 2.0, now.</para>
            </listitem>
          </itemizedlist></para>
          <para>This release has seen quite some 
          <link ref="http://developer.kde.org/~sewardj">valgrinding</link> so it
          should run rather stable and a major mem leak has been fixed, too.
          Unlike 3.73 this one compiles with gcc &gt; 3.0 with 
          <screen>-Wall</screen> and 
          <screen>-Werror</screen> enabled. Well, the version number ends in a
          zero, which means lots of new code with possibly lots of new and yet
          undiscovered busg.
          </para>
        </newstext>
      </newsitem>
      <newsitem>
        <newsheader date='18 Sep'>
        <link ref='download.html#Current Version'>terminatorX
        V3.73</link> available, 
        <link ref='http://www.debian.org'>Debian</link> inclusion + a 
        <dblink id="tutorial"/></newsheader>
        <newstext>
          <para>Aside of fixing numerous bugs, the new release does have some
          new features: 
          <itemizedlist>
            <listitem>
              <para>I ported terminatorX to 
              <link ref='http://www.gtk.org'>gtk+</link>
              <bold>Version 2</bold> so tX should integrate nicely with your
              GNOME 2 desktop. This release still builds with the old gtk+ 1.2,
              too, but I don't plan to support it much longer.</para>
            </listitem>
          </itemizedlist>
          <itemizedlist>
            <listitem>
              <para>I reworked the GUI a bit in order to make terminatorX fit
              better on those small DJ-laptop displays. Audio and control
              panels can now be minimized to a 
              <bold>panel bar</bold> to save space - works just like GNOME's
              window list. The panel bar status is stored within setfiles and
              restored upon loading. Additionally the buttons of the audio
              panel have been restructured. To lighten up the GUI five buttons
              have been merged into 
              <bold>two</bold> - on clicking one of these you'll get a popup
              menu with all previous functionality.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>After spending an evening with Adrian in front of his big
              endian system fixing the audiofile loading routines, I decided
              that loading audiofiles through a pipe is an ugly hack. Therefor
              I wrote 
              <bold>three new audiodfile loading methods</bold> that utilize
              libraries instead of pipes. These are 
              <link ref='http://www.mars.org/home/rob/proj/mpeg/'>
              mad</link> (for mp3 files), 
              <link ref='http://www.xiph.org/ogg/vorbis/'>libvorbis</link> (for
              OGG/Vorbis files) and 
              <link ref='http://www.68k.org/~michael/audiofile/'>
              libaudiofile</link> (for wav/aiff/au etc.). Using these routines
              instead of the old ones brings the following advantages: 
              <itemizedlist>
                <listitem>
                  <para>loading audiofiles is significantly 
                  <bold>faster</bold></para>
                </listitem>
                <listitem>
                  <para>terminatorX now evaluates the 
                  <bold>sample rate</bold> of an audiofile and adjusts the
                  turntable's pitch accordingly (this does not affect the
                  regular "pitch" setting btw)</para>
                </listitem>
                <listitem>
                  <para>the new routines provide much better 
                  <bold>visual feedback</bold> on the loading progress</para>
                </listitem>
              </itemizedlist>Additionally more file formats are supported, so I
              strongly recommend installing the libraries mentioned above to
              improve terminatorX' usabilty.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>Slowly approaching terminator 
              <bold>XML</bold>: the configuration file (now 
              <italic>~/.terminatorXrc</italic>) is no longer binary but an XML
              document. This is necessary to become more flexible in the future
              - and it allows editing your terminatorX configuration with a
              text editor - if you want to. Of course, terminatorX now requires
              
              <link ref='http://www.libxml.org'>libxml</link> to be installed.
              For convenience this release still reads the old binary config
              and stores it as an XML document on exit. I plan to move the set
              file format to XML soon, too.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>I completely rewrote the 
              <italic>tX_engine</italic> in order to allow installing
              terminatorX 
              <bold>suid root</bold>. This way terminatorX can run with
              realtime scheduling policy even for unprivileged users. Right
              after creation of the engine thread terminatorX drops root
              privileges - so it might even be safe to install terminatorX suid
              root - but I'll leave that up to security experts to decide. For
              a more detailed discussion read 
              <link ref='faq.html#11'>this FAQ entry</link>.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>Playing around with the wonderful 
              <link ref='http://www.povray.org'>povray</link> a bit I came up
              with a new logo for terminatorX. The icons have been replaced,
              too - the new ones should be easier for your desktop
              perception.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>Thanks to 
              <person>
                <name>Adrian</name>
                <email>adrian@lisas.de</email>
              </person> terminatorX now has a 
              <bold>manpage</bold>.</para>
            </listitem>
          </itemizedlist></para>
          <para>A lot of bug fixing went into this release, too, most notably: 
          <itemizedlist>
            <listitem>
              <para>An old clipping bug in the 
              <italic>tX_dial</italic> widget code has been fixed.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>This release builds, runs and loads audiofiles on big
              endian architectures.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>terminatorX should now build from scratch not only on Linux
              but on FreeBSD, too. Thanks to 
              <person>
                <name>Tilman Linneweh</name>
                <email>tilman@arved.de</email>
              </person> for testing.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>Many other fixes.</para>
            </listitem>
          </itemizedlist>Have a look at the 
          <link ref='ChangeLog'>ChangeLog</link> for more details and grab the
          tarball or the RPMS from the 
          <link ref='download.html#Current Version'>download
          section</link>.</para>
          <para>Aside of the release I'd like to bring to your attention that 
          <person>
            <name>Mike Furr</name>
            <email>mfurr@debian.org</email>
          </person> is now maintainer of the 
          <link ref='http://packages.debian.org/unstable/sound/terminatorx.html'>
          terminatorX Debian package</link>. So if you're a Debian user you may
          want to 
          <italic>apt-get</italic> this release - if you install 
          <italic>unstable</italic> packages at all and when your local mirror
          has been updated.</para>
          <para>For new terminatorX users 
          <person>
            <name>Brian</name>
            <email>bredfern@calarts.edu</email>
          </person> has created a wonderful step-by-step 
          <dblink id='tutorial'>
          "terminatorX TOOT" tutorial</dblink> - reading that will accelerate the
          creation of your first scratch considerably.</para>
        </newstext>
      </newsitem>
      <newsitem>
        <newsheader date='31 Jul'>
        <dblink id='turntables'>Turntable gallery</dblink> online and a fresh 
        <dblink id='scratches'>scratch</dblink></newsheader>
        <newstext>
          <para>I finally managed to hack the website's DTD and XSLT stylesheet
          to support the 
          <link ref='turntable.html'>users' turntable section</link>. Now that
          it's easy to update, please keep these turntable images coming in!
          I'd really like to see more of your turntables.</para>
          <para>
          <person>
            <name>Brian</name>
            <email>bredfern@calarts.edu</email>
          </person> - a California based terminatorX DJ - has contributed a very
          cool scratch for the 
          <dblink id='scratches'>scratches section</dblink>. It's just an
          excerpt of a complete drum and bass set that is available at Brian's 
          <link ref='http://asapien.org'>website</link> - which seems to be down
          currently. In case it doesn't come up again I'll mirror the complete
          set here, too.</para>
          <para>
          <italic>The names have been changed to protect the
          innocent...</italic> from 
          <bold>spamming</bold>. The XSLT stylesheet now mangles all email
          addresses on this site except for mine - if you've seen a correct
          email address before you should be able to recover the real address
          easily. BTW if you're a spam victim, too, add the incredible 
          <link ref='http://spamassassin.org'>spamassassin</link> to your 
          <italic>.procmailrc</italic> and spam won't annoy you anymore.</para>
          <para>On terminatorX news Version 3.73 should be ready for release
          RSN! It will probably still lack native ALSA support, though.</para>
        </newstext>
      </newsitem>
      <newsitem>
        <newsheader date='05 jan'>happy new year: 
        <link ref='download.html#Current Version'>terminatorX V3.72</link> is
        here.</newsheader>
        <newstext>
          <para>Hope everybody had a nice start into 2002, these are the
          changes that come with terminatorX release 3.72 (for details check
          the 
          <dblink id='changelog'/>): 
          <itemizedlist>
            <listitem>
              <para>Thanks to a patch from 
              <person>
                <name>Matthew Evans</name>
                <email>activesx@hotmail.com</email>
              </person>terminatorX finally supports loading 
              <link ref='http://www.vorbis.com'>Ogg Vorbis</link> audiofiles.
              Note that this feature requires ogg123 (&gt;= RC2) and 
              <link ref='http://sox.sourceforge.net'>sox</link> installed. The
              very fresh RC3 release of Ogg Vorbis works just fine, too.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>
              <person>
                <name>Adrian</name>
                <email>adrian@lisas.de</email>
              </person>once again submitted code to the project: terminatorX
              now features 
              <bold>mute</bold> and 
              <bold>solo</bold> buttons for each turntable's mixing unit. The
              initial patch had some problems with the already existing
              mute-function in terminatorX, therefor I extended the turntable
              in such a way that the new buttons 
              <bold>only affect current mixing</bold> - the sequencer will not
              record any events for them.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>I updated the XInput code to work with XFree86 &gt; 4.
              terminatorX now uses the 
              <italic>xsetpointer</italic> binary that comes with XFree86 to
              switch the core pointer - as the old code doesn't work with newer
              XFree86 releases anymore. 
              <italic>configure</italic> should auto-detect 
              <italic>xsetpointer</italic> if it's available. 
              <bold>Note:</bold> You only need to specify an additional XInput
              Device in the options dialog if you want to use a scratching
              device other than your mouse. (Yeah, I know, I state that in the
              docs, tooltips, everywhere - but I still get bug reports related
              to that issue...)</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>Updated mpg123 loading routines that should work with 
              <link ref='http://mpg321.sourceforge.net'>mpg321</link> (which
              many distros install instead of mpg123 these days), too. Note
              that you'll have to have 
              <link ref='http://sox.sourceforge.net'>sox</link> installed in
              order to get mp3-loading to work (As mpg321 doesn't support
              mpg123's 
              <italic>-m</italic> switch).</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>fixes for misc bugs (writing broken .wav's on big endian
              machines, gcc &gt;= 3.x compile fixes, some gtk+ cleanups,
              etc.)</para>
            </listitem>
          </itemizedlist></para>
          <para>Grab the sources or the fresh RPMs (Thanks, 
          <person>
            <name>Adrian</name>
            <email>adrian@lisas.de</email>
          </person>!) from the 
          <link ref='download.html#Current Version'>download
          section</link>.</para>
          <para>Initially I planned to integrate native 
          <link ref='http://www.alsa-project.org'>ALSA</link>-support into this
          release but I simply failed to finish. As many people wanted to have
          some of the above features early I decided to release it without ALSA
          now, as I'll be busy for the upcomming weeks. I haven't given up on
          ALSA though, hopefully the next terminatorX release will feature a
          new audiodevice backend that supports ALSA (V0.9) 
          <bold>and</bold> OSS and brings many other adtvantages.</para>
          <para>The website has undergone minor updates, too: 
          <itemizedlist>
            <listitem>
              <para>The section header's now should look fine with 
              <link ref='http://www.mozilla.org'>Mozilla</link>-based browsers.
              They might look funny with older netscapes, though.</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>Updated the 
              <link ref='screenshots.html'>screenshots</link> as people started
              asking howto achieve that old tX V3.5 layout :)</para>
            </listitem>
            <listitem>
              <para>Minor fixes to make 
              <link ref='http://www.w3.org'>W3C</link>'s validator accept the
              pages again, and a favicon that needs some improvement.</para>
            </listitem>
          </itemizedlist></para>
        </newstext>
      </newsitem>
     </news>
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