Posted By
TLC
on 2012-01-08
13:03:43
|  Re: TED Music Collection?
I'm still studying what PSID v1.0/2.0/2.0ng/RSID options imply and what should be kept and what part modified.
Though, after some time, I'm inclined to think that the first real question is, if the current psid/rsid format should be modified at all (apart from cosmetic changes ie. the magic in the file header and the filename extension).
Changing the format here and there might help getting rid of some of psid's historical details and options that still need to be dealt with today in a player for the fileformat. (As for the ability, I'm absolutely positive that the current psid/rsid fileformat is sufficient for our purposes; ...I could hardly invent a case (some special case of a ted tune) which would be impossible to describe, logically, using p/rsid).
Not changing the format's structure (apart from the mentioned cosmetic changes and logical "re-definitions", ie. there's no CIA timing in the Plus/4, but there's TED etc.), from the other hand, seems to promise very small "initial cost" of the project's startup, ie. no need to write file manipulating tools from scratch (the currently available sid file manipulating tools could be used with less to no modifications, which is IMHO a great advantage).
Still yesterday I could get SIDedit up and running on my machine (I mean the original version in Perl, not the supplied Windows binary). This is a Perl script ie. it can be analyzed and modified very easily. According to LaLa's copyright notice, it can be used and distributed under "the same terms as Perl itself" (which in practice is Perl's "artistic license" or GPL). I'm fairly positive that Plus/4 tune support can be added to SIDedit / Audio::SID if that turns out to be a good step. SIDedit already supports a lot of editing options, generating HVSC-standard filenames from tune titles, in short, most things which helps one to make clean sid tune files. Also, I'd suppose, it should run in ActivePerl natively (ActivePerl is a Perl/tk port to Windows), or it could be compiled to a standalone Windows exe (just as LaLa did, using perl2exe).
I'd be happy to read opinions on:
- What should be the coll's name?
- What should be the file extension of the files (from previous conversation, I'd presume .ted, but I'm not sure).
- What should be the 4 char file magic of the file headers, provided that some derivative of the p/rsid fileformat is used? (In p/rsid files, currently it's PSID and RSID).
This is still pretty experimental (still on the level of theory). Feel free to add suggestions, ideas, whatever...
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