a little stumped...

So on a PC the music has to have a .mp3 extension while on the mac it has to not have the extension. Furthermore, mac Nova doesn't seem to recognise the music if the type/creator codes are missing. But if it has type/creator codes then it will come out on a PC as .bin file - they will try to convert it and will fail. So the only options seem to be a) get PC users to use some other program to decode the Nova Music.bin file (not nice), or include both a Nova Music with type/creator codes and a Nova Music.mp3 without them and get the user to delete the one they don't need (wastes space).
Or am I missing something here? I was sure this wasn't an issue...

This post has been edited by Guy : 22 January 2006 - 07:00 PM

Guy, on Jan 18 2006, 02:12 AM, said:

So on a PC the music has to have a .mp3 extension while on the mac it has to not have the extension.
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Not true. The PC Nova music does not have an extension (although it will work with any .mp3 file) . If you want to give PC users new Nova Music, just zip it into a seprate file from the rest of the plug. You might even be able to zip the zip file into another zip file containing the rest of the plug (so you would have one .zip containing a .bin and another .zip). I know Stuffit won't do this for you though...

Though I can't find it on my hard drive now that I want it, I think I remember that Frozen Heart originally shipped with a little app that converted EV files to EVO ones, probably in part by changing their type & creator codes. That memory inspired this:

To save having to include two copies of what I'm guessing is a large music file, you could include a single music file without type & creator codes plus a little droplet app for Mac users to use to add the codes. I would hope that Applescript could easily generate the app.

This post has been edited by Dr. Trowel : 18 January 2006 - 01:24 PM

AppleScript can change creator and type codes, yes.

Dr. Trowel, on Jan 18 2006, 12:21 PM, said:

Though I can't find it on my hard drive now that I want it, I think I remember that Frozen Heart originally shipped with a little app that converted EV files to EVO ones, probably in part by changing their type & creator codes. That memory inspired this:

To save having to include two copies of what I'm guessing is a large music file, you could include a single music file without type & creator codes plus a little droplet app for Mac users to use to add the codes. I would hope that Applescript could easily generate the app.
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Frozen Heart did have such a converter. I also would save the music seperately for the PC users... Seems easiest.

Guy, on Jan 18 2006, 08:12 AM, said:

So on a PC the music has to have a .mp3 extension while on the mac it has to not have the extension. Furthermore, mac Nova doesn't seem to recognise the music if the type/creator codes are missing. But if it has type/creator codes then it will come out on a PC as .bin file - they will try to convert it and will fail. So the only options seem to be a) get PC users to use some other program to decode the Nova Music.bin file (not nice), or include both a Nova Music with type/creator codes and a Nova Music.mp3 without them and get the user to delete the one they don't need (wastes space).
Or am I missing something here? I was sure this wasn't an issue...
View Post

Let us be accurate. Stuffit 9.0 on PC, when it does Mac archive expansion, does indeed encode in MacBinary (.bin) files that have type and creator codes when it expands the archive, as it does for files that have a resource fork. However, if you do a .bin.zip archive, you're probably doing it with a tool that MacBinary encodes based on the presence of a non-empty resource fork, so the Nova Music file won't be binned and will be obtained as-is at the end when expanding. So this is only a problem for one doing sitx distributions. Not that it makes it any less important, but that prepares for step 2.

Indeed, if you ask Stuffit on PC to decode a .bin file, then I don't know exactly when it does but you can obtain the data fork encoded in this MacBinary file (probably accompanied by an empty extracted resource fork). So, the PC user just needs to rerun the Nova Music.bin through Stuffit, instead of feeding it to the converter. That's yet another thing we need to tell in the ReadMe and yet another annoyance for the PC user, but we at least have a simple solution.

Zacha Pedro, on Jan 19 2006, 11:29 AM, said:

However, if you do a .bin.zip archive, you're probably doing it with a tool that MacBinary encodes based on the presence of a non-empty resource fork, so the Nova Music file won't be binned and will be obtained as-is at the end when expanding.
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I was under the impression that the codes and other file attributes were stored in the resource fork. The file does get binned cos if it didn't the codes would be lost and would no longer work on a mac.

Zacha Pedro, on Jan 19 2006, 11:29 AM, said:

Indeed, if you ask Stuffit on PC to decode a .bin file, then I don't know exactly when it does but you can obtain the data fork encoded in this MacBinary file (probably accompanied by an empty extracted resource fork). So, the PC user just needs to rerun the Nova Music.bin through Stuffit, instead of feeding it to the converter. That's yet another thing we need to tell in the ReadMe and yet another annoyance for the PC user, but we at least have a simple solution.
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Yes but this defeats the whole purpose of .bin.zip - not requiring PC users to go through the heartache of finding and installing StuffIt and trying to get it to work.

I think I agree with rmx at the moment.

This post has been edited by Guy : 19 January 2006 - 09:36 PM

Guy, on Jan 19 2006, 08:36 PM, said:

Yes but this defeats the whole purpose of .bin.zip - not requiring PC users to go through the heartache of finding and installing StuffIt and trying to get it to work.

I think I agree with rmx at the moment.
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indeed, i have tried every version of win-stuffit i could find, ad none of them unstuff sitx or hqx properly, and it's agamble on good-ole'-fashioned sit files. i still think we should just move over to zip, i know it's less efficient compression (or we could use .rar if there is a free mac rar archiver, get around zip innefeciency), but i have NEVER had any problems going cross-platform with a zip file

Zacha Pedro, on Jan 19 2006, 05:29 PM, said:

However, if you do a .bin.zip archive, you're probably doing it with a tool that MacBinary encodes based on the presence of a non-empty resource fork

That's what I did. For anyone using my app, this will not be an issue.

Guy, on Jan 20 2006, 02:36 AM, said:

I was under the impression that the codes and other file attributes were stored in the resource fork. The file does get binned cos if it didn't the codes would be lost and would no longer work on a mac.

Yes but this defeats the whole purpose of .bin.zip - not requiring PC users to go through the heartache of finding and installing StuffIt and trying to get it to work.

I think I agree with rmx at the moment.
View Post

Er, Guy, do you actually read what I write? I already said the problem does NOT happen with .bin.zip archives, only with .sitx ones, so the user already has Stuffit up and running. These codes and file attributes are stored in a private fork, not the resource fork.

However, you're right that there is a fatal flaw in my reasoning: in fact the Nova Music file should be binned in the .bin.zip method because it won't work on a Mac otherwise. Unless you find a way to add the type/creator codes afterwards. This idea indeed seems the least problematic, and given the huge number of plugs featuring custom intro music, is satisfying enough. Of course, one has to put the type/creator codes setting app in the archive...

So, wait, we're supposed to .bin Nova Music?

Zacha Pedro, on Jan 20 2006, 02:42 PM, said:

Er, Guy, do you actually read what I write? I already said the problem does NOT happen with .bin.zip archives, only with .sitx ones, so the user already has Stuffit up and running. These codes and file attributes are stored in a private fork, not the resource fork.
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Except that it will happen with .bin.zip if it has a custom icon or vers or something or if the creator used ResEdit to add the codes in the first place (which it can only do if there's already a resource fork present) or if they've otherwise .binned it manually to avoid losing the codes.

Zacha Pedro, on Jan 20 2006, 02:42 PM, said:

However, you're right that there is a fatal flaw in my reasoning: in fact the Nova Music file should be binned in the .bin.zip method because it won't work on a Mac otherwise. Unless you find a way to add the type/creator codes afterwards. This idea indeed seems the least problematic, and given the huge number of plugs featuring custom intro music, is satisfying enough. Of course, one has to put the type/creator codes setting app in the archive...
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Yeah, while this would probably be easy enough I still think it'd be easier just to include two music files.

Guy, on Jan 20 2006, 09:18 PM, said:

(which it can only do if there's already a resource fork present)

That's not actually true. Take a look at "Get File/Folder Info...".

Guy, I think you're the only one crazy enough to diagree with ZP about plug-in ditribution.

orcaloverbri9, on Jan 20 2006, 03:32 PM, said:

That's not actually true. Take a look at "Get File/Folder Info...".
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Notice it will complain if there's no resource fork.

orcaloverbri9, on Jan 20 2006, 03:32 PM, said:

Guy, I think you're the only one crazy enough to diagree with ZP about plug-in ditribution.
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Heh, maybe

Guy, on Jan 20 2006, 10:03 PM, said:

Notice it will complain if there's no resource fork.

?

My ResEdit doesn't complain.

By the way, it's spelled "compatibility".

This post has been edited by orcaloverbri9 : 21 January 2006 - 12:52 AM

Guy, on Jan 18 2006, 12:12 AM, said:

...on a PC the music has to have a .mp3 extension while on the mac it has to not have the extension...
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Mac computers do use extensions. The "Finder" on a Mac has the option to hide or show extensions.

Further, if a Mac does not recognise a file that has no extension associated with it, the extension can be added. This will make the file work. i.e. - add .psd for a Photoshop file, but not .mp3 to an AIFF file, ya' dig?

Irrelevant. Nova for Mac recognizes Nova Music ONLY if it has no extension, and Nova for Windows recognizes Nova Music ONLY if it has an extension.

Macs do use extensions now. However, Nova won't recognise a file named "Nova Music.mp3" as the intro music and will play none. The fact extensions can be hidden does not change anything - Nova still sees a file named "Nova Music.mp3" and ignores it.

Well, I need people who disagree with me, because otherwise I tend to be complacent, think I know everything and there is no other solution than the one I propose. But be reminded of this tiny fact: the Nova Music that ships with Nova is 7.2MB. And my ResEdit doesn't complain either.

Then again, the Nova Music that ships with Nova is seven and a half minutes long. You're right, though; most songs in MP3 format tend to be about 4MB. In fact, 4MB is usually used in advertising and such (for instance, when Apple says 15,000 songs, they mean 15,000 4MB songs).

This post has been edited by orcaloverbri9 : 21 January 2006 - 10:12 AM

Zacha Pedro, on Jan 21 2006, 06:01 AM, said:

However, Nova won't recognise a file named "Nova Music.mp3" as the intro music and will play none. The fact extensions can be hidden does not change anything - Nova still sees a file named "Nova Music.mp3" and ignores it.View Post

That can easily be worked around by changing the second string in STR# resource 130. Set it to "Nova Music.mp3", and the file's name should give you no trouble on either system. I have not tested whether this string has any effect on Windows.

However, the Nova-doesn't-play-music-without-type/creator-codes problem is a nasty one, and is probably caused by QuickTime, rather than Nova. The best work-around I can come up with right off hand is to compress your music using .sit, and tell Windows users not to expand it using the "preserve Macintosh content" option. That or include the "Set Up Music (Macintosh Only)" application. Neither is very satisfactory, but both seem better than including two copies of the music.

Edwards

This post has been edited by Edwards : 21 January 2006 - 10:47 PM