GEMP3 2.2 - An MP3 player for GEM
Copyright (c) Owen Rudge 2000-2001

GEMP3 uses DJGPP, a 32-bit compiler for DOS. It uses the Allegro libraries,
which manage sound and graphics and LibAmp, an MP3 playing system. To
dynamically link to the encoder DLL, it uses a modified version of DLX (Dynamic
Linking and eXecution). DLX Module V2.91 provided by Nanosoft, Inc. The
version of DLX used in GEMP3 is very similar to the version used by SEAL 1.x.

You can download Allegro from http://alleg.sourceforge.net/. It is recommended
that you use Allegro 4.0 or higher to build GEMP3. There is a link to the LibAmp
source on this site. You can download DJGPP from www.delorie.com/djgpp/.

This software is licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License.
See LICENSE.TXT for details.

OVERVIEW
========

This is my MP3 player for GEM. It requires a 486 or better processor, as it
uses DJGPP.

I have modified the form_do() source code so if you are viewing the About
or Skin Information dialogs, the music will carry on playing in the
background.

I've also fixed a couple of little things as well, which make GEMP3 better.
Another skin, BEACH.SKN, has been provided. If you are using a monochrome
video driver, BORING.SKN is recommended.

Version 2.2 introduces a new feature: a full-screen visualisation. This is
in 256 colours and requires an SVGA card supporting 640x480 with 256
colours. Practically any new card supports this. There are some problems
with this new visualisation - GEMP3 has to switch from the GEM graphics
system to the Allegro graphics system. It's easy enough to do this, but
Allegro insists on switching back to text mode when GEMP3 quits. This
means that when the Desktop 'appears', you can't see it. Press ALT+C to
go to the command prompt, and type EXIT to return to GEM. Please see
SKIN.TXT for information on creating skins and customising the new
visualisation.

A program to set up the sound driver for GEMP3 has been included in
this version. To use it, run GP3SETUP.EXE. The interface is generally
self-explanatory.

GEMP3 also includes multi-language support. Currently, there are two
supported languages: English and German. Thanks to Heinz Rath for
translating to German. If you want to change the current language,
run SETLANG.EXE. Also, if you know a language and would like to
translate GEMP3 into it, please e-mail me at gemp3@orudge.freeuk.com.
Please note that the German translation is currently incomplete, due to
new features that have been added but not translated.

There are keyboard shortcuts too - press SPACE to pause or unpause, ALT+O to
display the Open dialog, ALT+V to display the full-screen visualisation, 
and ALT+Q to exit.

To use the MP3 player, run GEMP3.APP from GEM. It is recommended you put this,
ENCODE.DLL, GEMP3.DAT, LANG.DAT, GEMP3.CFG, GEMP3*.RSC and any skins you
want to use in your GEMAPPS folder or another folder on the path. The
COPYBIN.BAT file will copy all of these into the BIN folder. You may want
to associate MP2 and MP3 files with GEMP3. GEMP3 will also play WAV files
encoded with the MPEG Layer 3 codec, but not any other type at present.

Please note that the skins can be anywhere on your hard disk, as long as an
absolute path is specified in GEMP3.CFG (if you select from the File Selector
it would be). When you first run GEMP3, you will just have 'STANDARD.SKN'.

FEATURES
========

GEMP3 supports a number of things, including:

- 32-bit support, with access to up to 2GB (or is it 4GB?) of memory
  (although I don't think 2GB would be needed really....)

- Supports playing MP2, MP3 and MPEG Layer 3-encoded WAV files

- Skin support, allowing colours and patterns to be chosen

- Multi-language support. Adding new languages is easy.

- MP3 to WAV conversion

- MP3 encoding, with add-on encoder (available from www.owenrudge.co.uk/GEM/)

- Graphical represenation of music (for best results, keep the mouse
  pointer off-screen!)

- MP3 details including bitrate, frequency, etc, plus ID3 support (ID3v2
  coming soon...)

- Keyboard shortcuts

- Source code available

- Extended support for FreeGEM

- Full-screen, high-colour visualisation

INCLUDED FILES
==============

*.H          GEM headers, text window header (TW.H), GEMP3 header (GEMP3.H),
             LibAmp header (LIBAMP.H), language header (LANG.H) and skin
             header (SKIN.H)

COPYBIN.BAT  Batch file to copy required files to BIN directory

LIBAMP.A     The LibAmp library.

LANG.DAT     Language data file

GEMP3.CC     GEMP3 main module

GEMP3.DAT    GEMP3 logo

GEMP3.CFG    Configuration file

GEMP3DEF.CFG Default configuration file for generating distribution. Not
             required for normal use.

MP3PLAY.CC   MP3 player object (from SETEdit, and modified for GEMP3)

DLX*.*       DLX-related files

ENCMAIN.C    Encoder source code

ENCODE.DLL   Dummy encoder

BUILDAPP.EXE DLX constructor

LINKIT.BAT   DLX linker

ADDSTUB.BAT  DLX stub addition program

STUBEXE.EXE  DLX stub

GEMP3RSC.*   GEMP3 resources

GEMP3GER.RSC German resources

TEST.MP3     A sample MP3

SETLANG.EXE  Small DOS program that starts GEMP3.APP /SELLANG

SETLANG.C    Source for SETLANG.EXE

FORMDOBM.CC  Replacement form_do() function

VERINFO.C    Source for VERINFO.EXE

GP3SETUP.EXE GEMP3 Setup program

GP3SETUP.DAT Data file for Setup program

SETUP.C      Source code for Setup program

SETUP.H      Header file for Setup program

*.SKN        Skins

*.DAT        Skin data files (except LANG.DAT and GEMP3.DAT)

GERMAN\*.*   German resources (*.DFN, *.H, *.RSC etc)

BUILDING THE SOURCES
====================

To create GEMP3, make sure you have DJGPP, the GEM library and Allegro
installed. I believe GEMP3 will no longer compile with Allegro 3.12.
It is recommended that you use Allegro 4.0 or later. You can download
Allegro from http://alleg.sourceforge.net/.

If you are sure these are present, run MAKEIT.BAT.

CREATING A BINARY DISTRIBUTION
==============================

To place all the files needed for a binary distribution in the BIN
directory, run COPYBIN.BAT.

GETTING VERSION INFORMATION
===========================

To get version information, run VERINFO.EXE. This displays the
version number, build date/time and Allegro version.

OTHER INFORMATION
=================

This is a bit of a mess - sorry about that!

A pretty complete revision history is in the GEMP3.CC file.
Please send any comments or bug reports to me at orudge@freeuk.com.

Enjoy!

Owen Rudge
15th December 2001

http://www.osplus.co.uk/
http://www.owenrudge.co.uk/
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