AY tracker player programming

[andydansby]

I have been playing around with the newer version of WYZ and have written an article with code for anyone's who's interested. The article and code is made for the Z88dk compiler.

The article can be found at https://zxspectrumcoding.wordpress.com/ ... nd-player/

The code for the article is at https://github.com/andydansby/ZX_Spectr ... g_lesson10

My next article will be focused on the Vortex player / tracker.

andy

[dom]

Just as a note, I know Andy is using 1.99c for reasons, but if you're using a nightly/release from the past year or so, a lot of the topics that Andy has been covering in the series of articles are now available out of the box

* WYZ player: https://github.com/z88dk/z88dk/tree/mas ... /sound/wyz and https://github.com/z88dk/z88dk/wiki/Classic-WYZ-Player
* Vortex tracker: https://github.com/z88dk/z88dk/tree/mas ... /sound/vt2
* Banking (including interbank calls): https://github.com/z88dk/z88dk/tree/mas ... les/banked - banked loading "just happens" for tape/+3 disc
* Compression: https://github.com/z88dk/z88dk/wiki/Decompression

So although Andy's articles are good guide as to how to do things from scratch, it might not always be necessary to make life harder than it has to be: https://github.com/z88dk/z88dk/blob/mas ... og.txt#L91

[andydansby]

I still gripe that I had to move to Visual Studio 2010, even though MS is now on VS 2021.

[Alone Coder]

The first time I see a link to the legendary WYZ Tracker
Please write a line about Pro Tracker when you will describe Vortex Tracker (namely, the single-module Turbo-Sound *.pt3, the shortest Dr.Lion's player in Info Guide #11, and two options available in the editor but unavailable in existing players: tone shift and digital samples).

[andydansby]

The first time I see a link to the legendary WYZ Tracker
Please write a line about Pro Tracker when you will describe Vortex Tracker (namely, the single-module Turbo-Sound *.pt3, the shortest Dr.Lion's player in Info Guide #11, and two options available in the editor but unavailable in existing players: tone shift and digital samples).

Vortex tracker is coming up in my series. I've just got to find some time to do a bit of writing. I've also got the basics for Arkos Tracker 1 and 2.

In the meantime, I'm coming up with a few Vortex tracker tools that I think are pretty nifty. Vortex is now at version 2.6 and it looks like there might be some new feature added to the player. Very interesting.

[andydansby]

Starting to explore the Vortex tracker
https://zxspectrumcoding.wordpress.com/ ... #more-1068

[Ast A. Moore]

There’s an “unofficial” but greatly enhanced v2.5 here. Give it a go.

[andydansby]

There’s an “unofficial” but greatly enhanced v2.5 here. Give it a go.

I’ve got that version and now working with an even newer beta version from the Telegram group (2.6 dev 22). Still being actively developed.

Pasting back and forth from OpenMPT is a newer supported feature.

I’ve got 2 more trackers to play around with. I’ve got the working code in a bit of a mess right now.

[Ast A. Moore]

now working with an even newer beta version from the Telegram group (2.6 dev 22). Still being actively developed.

Oh, wow! Any way of obtaining it other than through Telegram?

EDIT: Never mind. Found it. Thanks!

[mausthekat]

now working with an even newer beta version from the Telegram group (2.6 dev 22). Still being actively developed.

EDIT: Never mind. Found it. Thanks!

Where did you find it?

[uglifruit]

I'm also interested in where to find this!

[Ast A. Moore]

EDIT: Never mind. Found it. Thanks!

Where did you find it?

Oh, from the pinned message in that Telegram channel. Turns out you don’t have to join it to see link.

If you search GitHub for “Vortex Tracker,” it’s the second hit from the top.

[uglifruit]

Brilliant, thanks.

(Github is something I have not got my head around. I feel like I need someone to explain the absolute basics to me).

[Ast A. Moore]

Add “/releases” to the project’s GitHub URL, and it should become pretty self-explanatory.

[Lee Bee]

I'm curious about WYZ. Never used it before, only Vortex and Arkos. Does WYZ offer any big advantage to the others? Is it more similar to either?

I really enjoy using Vortex, but Arkos has several advantages, particularly that it's truly optimised for making games, with faster playback speed and allowing smaller files:

• Arkos allows multiple songs from the same bank of instruments
• Arkos stores patterns on a per-track basis

Does WYZ have these space-saving features?

[andydansby]

I'm curious about WYZ. Never used it before, only Vortex and Arkos. Does WYZ offer any big advantage to the others? Is it more similar to either?

I really enjoy using Vortex, but Arkos has several advantages, particularly that it's truly optimised for making games, with faster playback speed and allowing smaller files:

• Arkos allows multiple songs from the same bank of instruments
• Arkos stores patterns on a per-track basis

Does WYZ have these space-saving features?

I’m pretty sure that WYZ’s songs are even smaller than Arkos tracker files. The player is smaller as well. WYZ also has the ability to play SFX on any channel of your choosing. I haven’t covered that subject yet in my blogs. Arkos has more features which I think makes certain tunes stand out well. I do like both trackers.

[Lee Bee]

I’m pretty sure that WYZ’s songs are even smaller than Arkos tracker files. The player is smaller as well.

Cool! In that case I will definitely be checking it out! Smaller files means games can have better, richer music with more attention to detail, which is how I like it!

WYZ also has the ability to play SFX on any channel of your choosing.

That sounds very useful. I love having control of the channels. This would also allow 2-channel SFX, which I sometimes wish I could have.

[andydansby]

I've put up a github example on Arkos 2 for Z88dk.

https://github.com/andydansby/ZX_Spectr ... g_lesson13

The write up for the code is at https://zxspectrumcoding.wordpress.com ... esson-13/

cheers
andy