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[olesio]

Hello.

I want to share my opinion about latest MilkyTracker for Windows.
I searched on youtube for "more 100 amiga games in 10 minutes"
and youtube show me some compression tutorial I checked out and
seen nice tracker in video with nice feature like popupmenu under a
right mouse button and copy only selected part of channel. I though
let's check it out, downloaded, unpacked, run and load few modules.
Hmmm "delirium cracktro - playing correct like only WinAmp plus an
oldsk00l did it before (no problems with Arpeggio effects). "Different
ways 2" by Aceman in XM also ok. (No problem with volume fade ou
 effect. Old outro module from the game "Franko" played ok, scratch
efect by volume change handled. Just like real Amiga only do this
So really nice work guys. Player is small, fast, look nice, good for
all oldskool style lovers who tried to composed own modules or xms
long time ago using FastTracker 2 But I have two suggestions.
Please add "Nibbles" game or something like that to do something
while playing modules. Second thing. I know a it format is horrible
for all programmers, but maybe you can fix few things. Siatek's one
module "Deesis" (final ver) is not played like a pure WinAmp do this
and from uknkow reason "Impulse" by Siatek, can not be loaded into
MilkyTracker. I got error message. Both *.it are handled by WinAmp
and under Delphi application using bass.dll. You should get these 2
modules from url below. That's all. Sorry for long post and my 10x
very bad English. Greetings from Poland And an url to modules:
http://www.modules.pl/?id=modules&search=siatek&mode=2

P.S.: and I get ride of SkaleTracker. Now MilkyTracker is number 1

[Saga Musix]

I know a it format is horrible for all programmers

From the programmer's perspective, IT is actually a breeze compared to XM - unless you are developing a certain tracker that's focussed around the XM format, of course.

is not played like a pure WinAmp

Ewww. WinAmp's IT (or general module) support is faaaaaar from perfect. Better compare the playback to Impulse Tracker, Schism Tracker, or OpenMPT. "Deesis" makes heavy usage of New Note Actions, which do not exist in the XM format and hence, Milky Tracker cannot handle them, not even with "a few small tweaks". "Impulse", on the other hand, is a 42-channels module, but the XM format only supports 32 channels. I would guess that this is the reason why it fails to load in Milky.
Basically, you're requesting here is to fit a big truck into this garage... You simply cannot support some things in a pure XM tracker that exist in the IT format, and you cannot do certain things in a pure IT that exist in the XM format (for example fucked up arpeggio). Better leave proper IT playback to IT trackers and proper XM playback to XM trackers.

[olesio]

Ok, thank you for answer. I can play *.it in WinAMP anyway.
But nice there is no problem with: *.xm files and *.mod are
played like real Amiga do this. Anyway, MilkyTracker is cool.

[Saga Musix]

I can play *.it in WinAMP anyway.

Please. Don't. Play. Modules. With. WinAmp. Or at least use the BASS plugin for IT/XM. here is a good reason why you should do it. Or just switch to XMPlay.

[pailes]

From the programmer's perspective, IT is actually a breeze compared to XM - unless you are developing a certain tracker that's focussed around the XM format, of course.

What's that supposed to mean?

[Saga Musix]

That the XM format is a weird format with even weirder effects, to say the least. In comparison to that, writing an compliant IT loader/player can almost be considered "easy".

[pailes]

Says who? You?

FT2 extended the MOD effect set while IT extended the S3M effect set, it's as easy as that. All the XM effect "weirdness" basically comes from combining effects which shouldn't be combined at all, that's not defined for the IT format either. And virtual channel management doesn't really make IT playback a breeze. Btw. Jeffrey Lim did not even care to document or describe the low pass filter used in the IT playback routines.

So in the end they both have hassles and quirks, I would definitely not say that one is actually easier to implement than the other and they both have bugs which result in strange playback behaviour.

And why exactly is the XM format itself weird again? Reading the format is as good or as bad as any other module format.

[Saga Musix]

There are very few mindboggling effects (like Retrig or Tremor), but that is really not as much as the pain-in-the-ass XM arpeggio or retrig for example. That is my opinion, but I just cannot stop to say it: All the interferences between all the XM effects (especially retrigger) just result from very bad code. The only real interferences in the IT format occur when using pitch commands in both effect columns, however most players just fail there because they evaluate the volume column before the effect column (which is wrong). Resonant filters are another not-so nice story of course, but then again I'm very confident that I could come up with another dozen of weird XM effects.

All the XM effect "weirdness" basically comes from combining effects which shouldn't be combined at all, that's not defined for the IT format either

Using the volume effect together with retrigger is for example very well defined in .IT, and it certainly does not delay the retrigger effect by one tick for whatever reason. Do you have any examples I can't think of at the moment?

And why exactly is the XM format itself weird again?

Well, I suppose you *do* know about the changes between revision 102/103/104, don't you?

[pailes]

... but I just cannot stop to say it: All the interferences between all the XM effects (especially retrigger) just result from very bad code.

Never said something else actually

The only real interferences in the IT format occur when using pitch commands in both effect columns, however most players just fail there because they evaluate the volume column before the effect column (which is wrong).

Oh, while playing around with IT and Schism I instantly found quite a few differences actually. Obviously it's not so clear how to get it the *right* way. And it was all stuff not mentioned in any of the IT tech documents.

Resonant filters are another not-so nice story of course

To make this clear: There is only one type of resonant filter in the original IT.

...but then again I'm very confident that I could come up with another dozen of weird XM effects.

Trust me, I know them better than you do but since they're so bugged they were hardly useful to the composers. So in the end it's just a few percent of the modules out there, who actually cares about it then as long as you get most of the basics right. If you go with the 80-20 rule playing XM is as "easy" or as "difficult" as playing IT, I would even say that playing XMs is easier than IT because there is *less* features.

Well, I suppose you *do* know about the changes between revision 102/103/104, don't you?

Surely, but 102 and 103 were produced by unofficial and unreleased versions of FT2 and the number of modules out there is not even a dozen. Again, who cares about it? 104 is all that matters. As we say in germany: "geschenkt".

[Saga Musix]

Speaking of weird XM commands: Does the "-" command (in the effect column) actually do anything useful? or is it maybe just an unfinished command?