Talk:Ultimate Soundtracker

Contradictory sources

I tried to rewrite this, but there are multiple differences and contradictions between the sources, and sometimes within sources, e.g. the company the guy worked for, how many sample it handled (15 or 16, and similarly for the NoiseTracker variant, 31 or 32), whether the 4th channel was percussion or lead etc. Even the spelling of the name is in doubt: Soundtracker vs SoundTracker. Pcap ping 05:25, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

DO YOU HAVE A BEEF WITH MY BEEF? ;-) JBsupreme (talk) 05:39, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

Karen Collins is wrong. SoundTracker supported 15 samples and newer variants supported 31 samples. Cant bother to find sources =P. They were always four channels (except Oktalyzer which supported 8 channels) and there was no limitation what could be played on which channel. Unfortunately good sources are lacking for old software. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Xorxos (talk • contribs) 14:39, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Source for 15/31 samples support: http://www.koeln.netsurf.de/~michael.mey/faq1.txt, found via http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOD_%28file_format%29 article Xorxos (talk) 15:15, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

I had found that usenet faq before, but it's a little vague.

NST     MOD          4       15       8 bits/fixed     Noise Tracker
M.K.    MOD          4       31       8 bits/fixed     ProTracker

That tells use something about the file format for the Noise Tracker; YMMV if its predecessor supported 15 or 16 instrument, especially since it seems it didn't use that MOD format from the beginning. Some WP:OR may be need here, i.e. someone needs to check the program itself to settle this. There are some versions on the net. 17:58, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

The original SoundTracker from Obarski did not have support for MOD format and I am not sure if Obarski invented MOD. The MOD format uses the same data format than SONG format developed by Obarski but data is stored to one continuous module while in the SONG format pattern data was saved separately sand samples were loaded from sample disks. There is also this: http://ftp.amigascne.org/pub/amiga/Sound/Soundtracker2.3.DOC SoundTracker 2.3 text file which I found. SoundTracker 2.3 already supported 31 samples and had save module option but this version was not developed by Karsten Obarski. Many SoundTracker versions and many developers. Xorxos (talk) 22:02, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure how GamesSound.com and textfiles.com can be considered WP:RS? Marasmusine (talk) 18:05, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

The texfile article is a bit low quality (and high in peacock verbiage, which caused this article to be so a not so long ago); it was the only source used in this article before I edited it. Ideally, we should get rid of it if we can find the all that info elsewhere; his writeup certainly predates all academic papers in this area, which are much more recent, but not necessarily as easily available. Gamessound is personal website of published academic in this area, Karen Collins, and has excerpts from her book; allowable per WP:SPS. Pcap ping 06:31, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Mark Wright, the author of that textfiles piece, is almost certainly this guy. Pcap ping 10:35, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

By googling I found this: http://www.exotica.org.uk/wiki/Soundtracker_History

The 1.x versions of SoundTracker did not have a module option, and was limited to 15 instruments, what you could select with your right hand on the numpad. You saved individual songs as patterns and instruments separately, all of which you had to load when loading the song (took long when the instruments were on different disks). It was for the sake of saving space, you could save a lot of songs on a disk using the same instruments which you loaded off the sample disks. I think instrument data (looping and base note frequency) was with the song data. The 2.x versions first allowed you to compile the piece into a single module, thus the mod.songname, which of course later became songname.mod (PC DOS influence). I never much used SoundTracker, I liked StarTrekker because it had a simple software synth built in, but I mostly used ProTracker 2. My brother used SoundTracker from the start, but as he progressed, ProTracker 2.3 had appeared, and that was the version on Amiga I used. I don't think you'll find a lot of published sources on trackers, I've never come across any, and still it's a European peculiarity I suppose. But I still use one, though, Renoise. 91.156.122.224 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 21:52, 29 July 2010 (UTC).

More, better sources

• [1] see also User talk:JBsupreme#Enlighten me, why this source is really useful.
• [2] found here, the blog/site of Anders Carlsson. Unfortunately the paper/chapter of Carlsson that I put in further reading is not online anywhere.

Pcap ping 06:56, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Source code of the program

The previous version of the article claimed that the modified versions of Sound Tracker were based on the original source code. However, Mark Wright who was used as the source, has later stated that this is misleading. So the program code was rather disassembled by hackers as stated in the source Kotlinski 2009. The article has been changed accordingly. Mark Wright has discussed the issue here English Amiga Board thread on Sound Tracker --88.195.100.211 (talk) 10:46, 6 July 2014 (UTC)