Daniel Kahlin: Software/VIC-TRACKER Tuesday, 19 March 2024, 14:59 (Stockholm)
 

VIC-TRACKER 2.0



The VIC-TRACKER COMPO 2005 has ended.

VIC-TRACKER is a full-featured tracker-style music editor for the Commodore Vic-20. It includes a cross-compressor which produces compact assembly source code output suitable for inclusion in demos and games.
As of version 2.0 VIC-TRACKER also supports Sync24/DIN-Sync making it easy to synchronize it to modern sequencers and electronic music hardware such as drum machines.

VIC-TRACKER is designed and programmed by Daniel Kahlin and released under the BSD-license, which makes it pretty much free for you to use and modify. (download)

Note: To run VIC-TRACKER you need at least 16KB expansion memory, but compiled songs normally work on unexpanded machines.

WHAT DOES IT SOUND LIKE?
IT CAN BE MULTI-TRACKED!
Here is an example what can be done when synchronizing VIC-TRACKER to a modern sequencer using overdubbing and a tiny amount of effects:
Daniel Kahlin & Andreas Ersson - Machine 3.42 (23 Aug 2003)
Programmed in VIC-TRACKER by Daniel Kahlin with some assistance by Andreas Ersson.
Mildly treated, edited and mixed in Cubase SX at Vanadis Studio by Daniel Kahlin and Andreas Ersson. Vocals by S.A.M.
Copyright © 2003 Daniel Kahlin and Andreas Ersson
WHAT DOES IT LOOK LIKE?

intro

patternlist editor

pattern editor

arpeggio editor

sound editor

DOCUMENTATION
BACKGROUND
One day in 1994 Mats Wicksell and Daniel Kahlin found an old Vic-20 at a junkyard. Mats picked it up, and Daniel fitted it with a new keyboard. Later that summer the original VIC-TRACKER 0.6 was written during one week by Daniel Kahlin with (mostly moral) support from Patrik Wallström and Björn Stenberg.
In 2001 at the LCP2001 gettogether VIC-TRACKER 1.0 got the last touch.

NEW IN 2.0
Now two years later VIC-TRACKER received a huge update. Many useful features were added!
Among those are: (full list here)
  • SYNC24/SYNC48 support. You may now sync VIC-TRACKER to an external sequencer/synthesizer/drum machine.
  • (SHIFT-)INST/DEL inserts and deletes in the patternlist.
  • SHIFT-CLR/HOME clears the current pattern. (After asking)
  • Songs may have a repeat step that is different from the start step.
  • Rastertime display may be toggled on/off (V).
  • Multispeed player, 1x, 2x, 3x & 4x interrupt speeds.
  • Sanity checks have been implemented in many places.
  • Patterns may be transposed up/down in the pattern editor (C= T, C= Y)
  • Arpeggio modes 0, 1 and f are implemented correctly.
  • A default arpeggio may be set up in the sound.
  • A frequency offset may be set up in the sound definition.
  • A default glide may be set up in the sound definition.
  • Cut and paste in pattern editor.
  • The current pattern may be changed from within the pattern editor.
  • The patternlist row that is to be edited may be changed from within the pattern editor. (C= N, C= M)
  • Sounds may have length.
  • New player effect Set Flag.
  • New player effect Cut Note.
  • New player effect Delay Note.
  • The pattern list has a new column allowing the length of the patterns to be selected per row in the pattern list.
  • Arpeggios may now have up to 16 steps, and have their speed, length, and repeat position individually configurable.
  • Sounds may be edited.
  • Support for both NTSC and PAL interrupt speeds.
  • Support for up to 16 different songs in each module. (different StartStep, EndStep and StartSpeed for each)
  • Pressing C= Q,W,E,R toggles voice 1-4 on and off.
  • Error check during load and save.
  • Loaded songs are padded with zeroes during load.
  • Pressing '<-' in the pattlist editor enters the first unused pattern
  • Empty notes (00) in patterns now show '--' and continuation notes (80) show '++'.
  • SPACE enters an empty value, and moves down.
  • SHIFT-SPACE enters a continuation note in the note field.
  • The editor cursor is blanked when input is required in the status field
  • The cursor is positioned on the same voice when switching between the pattern editor and the pattern list editor.
  • completely new directory structure
RUNNING VIC-TRACKER
Just load the VIC-TRACKER binary on your Vic-20 computer and type RUN.
Note 1: Currently there are no emulators that correctly emulate the Vic-20 sound chip (especially the noise channel). You should use the 'real' thing.
If you must use an emulator, I recommend VICE which as of version 1.15 has pretty good sound emulation.
Note 2: The intro will look messed up on NTSC (American) Vic-20's, and in some emulators. Just press SPACE to skip the intro.

DOWNLOAD VIC-TRACKER
You may get the files to your Vic-20 in several ways. You may for example use Over5 (by Daniel Kahlin) or you can look here for a pretty extensive list of other available options compiled by Marko Mäkelä.

COMPILING VIC-TRACKER
Note: This is only necessary if you want to modify how VIC-TRACKER works.

VIC-TRACKER should compile on any Unix-like system, provided the software listed below is installed. Just type 'make' or 'gmake' on some systems)

  • dasm-2.12.04 (by Matt Dillon, improved by Olaf Seibert) or any other compatible macro assembler.
  • pucrunch (by Pasi Ojala)
  • perl 5.003 or greater
  • dd
  • GNU make
 

[kahlin.net]