  Hello folks !


This is MikMod, version 3.1.6, a module player for Unix.
As usual with each new version, there's a lot of bugfixes and improvements.
Check out the file 'NEWS' for more information.


>> BUILDING MIKMOD
------------------

This MikMod version can build with either libmikmod 3.1.7 (shared library
version 2), or an older version, but all the configuration functions are not
available for older versions.

- If you're building MikMod under OS/2, please refer to the 'README' file
  located in the 'os2' subdirectory.

- If you want to build MikMod under Windows, an extension package including
  Windows specific code is likely to be released soon. Check out the www site
  (yes, I know I'm late). 

The first thing you need is to get and compile the libmikmod sound library,
which is not bundled with MikMod anymore !
If you don't know where to get libmikmod, look at the "contact and download
info" section later in this document.

So you're on a good old Unix workstation, aren't you ?

You'll need an ANSI C compiler to build MikMod.

To prevent clobbering the sources, I recommend building MikMod in an
alternate directory, for example 'build' :

  mkdir build
  cd build

In this directory, run MikMod's configure script :

  ../configure

The configure script will attempt to guess correct values for various
system-dependent variables used during the build process, and will
create appropriate Makefiles for proper compilation. 

If you're not familiar with configure scripts and their standard
options, you can find more general information about them in the file
INSTALL.

After you've successfully run configure, simply run

  make

to get all things build. Then, run

  make install

to have the player installed. Depending on where you choose to install it
(using the --prefix= option to configure), you may need root privileges for
this operation.


>> USING MIKMOD
---------------

Run MikMod with the ``--help'' parameter to get the available options, or
display its man page (if you did "make install") with

  man mikmod

Also, after you've run MikMod for the first time, you might want to
customize your $HOME/.mikmodrc, either from the configuration panel or by
editing the file, so you won't need to supply the same options to MikMod all
the time.

Once you're in the player, if you haven't choosed terse mode (a la
MikMod 2), pressing the H key will give you an help screen with the list
of the keys you can use. I hope it's understandable.

If you're playing MikMod in quiet mode (with the -q/-quiet switch), you can
tell MikMod to jump to the next/previous song by sending the MikMod process
SIGUSR1 or SIGUSR2 respectivly. In other words, let's say you're doing
something like this:

$ mikmod myalltimefavmods.mpl -quiet &
[1] 7531

You've told MikMod to read the songs out of the playlist myalltimefavmods,
to not spit out any output (-quiet), and to run in the background.
Your shell will give you the process ID, in this case it's 7531.  You
can also find this out from "ps", "top", or a number of process
management utilities.  Now, let's say a song you don't like as much comes
on, or for some reason one seems to be looping forever, you can do
this...

$ kill -s SIGUSR1 7531

or

$ kill -USR1 %1

(if your shell supports the %n process notation)
and MikMod will start playing the next file in the list.
If you want the previous file, just use SIGUSR2 in place of SIGUSR1.
This feature also works when MikMod is in interactive mode (with the
curses interface), but is less useful then, since you have full player
control...

If you used the playlist features of the previous MikMod versions, your
old playlist won't work anymore since the playlist format has changed.
Now the playlist files must have an .mpl extension. To convert your old
playlists into the new format, use the
'convert_playlist' awk script :

  ./convert_playlist < my_old_playlist > my_new_playlist.mpl


>> Y2K COMPLIANCE
-----------------

MikMod does not deal with dates. So, as long as the few libc functions used
by the program are Y2K-compliant, MikMod is Y2K-compliant.
However, the archive handler invokes archiver programs to display the contents
of the archive files ; if these external programs are not Y2K compliant when
displaying archive contents, MikMod may not work as expected when dealing with
archives.


>> THANKS
---------

I would like to thank everyone who contributed to libmikmod. Their names
are in the AUTHORS file for the significative contributions, but some other
names can be found in the NEWS file. Thanks a lot ! Keeping MikMod alive
wouldn't be much fun without you.


>> LICENSE
----------

The MikMod module player is covered by the GNU General Public License as
published by the Free Software Fundation (you'll find it in the file COPYING) ;
either version 2 of the licence, or (at your option) any later version.


>> CONTACT AND DOWNLOAD INFO
----------------------------

* email :
  Please send all your MikMod related e-mail to me, at :
  miodrag@mikmod.darkorb.net

* chat :
  People wanting to have a ``live talk'' with me can reach me on IRC (IRCnet
  and sometimes Undernet) under the nick 'effetaipa'.

* web :
  MikMod and libmikmod home page is located at :
    http://mikmod.darkorb.net
  The European mirror is at:
    http://www.multimania.com/miodrag/mikmod

* ftp :
  Latest releases of libmikmod can be found:
  - on the official ftp site
    ftp://mikmod.darkorb.net
  - on metalab (formerly known as sunsite) and its mirrors
    ftp://metalab.unc.edu/pub/Linux/apps/sound/libs for libmikmod, and
    ftp://metalab.unc.edu/pub/Linux/apps/sound/players for MikMod
  - on hobbes, in source and OS/2 binary forms
    ftp://hobbes.nmsu.edu/pub/os2/mmedia


>> LAST NOTES
-------------

I hope you'll enjoy using this version of MikMod as well as I enjoyed
debugging and improving it.

-- Miodrag ("Miod") Vallat, 07/05/1999
   miodrag@mikmod.darkorb.net
