I wrote quite a lot of stuff in BPC for DOS, but do not have that much experience in Win32 programming. I'd like to have some examples of code to play wave and midi files. I'm not looking for finished players, where one just clicks with the mouse, to play a file. I'd like to have code, with which one can just play little sounds. I've heard of a programming language called Profan, in which one can use Midi, by just entering commands in the source code like play(note1, note2) etc. That would be a great thing in Fpc. Does anybody here perhaps have a unit, which provides similar functionality? I'd like to write Windows programs, that only need an Exe file, no additional sound files, and nevertheless play sounds. This was easy under DOS, by using the PC speaker, but seems to be a bit difficult under Win32.

Thanks

<*** Michael Lang ***>

I don't have any knowledge of such a unit; Did you check the swag archive or the contributed units section of the web-page ?

Michael.

It's very primitive, but it works for win32:

   uses Dos;
   procedure PlayWave(WaveFile:String);
   begin
     exec('C:\Windows\sndrec32.exe', '/play /close /embedding
'+WaveFile);
   end;

Does anybody know the equivalent parameters for the "media player"?

From: "Andreas K. Foerster"
Subject: Re: [fpc-pascal]Playing sounds in Fpc?

Better use the Win32 PlaySound() method. It allows playback of all types of sound files registered within windows.
e.g.

{$mode delphi}
uses
    windows;
procedure PlayMediaFile(file : String);
begin
    // plays a sound in background from a file
    PlaySound(file, 0, SND_ASYNC or SND_FILENAME);
end;

should do the trick.

There are a lot more flags for this api call, like playing the sound from memory or resource, looping it or stop playing - it's probably best to check out the Win32 help for this function.
If you want a bit more control about the way the sound is played read the Media Control Interface (MCI) documentation. You may create some sort of "media player" using it easily (including video playback etc). Else you could try the DirectSound / DirectMusic API as well for most playback control.

Regards,
Thomas

Hi Thomas,

This doesn't work. Ppc386 says, that it doesn't know the PlaySound-Procedure. The "uses windows;" should import it, but it doesn't seem to work, at least not on my machine. Does it work on anybody else's here?

Thanks

<*** Michael Lang ***>

Subject: [fpc-pascal]Playing sounds in Fpc?

Forgot that the MMSystem header stuff is not already translated for FPC: Try this code:

{$mode delphi}
uses
 windows;
// flag values for wFlags parameter
const
  SND_SYNC            = $0000;  // play synchronously (default)
  SND_ASYNC           = $0001;  // play asynchronously
  SND_NODEFAULT       = $0002;  // don't use default sound
  SND_MEMORY          = $0004;  // lpszSoundName points to a memory file
  SND_LOOP            = $0008;  // loop the sound until next sndPlaySound
  SND_NOSTOP          = $0010;  // don't stop any currently playing sound
  SND_NOWAIT          = $00002000;  // don't wait if the driver is busy
  SND_ALIAS           = $00010000;  // name is a registry alias
  SND_ALIAS_ID        = $00110000;  // alias is a predefined ID
  SND_FILENAME        = $00020000;  // name is file name
  SND_RESOURCE        = $00040004;  // name is resource name or atom
  SND_PURGE           = $0040;      // purge non-static events for task
  SND_APPLICATION     = $0080;     // look for application specific
association
function PlaySound(pszSound: PChar; hmod: HMODULE; fdwSound: DWORD): BOOL;
stdcall; external 'winmm.dll' name {$ifdef unicode}'PlaySoundW' {$else}
'PlaySoundA' {$endif};
procedure PlayMediaFile(_file : String);
begin
    // plays a sound from a file
    PlaySound(PChar(_file), 0, SND_SYNC or SND_FILENAME);
end;
begin
 PlayMediaFile(paramstr(1));
end.

This works for sure with wav and mp3 files (verified). Doesn't with midi's - didn't test other.

Regards,
Thomas

Hi again,

[snipped PlaySound() example program] This works for sure with wav and mp3 files (verified). Doesn't with

midi's -

didn't test other.

The docs (MS Platform SDK, highly recommened to get the documentation part for free from MS ftp) read that it only works with waveform-audio based files, that's why midi files don't play.
Use the MCI api to do playback of those and other types as well.

Regards,
Thomas

About the windows unit:

The advantage of the Windows unit is that it is entirely free, since it was reverse engineered by the djgpp/cygwin team.

However I have good experiences with Marcel van Brakel's JEDI headers for things that the Windows unit doesn't eat.