MidiByte is a special kind of MIDI player. It will read any file byte by
byte, assign a note plus instrument to it, and play it via the MIDI port
of your system. So you will need a (virtual) synth connected to your MIDI
port.

There can be 256 different bytes in a file. The program assigns a range of 
bytes to an instrument, covering the musical range of that instrument. The 
current version uses violin, viola, cello, double bass, oboe and harp.
A few remaining bytes will issue a rest.

Each instrument keeps playing until the next note for that instrument is 
encountered. This will result in harmonies that may sound weird a times.
You can only set the tempo at this point. Other features will follow in a
next version, hopefully.

Text files have a limited range. Playing compiled binary files will unleash 
the full potential of the program. The compiled code is the composition,
the program is just the orchestra.

With some ear training you will be able to recognize the compiler used for
the binary file you're playing. Otherwise, it's utterly useless.

Compatibility
-------------
MidiByte should run on any Atari ST. As I no longer own Atari hardware,
I tested it on STEem which can easily be connected to the Microsoft GS 
Wavetable synth or, much better, VitualMIDISynth. It also runs fine on 
Hatari (I tested it on Hatari for Windows built with MIDI support).

On multitasking systems MidiByte runs in the background while its 
moveable screen keeps being updated. It runs nicely on MagiC-PC with MIDI
over serial or MIDI over tcp. I don't have a Mac so let me know if it works
on MagiC-Mac.

The only way I got it working on MiNT/ARAnyM is by using a MIDI over tcp 
connection. MIDI and serial port seem dead on Aranym under Windows.

There's a brief tutorial at acwot.atari-users.com/midibyte.html with links 
to the (free) Windows tools to get it working over serial or tcp.

Configuration
-------------
MIDIBYTE.CFG contains the configuration data. You can set the port to use
for MIDI (1=serial, 3=MIDI, 9=tcp). For tcp tou must set the ip address of
the host. For MagiC-PC that's 127.0.0.1, for Aranym you need to set the
actual local ip of the host, f.i. 192.168.178.64. The ip port defaults to 
1040. You can also set colour or monochrome in the config. If there is no 
config, the program will use default values. See the tutorial for more info.

Contact
-------
Send email to robv@acwot.atari-users.com or send me a PM on atari-forum.com. 
My username is robv.

