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NEXUS AND LASERDISC PLAYERS-------------------
Nexus works with Pioneer's excellent and popular series of
LaserVision players. Specifically, Nexus will work with the Pioneer
models 2200, 4200 & 8000. It REQUIRES that the cable for the player be
attached to the modem serial port of the GS. Be sure that the baud rate
is set to 4800 in the GS control panel.
Pioneer's LaserVision players are quite powerful and versitile, and
while most programs use only a tiny fraction of the player's features,
Nexus gives you complete control of ALL the LaserVision's capabilities,
including not only playing a section, or showing a single frame, but :
setting all scan rates;
multiscanning;
printing text on the screen;
changing screen displays;
changing access modes;
changing user-register;
setting the speed;
adjusting sound;
open/close the drawer;
locking out the controls;
...and ALL other features!
Additionally, Nexus allows you to combine commands into a "script" so
that multiple player-actions can happen at the press of a single key!
(For example, if your link was to the name of a painter, and your
laserdisc was the National Gallery of Art, you could establish a script
which would :
go to the disc;
show a single frame a one painting;
put some text overlayed on top describing the painting;
wait for the user/student to press a key;
proceed to the next example painting;
put up a different text-overlay;
wait for a keypress;
and then show 2 minutes of the tour of the national gallery
which involved that painter's period.
.....All with a single click on the Nexus link!)
Nexus can tell the user which disc to use with this set of links;
open and close the drawer automatically for the user (on the 2200); and
even knows which side of the disc to use, and will prompt the user to
turn it over if the wrong side is up!
Naturally, Nexus keeps it all simple to do as well...
CONTROLING A PIONEER LASERDISC PLAYER----------
Controling the LaserVision is really pretty simple, and Nexus has tried
to make it even more simple for you. The actual commands are
straight-forward: for example to find, say, frame # 2234, the Pioneer
player wants the command "2234SE" ( the SE is for SEarch). To start
playing, the Pioneer command is "PL", for PLay. You may either enter
these commands yourself, or have Nexus do it for you: we've tried to
make it both simple and versitile.
When adding a link to the video disk for the first time, or playing
back the first link to the video disc, you will be asked to verify that
you have the LaserVision player attached to your computer, and that you
have a disk installed, and the machine IS ON. If the laser player is
not powered on THE PROGRAM WILL HANG UP AND YOU'LL HAVE TO REBOOT!
If you do not have a player, or do not want to use it, answer by
clicking on the "No Player" button. From then on, during this Nexus
session, the laser player option will be disabled. To use the laser
player again, you'll have to exit the program and start over.
In order to access the add-video-link screen, select "Add Link" as
usual. After you have selected your word to link, and the file-open
dialog box comes up, you'll notice a button at the top of the dialog box
named "LaserDisc". By clicking on this, you'll be taken to the
video-link screen.
THE VIDEO LINK SCREEN
(If you're going through this for the first time, we suggest that you wait
until you get to the examples before trying anything: it will help to
understand it first. The "panic button" is labeled "Reset" and is near
the lower right of the screen.)
Across the top, you'll see four buttons: Record, Stop, Try & Accept.
Here's what they do:
Record: by clicking on this button, each action you take with the other
controls (which send commands to the player) will be 'recorded'
on the script pad in the lower right hand corner, instead of being sent
directly out to the player. When you first start, the script pad is not
displayed. To display the pad, click on "Record".
Stop: stops sending your commands to the script pad and starts
sending them directly to the player. This also causes the script pad to
be removed from the screen, but without losing any commands you have
entered.
Try : sends out to the player all the commands currently on the
script pad. The script pad does not need to be displayed for "Try" to
work. In fact, we suggest that you first turn OFF record before choosing
"Try" since you may otherwise add something to the script-pad which you
did not intend!
Accept: click here when you are satisfied with the script and want to
file it in the Nexus set, so that it will be executed when the user
clicks on the linked word (or area of a graphic). If this is the very
first link to a video disc, you'll be asked to enter a name for the
disc. This name will be recorded by Nexus, so that when the user tries
to play his/her very first video link, a message will appear, not only
remining them to turn on the player, but telling them the name of the
disc which this Nexus set uses (the name you entered above).
Nexus also records which side of the disc to use. Since Nexus is
free-form this will (on the model 2200 player)
open the drawer
ask the user to flip over the disc
close the drawer
then play the link
IF the incorrect side was up when the link was retrieved.
In the lower right-hand corner, is the button "Cancel": it cancels
everthing done so far (except "Accept") and exits the video link dialog.
Reset : resets the player to it's normal mode - the same as when
you first entered the video-link window. This is IMMEDIATE command: it
cannot be scripted. (Consider it your "Panic Button"...) It sets:
video ON
audio STEREO
RegA 7
motor ON
pause ON
display ON
mode FRAME (or time if CLV)
clearScreen ON
KeyLock OFF
Recording OFF
scriptPad EMPTY
Speed NORMAL
StopMark CLEARED
All the rest of the pop-up menus, buttons and text-editing controls
are used to send commands to the player (or the script pad, if recording
is on.)
At the bottom left you'll see a row of buttons. These are much like
the buttons on a tape recorder, but with an extra pair on the end.
Here's what they do:
Play: starts the player playing.
Still: freezes the frame (on a CAV/standard play disc) or pauses
(with a CLV/extended play disc). (Hit Play to resume.)
< & >: steps forward or back a single frame at a time (CAV only).
<< & >>: scans forward or backward about 500 frames at a time.
<<< & >>>: the "multi-scan" function. This is similar to play, but
will work either forward or backward, and will run at a rate which you
can set with the "Speed" pop-up menu. The normal speed is 30 fps (frames
per second), but you can go at up to triple speed (90 fps) or as slow as
1 frame per second. (Sound is disabled when using multi-scan).
The Pop-Up Menus-----------------
Speed: this pop-up is used to select the frame rate for the
multi-scan feature. You may select from triple-time to 1 frame per
second. It defaults to 30 fps (normal speed).
Sound: lets you select either channel, both or no-sound. Stereo is
the default.
Mode: This is the access method by which you'll be finding locations
on the disc. CAV disks ues either chapter or frame mode. CLV discs may
use chapter and do use time. Usually, you'll select Frame mode for CAV
and Time mode for CLV. Frame is the default. In the Frame mode, you'd do
a search for frame number 12345 as "12345SE" and in the time mode, to
goto 0 hrs 18 min 22 sec you'd use "01822SE". In the chapter mode, going
to chaper 7 is "7SE".
Misc: Commands which didn't fit in any other menu...
Open: opens the drawer.
Close: closes the drawer.
Start: starts the motor.
Reject: turns off the motor.
Clear: clears the players input buffer, including any numbers;
Search, stopmarker, and AutoStop.
ClearScreen: clears text from the screen (but not the FTC display)
Video: toggles the display of video on or off
Lock: toggles access to the player's remote & keys on/off.
Display: toggles the FTC (frame/time/chapter) display on/off
Pause: inserts a pause command
Special Nexus-only commands:
Wait: inserts a command to wait for a keypress before doing the
next command.
Show Wait: same as above but puts a message on the screen.
Use Arrows: toggles use of the keyboard arrow-keys on or off
in the playback mode. The right & left arrow-keys will step
forward or backward by a single frame (on a CAV disc). The
up-arrow will start forward play; the down-arrow will do
a still or pause. If you are allowing the use of arrows,
then "<+>" will appear on the screen in the lower-left
corner, indicating that the keys are active. The user may
them use the arrow-keys AND the ESCape key to exit the
video play. Enabling use of the arrow keys makes life
nicer for the user, but it also gives him or her control
over the range of the disc, and not just the area you have
specified.
Values : These commands REQUIRE that a number FIRST be entered in
the small box just below this menu BEFORE selecting one of these menu
items. ONLY NUMBERS will be accepted. This one-line tall box is called
the "number-box". To enter a number click the mouse pointer in the box.
To clear out a number in the box, press the "Clear" key on the
keyboard's keypad. All standard editing features are enabled. THEN,
once you have the number you want showing in the box, use the Values
menu-items to select which command the number applies to. For example,
to enter the command to search for frame number 1234, enter "1234" in
the one-line box and then click on the Values menu, and, holding the
button down, slide it to the word "Search" and release the button. (If
you have Recording on, you'll then see "1234SE" appear on the
script-pad; if recording is not on the machine will immediately search
for that frame.) In the following, the two letters in (parenthesis)
are the actual command sent by Nexus to the player
Print (PR): enter a number between 1 & 11 for the line on which you
wish to print UP TO 20 characters. (Then to actually do the printing,
enter the text (IT MUST BE LESS THAN 21 CHARACTERS LONG!!) and press
return. If you have recording on, here's exactly how you'd print the
text "Hello World" on line 5:
(optional: Click on "Reset")
Click on "Record"
enter the number 5 in the NUMBER-BOX
select Print from the VALUE-menu
click the mouse BELOW the line "5PR" which is now on the script-PAD
type in Hello World (no quote marks) and press return
(click on the "Try" button to see it work)
NOTE!!! this will work ONLY if you have set RegA to the number 7.
THIS IS DONE AUTOMATICALLY FOR YOU BY NEXUS, but it may have been reset
accidentally. If so, the print command won't show you anthing. The
command for setting RegA to 7 (enabling screen printing) is : 7RA.
Search (SE): this will search for the frame number you entered in the
number-box.
StopMark (SM): this is the frame or time where playing will
automatically quit.
MultiRight (MF)
MultiLeft (MR): using the speed number you have entered this will do
a multi-scan either Forward or Reversed at that rate.
StopPlay (PL) : starts playing and will continue to play until the
number you entered is reached (time or frame).
There ARE additional commands which are NOT included in the pop-up
menus. You DO have access to these commands, but you'll have to type
them in yourself: using the script-pad.
script-Pad----------------
The script-pad not only shows you what you've recorded but just it
can be used by itself to enter a script: it is a fully editable pad. In
fact, after you've grown used to the commands, you probably find
yourself using this feature _more_ than the menus and buttons: just
type in what you want to have happen, "Try" it, and either re-edit or
"Accept" it. To get the script-pad, click on "Record". Click on "Stop"
to make it go away without losing your commands.
The script-pad is FULLY EDITABLE with standard Apple controls (ie
double clicking; cut, paste, delete and clear). Thus, to clear it out,
highlight all the text you want to remove, and press the "clear" or
"delete" key.
---------------------------------------------------
How To Do Simple Links...
...using just the buttons and pop-up menus.
(Suggestion: just read the following first; in only a few paragraphs are some
examples for you to try...)
When the video-link window opens, you are in the "immediate" mode:
that is, any commands you give the player will happen right away. YOU
ARE NOT MAKING A LINK WHEN YOU ARE IN THIS MODE: you're just "messin'
with the player". (Go ahead...it's FUN!)
To actually make a link, you have to turn recording on. This is done
by clicking on the button "Record". Now, all the commands you issue will
appear on the script-pad, instead of immediately going out to the
player. To see if you've got it just right, click on the "Try" button.
This will send the commands on the script-pad out to the player, one at
a time, first to last. The script pad is fully editable, just like a "mini-
word processor".
When you're satisfied with the script, click on the "Accept" button:
this will actually establish the link by updating the Nexus.set and will
then exit from the video-link window. (To see the link in action,
naturally all you have to do from now on is just click on the linked
word/graphic...)
The most common player command is "SE": SEarch. By entering a number
followed immediately by SE (12345SE) the player is instructed to search
for that numbered frame, if you are in the Frame mode. If you are in the
Time mode, you number should be expressed as HourMinuteSecond. Thus
05923 is 0 hours, 59 minutes and 23 seconds. In the Chapter mode, the
number is a chapter number: 5SE searches for the fifth chapter.
The next most common command is "PL": PLay. If you do not enter a
number before the PL, then playing will begin where you currently are on
the disc. If you DO enter a number before the PL (ie 12345PL) then
playing will begin from where you are, and then STOP when the number is
reached.
From these two we can see that to play a particular section of a
disc, all you have to do is
1) SEarch for the place to start (ie 12345SE)
2) PLay until you get to the stopping point (ie 13000PL)
HOW THE COMMANDS WORK:
The Pioneer player must fully complete one command before starting
another. This means that if you tell the player to SEarch for frame 0, it
cannot do anything else until it has found frame #0. Likewise, if you then
tell it to play until it reaches frame 30000 ( 30000PL), then it cannot
execute any other commands until it has reached frame #30000. That's why,
for example, there is a difference between the SM (Stop Mark) command
and the PL (Play) command. (See example #6 for more information).
EXAMPLES (At last! you actually get to try some...)
So, here's how to..
A) make a link which will goto a place on the disc; start playing and
quit when you get to another place:
(Click on the RESET Button if you have been " 'messin' around ".)
1) Be sure recording is off (the script pad will be missing...) by
clicking on the STOP button.
2) Goto the place you want to start playing. Do this by pressing the
PLAY button and then hitting the STILL button when you get there.
You can use the STEP buttons [ < or > ] ( if you're using a CAV
disc) to get the exact position.
3) Click on the RECORD button to turn recording on.
4) From the VALUES menu, click on SEARCH. (Verify that there is no number
in the NUMBER BOX: turning on Record clears the NUMBER BOX for
you. If you click on any value item and there is no number in the
number box, the Nexus will get and use the CURRENT value.) This
will insert a SEarch with the current frame number.
5) Click on STOP to turn recording back OFF.
6) Now find the point where you want to stop. You can use the single
frame step buttons as noted above to get it just right.
7) Click on the RECORD button to turn recording on.
8) Once again from the VALUES menu, click on STOPPLAY. Nexus will
supply the proper frame number for you.
9) Click on STOP to turn recording back OFF.
Click on TRY to try it out.
(If you want to KEEP the link, you'd next lick on the ACCEPT
button to establish the link.)
(Here's the 'expert' way to do the same thing:
type these two lines into the script-pad:
12345SE (search for frame 12345)
13000PL (play until frame 13000 is reached)
)
--------------------------------------
B) goto a frame and show it
(Click on the RESET Button if you have been " 'messin' around ".)
1) Be sure recording is off (the script pad will be missing...) by
clicking on the STOP button.
2) Goto the frame you want to show.
3) Click on the RECORD button to turn recording on.
4) From the VALUES menu, click on SEARCH.
5) Click on STOP to turn recording back OFF.
Click on TRY to try it out.
(Here's the 'expert' way to do the same thing - if you want frame
#23456 , then type into the script-pad this line:
23456SE
)
-------------------------------------------------------
Here are some samples of the most common links you'll be making, and how
they will appear on the script-pad:
1) goto a place on the disc; start playing and quit when you get to
another place:
23456SE
23900PL
(search for frame 23456: 23456SE
play until frame 23900 23900PL)
2) goto a frame and show it
23456SE
3) show 9 frames (beginning at frame 23456) at 1 second intervals and stop
2SP (set the speed = 2 x the desired fps)
23456SE (search for the first frame -#23456)
23465SM (set the stop make 9 frames later - at 23465)
MF (start multi-scan Forward at rate 1)
or 2SP
23456SE
23465MF
4) show 3 frames (begin at 23456), put up a text overlay about the first,
wait for a keypress before going on to the next.
7RA (usually optional, just just to be sure...)
23456SE
1PR (on the first line...)
Flemish Painters (print this line - it's < 20 chars long)
11PR (on the last line...)
any key continues... (print this - exactly 20 chars)
WA (Nexus WAIT for keypress command)
CS (clear the screen)
Note: Nexus has a special
command which is the same as typing the
previous 4 lines: WK
SF (Step forward 1 frame)
WK
SF (Step forward 1 frame)
WK
5) Tell the user to turn over the disc
PA (pause)
7RA (see above)
8PR
Please turn the disc
9PR
to the other side...
WK
OP (open the drawer for them)
WK
CO (close the drawer)
6) using the arrow-keys
(goto a location on the disk and play, allowing the user to
use the arrow-keys to pause or step during playback.)
12345SE
30000SM (this is important!!! DO NOT USE 30000PL!!)
WU
PL
(Here's why you MUST use the Stop Mark command: the player has
to FULLY execute a command before the next one is accessible.
If you had used 30000PL, the player would have to reach frame
# 30000 before the keyboard could be checked for a keypress.
Instead, you should set the Stop Mark (ie 30000SM) which takes
only a moment to complete, then issue a PLay command. Since this
simply starts playing, it too takes just a moment, and the keyboard
can be checked almost immediately...)
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Here are the commands for the Pioneer LD-V2200/4800/8000 series of
players. Not all commands work on all players.
(In the following, * means an optional number may preceed the command
ie 2345PL or PL
& means a number MUST preceed the command
ie 2345SE
# means see the footnote )
OPEN OP open drawer (2200 only)
REJECT RJ stop disc rotation
START SA start disc rotation
PLAY PL * play (*play until)
PAUSE PA pause
STILL ST still frame
STEP FORWARD SF move ahead one frame
STEP REVERSE SR move back one frame
SCAN FORWARD NF scan forward by about 500 frames
SCAN REVERSE NR ditto except in reverse
MULTI-SPEED FORWARD MF * scan at rate set in SPeed (*ms until)
MULTI-SPEED REVERSE MR ditto except in reverse
SPEED SP & set the speed for multi-scan
SEARCH SE & search for a frame/time/chapter
STOP MARKER SM & set the stop marker
FRAME FR set the mode to frame access
TIME TM set the mode to time access
CHAPTER CH set the mode to chapter access
AUDIO CONTROL AD & turns sound on/off/channels
VIDEO CONTROL VD & turns the picture on/off
DISPLAY CONTROL DS & turns the display of access mode on/off
CLEAR CL clears the last command
FRAME NUMBER REQUEST ?F returns the current frame number
TIME CODE REQUEST ?T returns the current time
CHAPTER NUMBER REQUEST ?C returns the current chapter
PLAYER ACTIVE REQUEST ?P #1 returns coded string about player's state
DISC STATUS REQUEST ?D #2 retruns coded string about type of disc
COMMUNICATION CONTROL CM & #3
CCR MODE REQUEST ?M #3
DOOR CLOSE CO close drawer
LVP MODEL NAME REQUEST ?X returns coded string for player model #
KEY LOCK KL & turns access to remote/front panel on/off
REG A SET (DISPLAY) RA & #3
REG B SET (SQ CONT) RB & #3
REG C SET (MISC) RC & #3
CLEAR SCREEN CS clears the PRinted stuff from the screen
PRINT PR & sets line for following text print to screen
LEAD OUT SYMBOL LO #3
REG A REQUEST $A #3
REG B REQUEST $B #3
REG C REQUEST $C #3
---------------
#1 replies: P00 = door open
P01 = disc not spinning
P04 = normal play going on
P05 = still picture
P06 = Pause
P09 = playing at multi-speed
#2 replies: ABCDE
a = disc loaded 1 = yes 0 = no
b = CAV/CLV CLV CAV
c = disc size 8 12
d = disc side 2 1
e = chapter code yes no ('X' = unknown)
#3 these indicate a sophisticated code generally not needed for normal
programming of a Pioneer player. Users interested in these codes should
request a manual, as noted below. We should note however, that Register A
must be set to 7 for printing commands to function. Nexus takes care of this
for you...
------------------------------------
We at dataSmith would like to thank Pioneer for their kind permission
in allowing us to include the above information for you. If you would like
to recieve the full manual for programming the Pioneer series of laser players,
simply address a note to:
Pioneer Corporation of America
Laser Optical Products Division
3545 Long Beach Blvd. Suite #400
Long Beach, CA 90807
---------------------------------------------------------
Miscellaneous Notes:
Special nexus commands:
WA = wait-for-keypress
WK = WA + "any key continues..." at the bottom of the screen
WU = Let the user use the arrow keys during a display, and
prints "<+>" at the bottom-left of the screen.
Limitations: 251 characters total per link.