

                                     Plug-ins


Plug-ins provide visualisation of the sound produced by the player. At the
moment it is reserved to sound produced on the sound DMA buffers as there is
no way to intercept the CD output on current hardware.

Plug-ins are defined in DigitalCD as a directory (no need to prefix it with !)
containing any files you wishes but where 3 filenames are reserved: !Run, !Help
and !SrvSetup which DigitalCD will Filer_Run when required. They are stored
either in !DigitalCD.PlugIns.Desktop or in !DigitalCD.PlugIns.FullScreen
depending on whether they are running in windows on the desktop or whether they
are taking over the screen.

!Run is mandatory and is used to start the plug-in. It's the usual Obey file
which sets a few variables, the wimpslot and runs the main program (don't forget
to give it the parameter that DigitalCD will provide).

!Help is optional and is used to provide information on the plug-in. Usually
it's a text file.

!SvrSetup is optional too and is used to configure the plug-in. It is most
likely to appear as an application directory without !Boot nor !Sprites files.
You may have noticed that I used the same name convention as for screen savers,
just in case you decide to provide your code both as a plug-in or as a screen
saver.

At this point you think that you may start coding your plug-in? Well, not yet
because as I said DigitalCD provides you a parameter and you don't know what
it is. The parameter is a player handle that you will have to use to register
and unregister your plug-in or to retrieve information from the player.
So, now you read carefully the file !DigitalCD.Docs.DCDUtils which explains
my previous sentence. You can also look at the following sources:
- !DigitalCD.PlugIns.Desktop.PowerBars for a windowed plug-in
- !DigitalCD.PlugIns.FullScreen.Audio16 for a full-screen plug-in.

Happy coding!