"instrument clutter?" Instruments are often-used patterns/shortcuts so you don't have to copy/paste huge effects lists every time you want to change something :X
Also this "tracking style" is pretty crazy, as in "why would you do it this way??" crazy.
Well, it eliminates instrument clutter and allows the most perfect manipulation possible.
Though it's a pain, it takes long, and you need some getting used to it.
Not to mention it's hugely ineffective memory-wise. Try comparing the size of a normal FTM with an exported & imported back version. Most NSFs I import and save as FTM are about 160KB~200KB...
"instrument clutter?" Instruments are often-used patterns/shortcuts so you don't have to copy/paste huge effects lists every time you want to change something :X
I do see the importance of instruments to more seasoned users, but there are some benefits to the importer's "cleaning up the instrument clutter."
I was working on an incomplete song that BetaSword did (which was part of a 9-song OST with 49 instruments). The song itself only used 3 instruments, so why would I need the other 46? And if I'm ever curious about how to effectively do this at 900 BPM with only a blank instrument, then this is useful to have in terms of advanced analysis.
On a separate note, I wonder how well the importer would work with triangle-wave samples...
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TechEmporium: what does triangle wave samples mean?
Sorry about that; I should fill you in on this.
I don't recall if it was nicetas_c, tadpole or Rushjet1 who did this, but one of them actually created DMC samples that produce a triangle wave output which matches that of the triangle channel, except with a lower volume level (due to the DPCM channel's limitations). The only downside is that the triangle wave samples don't work well in most NSF players & NES emulators due to programming errors in different NSF driver engines (so far, it fails to play properly on Nestopia, FCEUX, NotSo Fatso & FlashNSF, but it plays correctly on VirtuaNSF & NSFLive).
You can check out the attached files; yet another MMC5 track that produces the same MMC5 square duty glitch as previously mentioned (along with the fact that none of the DMC samples are actually assigned to any note whatsoever from within any instrument,) but it preserves the triangle wave samples I've used quite well (instrument 0F in the original FTM).
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(along with the fact that none of the DMC samples are actually assigned to any note whatsoever from within any instrument,)
People keep saying this, but they're there in instrument 00 octave 0, the notes played in the DMC channel will inform you of this. (There's still the crash problem with the filename-less samples though.)
So anyhow... sounds like it works fine? (Other than the MMC5 duty which I have alreay corrected locally.) Glad to see looping samples come up okay.
Never mind about my DMC note assignment complaint; I just found that the samples were assigned correctly.
As for the triangle samples, it all works fine, including sample-looping; you may have to watch out, though, because NotSo Fatso doesn't play them well (triangle samples sound slightly detuned, as though they were playing with a P7F effect, while looping the sample would cause a tremolo-like effect). You may end up having to switch to a different engine for NSF playback.
If you want to investigate that further, try playing the NSF file in NotSo Fatso.
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If anyone is interested, I just spent the last hour and a half ripping the entire Lagrange Point soundtrack, just for kicks. It's up for grabs here. Not to worry, I have included a text file that makes it very clear I'm not claiming these as my own. :p
I thought it'd be an interesting soundtrack to look at, so I thought I'd save other people the trouble of going through the ripping process 31 times, plus setting loop points etc.
Hope you guys will find some use for it.
EDIT: track 1 sounds a bit wrong, I think the program doesn't make the distinction between note off and note release. :\
Some folks don't seem to get the single instrument thing.
In the first track of Super Mario Bros. Koji Kondo uses a volume pattern on the square channels like this: 0 8 7 6 5 - 4 - 0 (see the 'imported' ftm). He uses the same pattern over and over exactly the same way for each note. This is equivalent to us making an instrument with [0 8 7 6 5 5 4 4 0] in the volume envelope editor of Famitracker. In other words, Kondo did use instruments to write the song, but this importer doesn't group the patterns into instruments for you.
So, I started to do it by hand (see 'perfect' ftm.)
Actually, I didn't bother with the Pxx stuff. [s] What's the deal with that? Is that an artifact of the NSF2FTM recording process or are those P7F's intentional?[/s] Nevermind, I read the thread now. Still, does that mean the notes had slightly different Hz values in the original, original code? How do you specify the frequencies in 6502/2A03 assembly?
track 1 sounds a bit wrong, I think the program doesn't make the distinction between note off and note release. :\
Thanks for pointing this out. I was going by this document:
http://nesdev.parodius.com/vrcvii.txt
I had been confused as to why there was another bit in the register that contains note on/off information that was being used by the game, because that document said "no audible effect". :P Just found a more recent version of the document here:
http://kevtris.org/nes/vrcvii.txt
So... yes, you hit the nail on the head. It was the sustain bit, which is what FamiTracker does with note release. Here's a new import of that first track. (Obviously all the other tracks are probably missing note releases as well.)
Does anyone know of any original games that used the sample offset technique? I'm going to try to support Yxx as best I can, but I'm wondering if it actually appears anywhere outside of FamiTracker.
) 
Thanks a lot, man !!! You make my dream!!! Yeeeaahh!!!