User`s manual

Alcorn McBride Digital Video Machine DVM-7400 User’s Manual Rev 1.5

Special Playlist Commands

In addition to regular Digital Video Machine commands listed in the Command

Protocol section, there are a few commands that apply only to Playlists. These

single-character commands further modify the behavior of the Playlists. These

characters and their functions are listed in the following table:

Char Meaning

U Uninterruptible. Causes the Digital Video Machine to ignore the Resume input

and serial Play until the playlist becomes interruptible once again.

I Interruptible. Allows the Resume input or serial Play command to skip to the

next track. This is the power-up default.

S Seamless. Whenever PL commands are located immediately after one

another, the playlist will seamlessly transition between the clips. This is the

power-up default.

G Segmented. In this mode, the playlist will not transition between clips

seamlessly. There will be a brief delay between clips.

W Wait. Unit waits until a Resume (Parallel) or a Play (Ethernet or Serial)

Command received, then continues to the next command in the playlist.

< Loop. Tells the playlist to loop upon completion. The only way to stop the

playlist from looping is to use the Parallel Stop input or Stop command. The

playlist will also stop if another playlist or video is started.

; Comment. Ignore all characters until the next line.

Commands may be entered into the Playlist in either upper or lower case. All text

following a semicolon (;) is interpreted as comments, until the next line in the file. You

may put anything you want in comments, including the special command characters

normally used in the Playlist.

One thing to be cautious of when making a playlist is creating an unintended endless

loop or uninterruptible wait. For example, if a Playlist contains a ‘U’ followed by a

Loop Play command, it doesn’t matter how many more tracks may occur in it, there is

no way to get to them! When using the ‘U’ command, always include an ‘I’ command

before the next Loop Play or W, unless this is the desired behavior. Of course, you

can always terminate the loop or wait with a stop command, or by selecting a different

file.

Playlists may contain references to other Playlists, but as soon as such a reference is

encountered the new Playlist begins execution, and the old one is abandoned.