Official homepage of SongShowToText Utility

-Robert Guico
Setup -- Usage -- Support -- Downloads Page

This is the official, barebones page of the SongShowToText Utility. Included on this page are directions on how to use the utility.

Why Java?

Well, first of all, this program and website were developed on a Mac. It is impossible to develop for Windows on a Mac platform. One of the only widespread ways to develop this way is to use Java, a largely platform-independent language.

Of course, this decision causes some problems when you actually want to use the utility, but overall the setup to use the utility should be much better than retyping all SongShow files into separate files yourself.

Setup

If you know you have Java on your computer, you can skip this whole section.

Otherwise, go to the Java 1.4.2 Download Page and click on "Download JS2E JRE".

Choose either installer, and install the program with all defaults. When you're completely finished with the process (it should take 10 minutes), go ahead and head to the Command Line.

In Windows, click on the Start Menu, then click on "Run...", then type "java" and press enter in the resulting line.

If you see the following screen, or something like it, you have been successful:

  Usage: java [-options] class [args...]
           (to execute a class)
   or  java [-options] -jar jarfile [args...]
           (to execute a jar file)

where options include:
    -client       to select the "client" VM
    -server       to select the "server" VM
    -jvm          is a synonym for the "client" VM  [deprecated]
    -hotspot      is a synonym for the "client" VM  [deprecated]
                  The default VM is client.

                  ... more stuff ...

If you see the following line, you failed:

  Bad command or file name

Try rebooting the computer, and repeating the "Run...", "java" steps.

Usage

A good First Thing To Do is to download the SongShowToText .class file to the directory that contains all your sbsong files in it. In general, it's also a good idea to ensure that you are in that directory when you issues all the following commands in the command prompt.

The simplest way to work the program is to type the following:

  java SongShowToText "mysong.sbsong"

where mysong is the title of your song.

Of course, it's far more useful to save this information to a file if you're going to import it to MediaShout or other programs...

  java SongShowToText "mysong.sbsong" > c:\temp\importme.txt

Which gets you a step closer to what I recommmend...

  del c:\temp\importme.txt
  for %1 in (*.sbsong) do java SongShowToText "%1" >> c:\temp\importme.txt

This is actually two commands. The first deletes the file you're going to want to import. The second runs through all the files in the directory where your songs are, and converts them to text files. Then you can import them by going to the c:\temp directory on your computer, and importing "importme.txt".

Make sure you're in the directory where all your songs are when you issue this command. Generally, you'll have to do something like this:

  cd "C:\Program Files\RTechnics\SongShow Plus\Songs"

Again, do this before you issue the "for .... " command.

Support

Support is not guaranteed. But send an e-mail to lpangelrob@users.sourceforge.net and I'll do what I can to assist you.