IXALANCE(1)

NAME

ixalance — DOS32 demo loader for Linux (The Black Lotus demo system)

SYNOPSIS

ixalance [OPTIONS] demo.ixa

DESCRIPTION

ixalance is a DOS32 protected-mode demo loader for Linux. It was originally written by Jurjen Katsman (The Black Lotus, TBL) and ported to Linux and SDL by Jarno Paananen.

It runs TBL demo files (.ixa archives) by emulating the 32-bit protected-mode environment the demos expect, while rendering graphics through SDL2 and playing music through libopenmpt and SDL2 audio.

The program opens a resizable SDL2 window at the native resolution of each demo effect (typically 320×200, 640×480, or 800×600) and scales it to fill the window while preserving the original aspect ratio.

OPTIONS

-mx Set the audio mixing rate to x Hz (e.g. -m44100).

-ox Set the output mode. Valid values: 8 (8-bit), 1 (16-bit), s (stereo), m (mono).

-fx Set the interpolation filter. Valid values: 0 (none), 1 (less), 2 (more).

-i  Enable oversampling (interpolation).

-sWxH
    Force the initial window size to W×H pixels (e.g. -s800x600).

-d  Write debugging output to debug.txt in the current directory.

-t  Print frames per second to standard output.

-F  Start in fullscreen mode.

KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS

F   Toggle fullscreen / windowed mode at any time during playback. Fullscreen uses SDL_WINDOW_FULLSCREEN_DESKTOP so the desktop resolution is preserved; the demo image is centred and letter-boxed to maintain the correct aspect ratio.

ESC Quit the program cleanly.

FILES

debug.txt
    Debug log written in the current working directory when -d is used.

EXIT STATUS

0   Normal exit (demo finished or user pressed ESC).

1   Error (missing or unreadable demo file, SDL initialisation failure, etc.).

BUGS

The program only runs .ixa archives produced by The Black Lotus demo system; it is not a general-purpose DOS emulator.

Code compiled from code.asm is i386 protected-mode only; the binary must be built as a 32-bit ELF executable (-m32).

SEE ALSO

sdl2-config(1)

Upstream iXalance/Linux home page: <http://www.s2.org/iXalance/>

TBL demo archive: <http://www.tbl.org/tbl32.htm>

AUTHORS

Jurjen Katsman (The Black Lotus) — original DOS32 demo system.

Jarno Paananen <jpaana@s2.org> — Linux/SDL port.

Packaged for Debian/Ubuntu by Nicolas HOUDELOT <nicolas@demosdebs.org>.

AUTHORS
Packaged for Debian/Ubuntu by Nicolas HOUDELOT <nicolas@demosdebs.org>.