Preferences

General

• Auto-Cue: this option kicks in when pausing between songs, what it does is load the song and pause it right at the first non-silence, so when you press the space bar, instant music. If you find that the song jumps too far past the start, then before pressing space, press the left arrow key to simply rewind the song. (This can happen for songs that expect you to start singing before the music). There is also a new button in the browser, next to the "Next" button. This does the same thing, it will cue the song to the first non-silent sample.

Audio

Import & LAME

• Ignore CDG ripping errors (black video is OK): This really is only for debugging purposes, if you turn this on, then kJams will function with ANY drive, but drives that do not support CD+G media will simply return black video. So you'll get the music, but no graphics.

Burning

Advanced

• Logging is used for debugging purposes. Please leave it on. Do NOT turn on Log Threads unless I ask you to
• Clear Search field when switching Sources: With this on, when you switch between sources (eg: a playlist, the Library, a Singer etc), the search field is cleared, so it will reveal all items in that source. If you leave this checkbox off, the search is re-executed on the new source after you switch to it.
• Update Search Results as you type: will perform the search after each key stroke. When off, you must press [Return] to execute the search
• Allow Name Editing: lets you edit meta info directly in the browser. It's a bit to zealous at starting an edit session right now, so I made this pref to shut it off. (This will be fixed to work like the sources list, where you have to click and then not move your mouse for a second before the edit starts)
• Remember Pitch & Tempo changes in all playlists: If you set pitch or tempo in a playlist that does NOT belong to a singer, the setting will stick, and next time you play the song from any non-singer playlist, it will play with the previously set pitch and tempo. Actually the setting is always remembered, this preference only determines if it gets applied. Note this does not affect burning a disc. In other words, if you set the pitch on a song in a non-singer playlist, then burn the disc, it will be burnt with the new pitch, even if this preference is not set.
• Automatically mark singers “Here”: Will automatically place in rotation a singer who's "Tonight" list is touched (added to, removed from, or reordered)
• Automatically un-mark singers “Not Here”: Will automatically remove from rotation a singer who runs out of songs. You would leave this NOT checked if you want the singers to keep their place in the rotation even if they forgot to sign up for another song after their last one. Otherwise, when they add another song, they will go to the end of the rotation (and will therefore sing SOONER than they would have had they stayed in the rotation)

freedb

See freedb

Exporting

• Pad QuickTime Export to 320 x 240: Normally CD+G media is 300 x 216 pixels, but this looks even more chunky than normal when scaled to the video iPod screen. If you enable this option, kJams will pad the frames with a black border to fill them out to 320 x 240.

Secret Prefs

There are some prefs that are not exposed in the user interface. You can use an XML or plist editor (like the excellent PlistEdit Pro) or you can just use a text editor. When kJams is NOT running, open the file:
~/Library/Preferences/kJams/kJams Preferences.xml

• Seconds to wait after click to edit: how long to wait after clicking, while holding the mouse still, before you go into "edit mode" when clicking meta info directly in the browser
• Max number of zips at once when pushing meta: how fast is your machine? intel duo? set it to maybe 20, ppc solo? set to maybe 6
• BOMArchiveHelper Location: not used, but probably points to the location on your hard drive of this application
• XYZ Window Rectangle: the rectangle in screen coordinates of the XYZ window, you can change this to something reasonable if a window ever disappears off your desktop
• XYZ Window Visible: is this window visible?
• Calculate file sizes: turn this OFF if startup is taking forever. Gets set to ON when you use "Advanced->Special->Scan all file sizes..."
• Prefs file version (do not change!): If you change this, you will screw things up badly, you have been warned.
• Selected Pref Resource ID: this is the resource ID of the preference pane that was last used.
  • 300: General
  • 301: Audio
  • 302: Importing
  • 303: Burning
  • 304: Advanced
  • 305: freedb
  • 306: Exporting