Controller

General

With the Controller you select which music and which sounds (more precisely, which mode elements) are played. The controller can run on the same computer as the Player or on a different one. It needs a player in both cases which will play the files.

On the Controller computer you need neither the Ares project file nor the music and sound files. They have to be on the computer where the Player is; the Controller gets all necessary information from the Player.

In the upper part of the Controller are three sliders to set the volumes. The Controller remembers the settings for the next start automatically. With the sliders for music and sounds, you can't set the volume higher than defined by the overall volume; so it makes sense to set the overall volume rather high and then set the volumes for music and sounds somewhat lower.

Below, the Controller displays the current state:

• Which project is loaded?
• Which mode is selected?
• Which elements of the mode are currently played?
• Which music file is currently played?

Below, there's a section for the connection to the Player. You have to establish a connection first, before anything can be played. The Players which are visible in the network are displayed automatically in the selection list. If you don't see anything in the list, there are several possible reasons for that:

• You have not yet started the Player (if the Player is also installed, the Controller can start it automatically)
• You want to use two computers, but one of them doesn't have access to the network.
• A firewall on one of the computers is preventing the connection
• You have selected different UDP ports in Player and Controller

You can select the UDP port for the network connection in the Controller under Extras -> Settings (the TCP port is taken from the Player settings automatically).

The last section of the Controller contains buttons depending on the loaded project. Each mode in the project gets its own button. With this button, you open (and close) a separate window for the mode.

A special, always available 'mode' is the currently played music list. With it you can directly select one of the songs in the current list. Another special 'mode' can be used to select music tags.

Control

Firstly, you open the window for the mode you want, either through the button or per keyboard key (which you have selected in the Editor). Several windows can be open at the same time; if you minimize or restore the main window, all other windows will also be minimized or restored.
Then, you can select elements in the window for the mode. Again, you can do that either by pressing the button or by pressing the defined keyboard key. For elements which remain active (like background music), the button remains pressed, and you can stop playing the element by pressing the button or the keyboard key again.

Messages

The messages window is opened either through the menu or automatically if a warning or error message occurs. The Controller outputs such messages if something doesn't fit or has gone wrong. With the filter, you can switch between different categories of messages.

Settings

Apart from the network settings, you can also change the appearance of the Controller through Settings -> Display. You can select a different look & feel instead of the default Walnut one. To select a skin, you have to choose "Skin ..." as look & feel.

Or you can change the font. If you change the font size, the buttons get bigger or smaller; that's good e.g. for touch screens.

Finally, there are some options regarding music playing, which hopefully explain themselves.