MiniCD  v1.2 - 32-bit Shareware CD player for Windows 95 and NT 3.51
--------------------------------------------------------------------


Short Description:
------------------
Adds three small CD audio control buttons (play, stop, track forward) and 
three application control buttons (mode, minimize, exit) to the Windows 
desktop. Starts playback of an Audio CD automatically on startup. 


Longer description:
-------------------
When the program starts, it checks the CD-ROM drive for a disc, if any, and
determines its type. If it finds an audio CD, playback is started. If there 
is no CD in the drive or the CD is a data CD-ROM, the program shuts itself 
down. The control buttons for the CD are located in the upper left hand 
corner of Windows's desktop and are floating on top of other windows. Pressing 
the X-button closes the program and stops playback, pressing the down arrow 
minimizes the program to an icon. The mode button switches between
normal mode and movable mode. Windows 95 users might find it useful to set the 
auto play property of the CD Audio file type to true, and set the application 
to be launched to MiniCD. That way, every time an audio CD is inserted in the
CD-ROM drive, MiniCD starts automatically. NT users can copy the program
item to their startup group/folder so that when the system boots, minicd checks 
the CD-ROM drive for a disc and starts playback if one is found.

Installation:
-------------
Copy the file ctl3d32.dll to your Windows\system32 directory (if your setup
doesn't have a \Windows\system32 directory, try \Windows\system). In NT this
directory is usually \WINNT35\SYSTEM32. Copy the file minicd12.exe to the 
directory of your choice. Create a desktop object for the program, or place 
it in a folder in the Start menu (95), or create a new program item for 
MiniCD into one of the groups in Program Manager (e.g. startup) (NT).

Changes from v1.0
-----------------
- Redesigned buttons
- Added tips to the buttons
- Added mode button, i.e. button bar is now movable.
- Fixed misc bugs (press play -> play button becomes disabled, etc.)

Future Development
------------------
Version 1.5 already exists and all registered users have received it. In it
there are two more buttons (previous track, pause) and a pop-up menu for
directly choosing tracks from the CD. The shareware version of 1.5 will
perhaps be available later this year, but as mentioned, upon registering
you will reserve the registered version of 1.5 along with the registered
version of 1.2. When I decide to release the shareware version of 1.5, I
will raise the registration fee as well because of the time used for 
development. Registering v1.2 entitles you to free upgrades to all future
versions of MiniCD, see register.txt for more details.
    The latest news on future development, release dates, current versions 
etc. can be found at http://www.utu.fi/~seaavi/minicd.html   - if you want
to see what version 1.5 looks like, visit the site!


What about Windows 3.1x?
------------------------
The version of MiniCD included on this ZIP is a 32-bit Windows application 
and doesn't function in Windows 3.1x. There is, however, a 16-bit Windows
version of MiniCD 1.2, which is fuctions and looks just like this 32-bit 
version, and which you can download from:

http://ftp.winsite.com/pub/pc/win3/sounds/minicd12.zip    or
http://www.utu.fi/~seaavi/minicd.html    .

The Author:
-----------
Seppo Virtanen, student, dept. of physical sciences (electronics and
computer science), University of Turku, Finland.

Internet e-mail: Seppo.Virtanen@utu.fi  
Web page: http://www.utu.fi/~seaavi
MiniCD Web page: http://www.utu.fi/~seaavi/minicd.html

- feel free to give me any feedback!

If you decide to evaluate this program, please let me know - it would be 
interesting to know how many people have tried this program out. 

(EOF)
