flashCube OS X Installation Instructions





WARNING: It would seem to be the case that you MUST have Jaguar (OS 10.2) to get Java 1.4.1, and Java 1.4.1 is in turn required for flashCube. If you are running OS 10.1.x then I'm afraid you may not be able to use flashCube. Consider an upgrade to Jaguar.





1] Using System Update, update your system software to the most current version (e.g. 10.2.6)





2] Again using System Update, update Java to the most current version (it should end up being 1.4.1 or higher)





3] Download the .zip file for flashCube (e.g. 9.01-flashCube.zip or Zhongwen-flashCube.zip) and save it somewhere where you can find it, e.g. your Desktop





4] The .zip file may automatically open with StuffIt expander, but if not, you should be able to double-click the .zip file to expand it.





5] You should now have a folder with the same name as your .zip file, minus the .zip extension, so you might have a folder called Zhongwen-flashCube, for example.





6] Inside that folder is a "flashCube" folder which you should move to whereever you want flashCube to reside (your Desktop is fine). You can now discard the Zhongwen-flashCube (or 9.01-flashCube) folder and its contents.





7] If you do not wish to have your IP address associated with your flashCube usage, please edit the flashCube.ini file in the flashcube-user-data folder and set the value in the "locationTracking" line to false. Again, be careful not to delete the tab between the word "locationTracking" and the "true" or "false".





8] If you intend to use sound with flashCube, keep the flashCube.ini file open, otherwise close it (saving changes) and you should now be able to run flashCube by double-clicking the flashCube.jar file in the flashCube folder (it will have coffee mug icon).














OPTIONAL:





If you intend to use sound with flashCube, there are a couple more steps you have to go through. A perfect solution for sound under OS X has not yet been found, but you have a couple of choices and you can experiement with both.





Choice #1: QuickTime Player. QuickTime player works fine but it does not appear to begin playing the file on its own. So, you will have to hit the play button in QuickTime each time you want to hear a sound. flashCube still loads the proper file automatically, it just doesn't have a way of telling it to play (without using AppleScript which I can do but I'd rather not do until all other options are exhausted).





Choice #2: iTunes. iTunes essentially has the opposite problem from QuickTime - it plays the files automatically but in doing so it also adds them to your library. This actually works fine until you play an item that you've already heard before at which point it will continue playing all remaining items in the playlist below the current item. So, you will have to manually hit the stop button in iTunes whenever this happens.





Choice #3: Find a player that is better than either of this and install it. Provide the path to the program in the steps below. Please email me (dinoriki@mit.edu) if you find a good solution.





1] Near the top of the flashCube.ini file is a line (or several lines) starting with "audioPlayerPath". The line may also have a # in front of it which disables that line so flashCube ignores it.





2] If you wish to use QuickTime to play audio, remove the # from the beginning of the line which reads:





#audioPlayerPath	/Applications/QuickTime\ Player.app





If the line does not exist, just type the above line into your flashCube.ini file, removing the initial # and hitting the TAB key inbetween the "audioPlayerPath" text and the "/Applications/QuickTime\ Player.app" text that follows.





3] If you wish to use iTunes to play audio, remove the # from the beginning of the line which reads:





#audioPlayerPath	/Applications/iTunes.app





If the line does not exist, just type the above line into your flashCube.ini file, removing the initial # and hitting the TAB key inbetween the "audioPlayerPath" text and the "/Applications/iTunes.app" text that follows.





4] Save the file and exit, you can now run flashCube by double-clicking the flashCube.jar file in the flashCube folder (it will have coffee mug icon).























Instructions for editing the flashCube.ini file using emacs:





1] Change into the flashcube_user_data folder within the main flashCube folder. If, for example, the flashCube folder is on your Desktop, you would use the following command:





cd ~/Desktop/flashCube/flashcube_user_data





2] Open the emacs editor by typing:





emacs flashCube.ini





3] Do your editing





4] Exit emacs by typing:





CTRL-X CTRL-S CTRL-X CTRL-C





That's it!