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Example UI Spec: Sounds By Ellen Isaacs This page last updated: July 20, 2000 Figure G1. Bub screen The Palm device has very limited sound capabilities, so we have only some of the many properties of sound to work with. (We expect Palm sounds to improve over time, but for now, this is what we have to work with.) Specifically, there is only one timbre (or instrument) on the Palm, which is the biggest limitation. Instead, we can work with rhythm, number of notes, duration of notes, octave, and pitch. And of course the sounds have to be short, and they should be reasonably pleasant sounding. Keep in mind that the sounds are in MIDI format, which means that the file contains only the instructions about what notes to play, not the sounds themselves. This keeps the file very small, but it also means that the device maps those notes to the sounds it has available. The place where this makes the most difference is in the instrument. The midi files indicate which instrument, but since the Palm has only one instrument, it maps all instruments to that one. This means that when you play these sounds on your PC, they won't have the same tone as they'd have on the Palm. (Most likely they will sound like a piano to you, but on the Palm they sound kind of synthetic, a bit like the sounds on Star Trek.) One final note: when you click on these sounds, your browser will attempt to open them in whatever sound player you have installed on your machine. If you get the popup asking if you want to save the file or open it, choose open it, and that'll try to open an audio player and play it. If you don't have an audio player installed, you'll need to get one. Awareness sounds Active (Plays when bub becomes active) Idle (Plays when bub goes idle)   Sound Instant Messages Hi Bye Busy Thanks Ready? (Are you ready to go?) Eat? (Want to go eat lunch? dinner?) 5 Min (Meet you in 5 minutes, I'll be ready in 5 mins, etc.) Yes No Huh? / What? OK Bummer Can you talk? LOL (laugh out loud)   Sample Sound IDs / TV & Movie theme Batman Gone With the Wind Hawaii 5-0 Mission Impossible Munsters Odd Couple Peanuts Pink Panther Pretty Woman Simpsons Top Gun Beverly Hills Cop Star Wars X-files Other Sound IDs Aqualung Grapevine Holiday Midnight Sonata Smoke on the Water Sometimes Tubular Bells Walking on the Sun