It seems everyone is doing something slightly different which is a headache for mod makers, because I wanted to switch music tracks during a map.

DP/FTE are using CD command, like for example:
CD PLAY TRACK04
(Music tracks can be several places)

QS is using a MUSIC command, like for example:
MUSIC TRACK04
(Music tracks must exist in ID1/MUSIC)

Is it possible QS could have a CD command to match the other client engines? 

to use external ent file which I know is supported by DP and am pretty sure is also supported by FTE seeing how versatile an engine FTE is.

And the next step is to use bat files or other means to switch different ent files depending on the choice of engine. 

 

requiem uses "cd play X" too. 

@sock
cd play not cd loop?
incidentilly, fte has a 'music' command for compat with q3, which needs an extra argument to control/disable looping ("-" to disable).
so take your pick. :P

@dooomer
ent files won't help with music/named faketracks. they're technically limited to numbered tracks only, which are a pain however you look at it.
you need qc for anything else, which at least prevents the need for horrendous user intervention (which you just know would go horribly wrong).

@ijed
I assume he's stuck on the step after that - the great thing about standards is that there are so many to choose from. 

Make another standard!

Play them from Qc... 

Yeah it's annoying, I always felt you should be able to use "cd play 4" in quakesapsm and have the track04.ogg play.

But, as ijed says, the right way for a mod to do it is with qc; this should work in DP and QS:

WriteByte (MSG_ALL, SVC_CDTRACK);
WriteByte (MSG_ALL, 2); // 2 is track number
WriteByte (MSG_ALL, 2); // 2 is track number

courtesy of Baker. http://forums.inside3d.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=4552&p=41367&hilit=svc_cdtrack#p41367

There's some useful info on how different engines handle soundtracks here: http://neogeographica.com/site/pages/guides/soundtrack_solutions.html

In short, both QS and DP handle music in the form: moddirectory/music/track02.ogg 

"cd play" doesn't save to a savegame file.

So if you use cd tracks for "mood music" and use "cd play", saving the game and reloading it you will notice it didn't preserve. 

If you start recording a demo AFTER a "cd play" and you play it back, it didn't happen.

In both cases using the SVC_CDTRACK does preserve.

Some QC ace here could easily write a bit of QuakeC to expose the correct method within a map. 

no. svc_cdtrack is not preserved in demos. I just checked markv. not preserved.
saved games are server-side. the server doesn't have a clue what the last svc was, and certainly doesn't have a way to update it without potentially bugging out mods.
even if it was saved/recorded, it would still be rewound.
also, sock did seem to explicitly say 'cd play' and not 'cd loop' - and svc_cdtrack doesn't support playing without looping, in which case cutting it short is probably the better choice over rewinding to start and then forcing it to inexplicably loop anyway. 

Even if every engine implemented emulation of the cd audio the same way, it wouldn't be a music system that can be counted on robustly in gameplay/gamecode at all. Trying to use in-world sound entities has even worse limitations.

It'd be nice to be able to just include a .dll in with a quake mod that adds its own locally contained SVCs and builtins. The issue of netcode being rendered permanently incompatible would go away, because id1 would still work like id1 and you have to run Quake with the same mod as other people joining your game or playing back your demo anyway. Then every tin-pot quake modder can gleefully create their own utterly incompatible music systems and particle systems and whatever else without everything immediately reverting to the usual argument about how it doesn't comply with the standards that nobody's upholding. 

It's possible to use a "nosave" variable to detect when a saved game has been loaded, and thus restore things after a save is loaded. No reason why you couldn't code your CD system into that. Of course, playing CDs always start the track over, but I doubt anyone was expecting the CD method to provide anything but a loop. 

Its fine, I have a QC solution already with background tracks and additional ambient stuff triggered on events. The downside is when the console is dropped, QC stops. I was wondering about the idea of looped background ambient tracks and found the console commands were different. Nothing to worry about, doing the QC route.