Getting Started

This section will guide you through the basics of setting-up and using Half-Life DJ quickly and easily.
For more thorough and detailed explanations please see the other respective sections of the manual.

Getting Started covers the following topics:
Installation
Setup
Options
Main Application
In-Game


Installation

After downloading Half-Life DJ, install it by unzipping it to any location. Once completed, the program will be located in the folder named "HLDJ" (you can rename this if you'd like).
To start Half-Life DJ, run "hldj.exe" from within this folder. For easy access, it is a good idea to create a shortcut to it (right-click on "hldj.exe" and select "create shortcut"), and place it in a convenient location.


Setup

When running Half-Life DJ for the first time, you will be prompted to run Setup. Answer "Yes" to the next two dialog boxes that appear and you will be taken to the Setup window with the Add All dialog displayed (alternatively, you can click the Add All button to get there).

From the Add All window, you will notice the following fields:
1)  Game Directory
2)  Audio Directory
3)  Play audio key
    (other fields and settings detailed further in Setup).

1)  Note: When adding all games this field is optional: you can either choose to leave it blank and HLDJ will search through the entire current drive, or you can specify any game directory and HLDJ will narrow down its search (making it faster). If you choose to leave it blank, please skip forward to the next section (2). Otherwise, fill in the field as described below.
A Game Directory is the directory of a game that contains its files (i.e. "C:\...\Steam\SteamApps\username\counter-strike\cstrike"). Since we are adding all games, any game directory will do here. To specify one, click the Browse button to the right of the field and you will be presented with an explorer-type view of your files and folders. Navigate to a game directory by selecting and expanding folders until you have found one (the status light will go from to and the Select button will become available) and hit Select. If you are having trouble finding one, as mentioned above, just leave the field blank.

2)  The Audio Directory is the directory that contains your converted audio files to play in-game.
     Important!!: All audio files must be in proper HL audio format:
                        wav file, 8000Hz (HL game) or 11025Hz (Source game) frequency, 16-bit sampling rate, mono-channel
                        Failure to do this may result in distorted audio and/or game crashing!!

If you leave this field at its default value (the directory already supplied) it will be created for you (answer "Yes" when prompted to create it). Otherwise, to supply your own directory, click the Browse button to the right of the field and select the desired directory.

3)  The Play Audio Key is the key that you will use to play/stop audio while in-game. Select the key you wish to use from the drop down list.

Once you have everything filled out to your satisfaction, hit the Ok button. This will start a scan that adds profiles for all Steam games found. This may take a while (depending if the Game Directory field is filled out or not) so please remain patient until it has completed. Afterwards, a summary will be displayed:
• If you receive a message about 3rd-party Source Mods being added, you will need to supply an additional field for these profiles, please see Adding 3rd-party Source mods for more details.
• If you receive a message about game icons, this is not critical, but you can see Using Custom Icons for more details.
Hit "Ok" when you are done with the summary to return to Setup. All found games will now be present in the Games List.

Click on the picture below for a visual demo of the above steps:


• To quickly change the name of a game profile, select it in the list (click on it), then click on it again. This is similar to renaming files in Windows (not a double click, but rather two single-clicks).
• Each game profile can be further edited by double-clicking it (or selecting it and hitting Edit ).
• To remove any unwanted games from the list, select the game and hit the Remove button.
• Games can be moved up and down the list by using the Move up and Move down buttons.
• When adding a third-party Source mod, there is an additional field required, please see Adding third-party Source mods for more details.
• For more details on how to customize game profiles, please see Setup.

Hit the Ok button to save changes and return to the main application (to discard changes, hit the Cancel button.).
If you've selected Ok, a set of Recommended Options will be displayed, some of which will already be checked for you. It is recommended that you enable them all, which will allow HLDJ automatically launch the correct game application for you and minimize to tray afterwards (for a futher explanation of what each does, see Options, below). Hit Ok when you are done.

Main Application

From the main application you can activate (start) a game profile. To start a game with HLDJ, select it from the Select Game drop-down list, and hit the Start button.
Click on the picture below for a visual demo of the above steps:



If you have the Launch Game Application option enabled (mentioned as one of recommended options above), the correct game application will be started for you; if not, start the game as you normally would (making sure it is the same game as you have started in HLDJ).
If you have the Minimize to tray and Minimize on game start options enabled HLDJ will also minimize to the tray; double-click the tray icon to bring it up again, or single-click it for a tray menu.

• Once the game is started, you can interact with HLDJ through the console (see In-Game, further below).
• To select a different game, press the Stop button first.
• To enter Setup again, click Setup .
• To configure your Options, click Options .
• To get help on a topic, hit the Help button.
• More details can be found in the Main App section.

When you are ready to quit HLDJ, hit the Exit button.


Options

The Options window allows you to control how Half-Life DJ starts up, runs and interacts with you.
It is recommended that you enable the following options in the Start-up section:
Launch game application
Minimize to tray
Minimize on game start
These will allow HLDJ to automatically launch the correct game application for you (and Steam if it is not already started), and then minimize itself to a tray icon (click the icon for a tray menu, double-click to restore). You will generally want to have these enabled as they make using HLDJ with your game much more seamless. More details can be found in Options.

Hit "Ok" to save settings and close Options, "Reset to Defaults" to restore default settings, or "Cancel" to discard settings and close.


In-Game

While in-game, interaction with HLDJ is done via the console (usually accessed by the tilde "~" key).
After starting a game with HLDJ, check the console to confirm that HLDJ has been successfully loaded (a confirmation message should appear, and in HL1 games, a short tone will play). If for some reason Half-Life DJ has not loaded properly, stop and start HLDJ again.
The Quick-Start Guide will be displayed in console as a quick reference to help you start using HLDJ.

HLDJ's basic in-game functions are:
• selecting a file or directory
• selecting next/previous file
• displaying help messages.

• To select a file/folder:
1) Enter "la" or "listaudio" into the console to bring up the audio list (displays files/folders in the current directory).
2) Select the desired audio file or folder by entering its corresponding number into the console.
3) Press your Play Audio Key (while in-game) to start playing the audio file. Press this key again to stop playback.

• To select the next or previous audio file in the list, use the next command "hldjn" or previous command "hldjp".

• To display the in-game help messages:
Enter "hldj" into console to view the Quick-Start Guide.
Enter "hldj1" to view the HLDJ Command List.
Enter "hldj2" for basic help.
Enter "hldj3" for more advanced help.

To stop HLDJ and quit the game, you can use the stop-quit command: "hldjsq" or "hldj_stopquit".
To quit both HLDJ and the game, use the quit-all command: "hldjqa" or "hldj_quitall".

For an explanation of more advanced commands please refer to the in-game help messages or see the In-Game section.
This concludes the basics of setting up and using Half-Life DJ. Keep practicing and experimenting with HLDJ's unique features and read the other sections of the manual to help master you're DJ-ing skills!