Nectarine
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Currently, there are 31 Active FAQ's:Q. Where is my account? I can't log in!
Q. Is Oneliner a free speech zone? Is it censored?
Q. Why is the 'Search' function so slow??
Q. How does the queue work? How do I queue multiple tunes at once?
Q. When are you going to fix <bug>? I want to help! Is there a source code repo?
Q. How can I upload a new song?
Q. Can I have more than one account here? What if I'm an artist who writes tunes under different aliases?
Q. What are the basic upload rules?
Q. Which file formats can I upload?
Q. How do I fix an existing tune that has the wrong audio, or needs a better version?
Q. I want to upload "missing" game tunes!
Q. Hey, why is <Song I Like> rejected when <Song I Don't Like> is accepted?! I demand you accept that other song!
Q. Adding a new artist?
Q. Why are there game tunes on here, then? What's the policy?
Q. What do these song statuses mean?
Q. How can I automate making requests?
Q. How can I help correct duplicated songs, or songs with incorrect/missing information?
Q. I want to download that tune!
Q. Do you have some hints about how to use tags?
Q. Where can I change my flag?
Q. I heard that there are some flags which are not mentioned in ISO 3166...
Q. Where can I find a current list of all smileys?
Q. Where can I find a list of all BBCode commands, along with examples?
Q. Did you know that... ?
Q. I wanna chat! Is there an IRC channel or similar?
Q. Is there an API for Necta?
Q. What to do when song information is wrong?
Q. How can I add or change artists to a tune, or edit artist info?
Q. HE MAN? Confirmasse? AMIGAAAA? What the hell does it mean?
Q. How do I get a gold star?
Q. What happened to the old Nectarine?
[Back To Top]
Q. Where is my account? I can't log in!
If you had an account on the old Nectarine site (scenemusic.net), contact one of the administrators with your email and username, and we will set you up with a new password.
Added by
admin (Last Updated: 11 months, 1 week) [Top]Q. Is Oneliner a free speech zone? Is it censored?
ONELINER GUIDELINES (and these same rules apply in the Nectarine Discord chat!)
YES:
- Enjoy friendly chat with other sceners and scenemusic appreciators
- Discuss music, especially what is playing on the stream
- Make funny jokes
- Talk/rave/gripe about your job, your move, the weather, your food, your craft beers, your life generally
NO:
** Do not make comments that would, to a reasonable person, seem racist, sexist, overtly political, or making light of the struggles of others.
** No politics or religion. Keep your politics to yourself. Let's all just get along.
** Do not post links to edgy memes, videos, comics, political news articles, or anything else that may make casual visitors believe this is a hostile or unwelcoming environment.
** You are not sure whether a link or comment is appropriate? DON'T POST IT.
Oneliner is displayed on every Necta page, and to the general public. Oneliner is NOT a "free speech zone". Nectarine admins will remove any comments that break these guidelines posted anywhere on this site, without warning, and will remove oneliner privileges from users who repeatedly break the guidelines. This is a demoscene appreciation site and archive, not a general social media platform.
THERE IS ZERO TOLERANCE FOR ABUSE OF OTHER USERS OR STAFF. Hateful words toward users or staff will result in loss of privileges to use the site. There is no trial, tribunal, or appeal. If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all.
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nyingen (Last Updated: 11 months, 1 week) [Top]Q. Why is the 'Search' function so slow??
Search has some major issues due to the underlying framework and code that have not proved easy to fix. In the meantime, use this search page instead, which is much faster:
(Thank you, ers35 for providing this marvellous service!)
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nyingen (Last Updated: 3 years, 7 months) [Top]Q. How does the queue work? How do I queue multiple tunes at once?
1. You can only have one request while there is an active queue; i.e. when other people, including djrandom, are queuing and playing tunes.
2. If nobody else is requesting anything, you may be able to request up to three songs. This is possible when (i) the currently playing song is your own request, and (ii) there is nothing queued by anybody else.
3. Since January 2020, it is only possible to queue one "long" tune at a time. So if you are currently playing a tune that is approx 7 min long or longer, or have one in the queue, you won't be able to queue another such tune until that one has finished playing.
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mirrorbird (Last Updated: 3 years, 7 months) [Top]Q. When are you going to fix <bug>? I want to help! Is there a source code repo?
Nectarine is based on very old versions of Django software and some other libraries, and as such, changing components (for example, to fix the search function) is difficult or even impossible in some cases. Updating the Django version, or changing the site to use Flask or whatever, would involve a lot of tedious unrewarding work and breakage that no one wants to do. As such, the site is basically in maintenance mode now. The infamous "Now Playing" bug is especially frustrating, as it has been very thoroughly investigated and we are still not sure why it occurs.
We are sometimes able to add new features, depending on how much work/breakage would be involved.
Two rewrites of the site into modern technology are in progress, but tend to get worked on in fits and starts as we are all very busy.
There is a github repository for the demovibes codebase, but it is not kept in sync with the actual code used on the Nectarine site. Patches would be welcome, except for the fact that setting up a DV instance of your own is quite difficult and annoying, making it difficult to test code changes.
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nyingen (Last Updated: 11 months, 1 week) [Top]Q. How can I upload a new song?
So, you want to upload a new song? No problems, here some tips on what to do:
1) Check if the song already exists in the Nectarine database. Be careful with soundtrack from demo: sometimes the name of the song is not the same that the name of the demo (e.g.: soundtrack from "Lifeforce" is called "Memento Mori". Please research both, demo name and music file name.) If you are trying to fix an existing tune which has a bad file, see How do I fix an existing tune that has the wrong audio, or needs a better version? and follow the instructions there.
2) Search for the artist in the Nectarine database (Search page)
3) Once you have reached the artist page, you will find a "Upload a new song for the artist" link.
4) Fill the form ([faq]6[/faq] can help)
5) Wait for approval from a moderator. You will receive a PM when a moderator will have checked your upload. If your upload is rejected, you can always ask more information to the moderator who reject your tune.
Note: If the artist of your song does not exist, please look at: Adding a new artist?
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LittleWhite (Last Updated: 11 months, 2 weeks) [Top]Q. Can I have more than one account here? What if I'm an artist who writes tunes under different aliases?
Multiple accounts are highly discouraged.
If you want to change the name on your existing account, contact us. Don't create a new one.
If you're an artist who writes tunes under different names, please use only one user account here for chatting, requesting, voting, etc.
Sockpuppet accounts are not allowed, and will be disabled when detected, with problem users subject to banning.
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nyingen (Last Updated: 3 years, 3 months) [Top]Q. What are the basic upload rules?
Here are some things to keep in mind when you decide to upload a track:
- Do not upload game tunes or game remixes. They will be rejected. This is a demoscene radio.
- We don't need each and every tune of an author, no, not even from Skaven. 
Don't upload whole collections if they vary in quality, just keep the best tracks.
- You can directly upload most formats. If your module is rejected, you need to encode it yourself. See also: Which file formats can I upload?
- When encoding to a lossy codec, use at least 192kbps or higher. See also: [faq]6[/faq]
- Looped tunes have to be faded out after the loop point. Short tunes (shorter than a minute or two) can be looped twice before fading out. Nectarine's streamer can handle module looping. Currently only moderators can enable module looping.
- Check if the tune already exists in our database. Try to use as few keywords as possible when searching, so that you don't miss possible alternative spellings or incomplete song titles.
- Don't upload a tune again if it just needs re-encoding. Get in touch with the moderators to resolve this issue.
- Fill out as many fields as possible. Try to find out the song platform, release year, if it was used in a demo, etc... All this normally doesn't take longer than a few minutes and helps us keeping up the database integrity!
- Cut off silence at the beginning and the end of the tracks. If your source file is MP3, use something like mp3DirectCut to prevent re-encoding (and thus quality loss). When rendering modules in XMPlay, enable the "trim ending silence" option. An alternative to mp3DirectCut is musiCutter - although it just has a very non-visual and basic GUI, it has the advantage that it can also be used to join several files and it also works with Ogg Vorbis.
- Always use the latest version of the player / plugin you're encoding from (f.e. always use the latest version of ASAP to encode POKEY tunes or the latest version of XMPlay to render IT modules) and your encoder (f.e. LAME).
- Do not upload commercial tracks! We need the permission of the original author and if we get it, we only accept commercial tracks by renowned demoscene musicians that are still somewhat related to the demoscene (f.e. Purple Motion's Musicdisk). However, just because a person is an (ex-)demoscener, that does not automatically mean that we want to have all their music from commercial side projects on Nectarine.
All this together can be done in less than 5 minutes and helps us improving the quality of this radio station!
Added by
Saga_Musix (Last Updated: 3 years, 11 months) [Top]Q. Which file formats can I upload?
Any format FFmpeg, BASS, OpenMPT or Hively Tracker support. Here are the most common formats, but by no means everything: mp3, ogg, mp4, aac, flac, opus, xm, mod, s3m, it, mtm, ahx, 669, med, okt, [...]
Wherever possible, upload the original format. For example, always upload the original MOD file for an Amiga MOD rather than a rendered version. Our playback software is not completely perfect, but it is always being improved.
If you must submit a rendered version of a track (for example, if a tune is in a format we cannot play directly), please use FLAC or Ogg/Vorbis at the appropriate bitrate.
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Elrinth (Last Updated: 4 years, 2 months) [Top]Q. How do I fix an existing tune that has the wrong audio, or needs a better version?
First of all, don't create a new song entry by using the "Upload a new tune for this artist" link. That would result in duplicate song pages, something we try to avoid at all costs.
There are two cases:
1) The song you want to fix is a streamrip, and you have the proper song file. On the song page, there should be a little asterisk next to the "Active" song status. Click on this asterisk and you will be taken to a file-upload form. See the FAQs below for which audio formats are supported, if you have any questions.
2) The song you want to fix is not a streamrip, but the song file we have is still not correct. For example, our version has erroneous tracker commands resulting in silence, or has incorrect notes due to file corruption or being a hacked version. In this case, you cannot use the asterisk (because it only appears on streamrips). Contact us on the forum, by PM, or on Discord. Let us know the problem and provide a link to the correct file, and we will replace it.
Added by
nyingen (Last Updated: 11 months, 2 weeks) [Top]Q. I want to upload "missing" game tunes!
Nectarine is a demoscene-music radio. Some tunes were used in games and generally would not qualify here (as opposed to CVGM). For a variety of reasons, though, certain songs like the first module ever (
Amegas [Title]) are already in Nectarine. *New* game tunes are not accepted, unless there is a clear, strong demoscene relationship.
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sqrmax (Last Updated: 4 years) [Top]Q. Hey, why is <Song I Like> rejected when <Song I Don't Like> is accepted?! I demand you accept that other song!
1.There's no good way of going through the database of thousands of songs and making everything consistent all at once. We probably just haven't heard the other tune in a while.
2. 99% of the time, this is not an argument for us to accept the other tune. It's an argument for us to reject them both. "This song that violates site policy is here so I want this other song that violates policy to also be here." 
3. It's much better if you say "this contains too many commercial samples" or is not scene-related or whatever, on the song comment page.
4. If you really think a song that is rejected should be accepted instead, on its own demoscene merits, because you think the song is in fact in line with site policy, please make the argument on the song comments page. We really do listen. Your argument will be stronger if you don't compare it with other tunes.
5. The "whine whine A is accepted so why isn't B accepted" thing gets really old... Please don't do it. 
Added by
nyingen (Last Updated: 3 years, 7 months) [Top]Q. Adding a new artist?
Remember that the artist must be connected to the demoscene (wrote music for a demo, took part in a demoscene music competiton, wrote music for an old demoscene-related game, etc).
Mind also that if you intend to upload some contents of an audio CD created by an artist, you must ask his/her permission.
If the artist doesn't fit our requirements, he might still be suitable for our sister radio CVGM.
Just as before adding a new song, please check that the artist you want to add doesn't exist in the Nectarine database. Sometimes the same artist is using different nicknames: try searching for all of them you know. Especially for MOD artists, AMP is a nice help here.
Once you are completely sure that the artist doesn't exist in the Nectarine database, go to the artist list ("Artists") and scroll to the bottom of the page: there you will see a link to suggest an artist.
Fill in the form, and wait for a moderator to accept or reject your suggestion.
If you are too lazy to go on the artist list, the link is the following: Suggest new artist
Added by
LittleWhite (Last Updated: 3 years, 11 months) [Top]Q. Why are there game tunes on here, then? What's the policy?
The policy on game tunes is in a state of flux, but basically:
0. No further game music remixes will be accepted, no matter who wrote them. This has been a rule for years. 
As for what is already here, we are making efforts to remove irrelevant game tunes and tighten our demoscene focus:
1. Remixes of non-scene-relevant game tunes, for example, Super Mario, Chrono Trigger, and the like, are being aggressively removed. Many stations and websites exist for hearing such tunes, such as OCRemix or CVGM. They don't belong here.
2. Popular tunes from games that originally ran on the C64, Amiga, and early DOS systems are ok, because they often have significant demoscene relevance. Rob Hubbard's game music, for example, was enormously influential in the scene. Tunes like Speedball are considered foundational. BUT...
3. Humdrum tunes from old games are gradually being removed. We do not need the complete soundtrack to every game David Whittaker scored. We are basically going by rating and popularity here, so tunes with a rating of more than about 4.0 stay, and others may be deactivated to avoid filling the stream with obscure and uninteresting game music.
4. Some game tunes by sceners are also being removed, unless they're very popular or have some additional scene relevance, such as being tracked for a game compo at a scene event, or being made using interesting scene tech. By "game compo at a scene event", we mean the "game" category at major scene events like Revision, not a game-music or remix compo. To clarify, if a scene group collaborates on a game during the game compo at Revision, the music for that game may be accepted. But if a scener writes music for a commercial game (including indie, homebrew, shareware, etc), that will probably not be accepted.
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nyingen (Last Updated: 2 years, 11 months) [Top]Q. What do these song statuses mean?
They determine whether the song can be queued and why (or why not).
Songs that can be queued have these statuses:
Active - Everything is okay with this song!
Needs Re-Encoding - This song can be queued, but a better version should be uploaded. Often this means we have a lossy or poorly-rendered MP3 and would like the original file instead.
Songs that cannot be queued have these statuses:
Reported - The song has audio problems – glitches, skips, extra silence or grossly incorrect content – and should be replaced with a new upload ASAP. Please click on the asterisk next to the word "Reported" and submit a replacement, if you have one!
Missing - The tune was not recovered during the reconstruction of the site. If you have a replacement, feel free to submit it by clicking the asterisk next to the status.
Kaput - There is a problem with the actual file we have for the song; usually it means that it is missing (and attempts to request it might fail silently). These tunes are eligible for replacement by clicking on the asterisk next to the status.
Uploaded - This song has just been uploaded and submitted for moderator review. It usually takes us a day or two to review new uploads.
Not verified - Used during mass uploads to indicate songs that still need review.
Removed By Request - This song was removed by the artist's request. If you can no longer see a specific song page, this is the reason.
Inactive - The song is scene-relevant and was accepted into the database, but is currently not eligible to actually be played on the stream – usually it’s because of listener complaints (not necessarily a low rating), for example, over-the-top obscenity, cacophony, or extreme length, to name a few possible reasons. This is not a permanent judgement and such tunes may be re-enabled in the future, depending on user consensus.
Rejected - The song is not really scene-related enough to be played on Nectarine Demoscene Radio.
Moved - The song was moved to an other radio station (CVGM, for example) and is inactive here. This status can also represent an "intention" to move the tune, so if you don't find it on CVGM, feel free to upload it there yourself.
Dupe - This song is a clone of an existing one.
Jingle - This song is a jingle, and thus cannot be requested. Listen to Nectarine long enough, and you'll hear it!
If you see an asterisk (the * symbol) next to any status, this means the song file is eligible for replacement. Clicking on the asterisk will take you to an upload page, which you can use to submit a replacement version. The replacement will be subject to review just like any other upload, so be patient.
Added by
MyO (Last Updated: 3 years, 11 months) [Top]Q. How can I automate making requests?
Please do not do this. Abusing the request system with a script or program will result in your account being deactivated.
Added by
sqrmax (Last Updated: 4 years, 3 months) [Top]Q. How can I help correct duplicated songs, or songs with incorrect/missing information?
Nobody is perfect, and we know that! Our long-suffering song database is definitely not 100% correct. Some information on songs/artists/groups can be missing or corrupted. If you notice any errors, please please please help us correct the song DB!
There are several ways you can reach us quickly:
- You can send a songinfo edit request using the "[Edit information]" link on the song page – one of the moderators will review it quite soon.
- Post in the 
Correct DB Info or Report Broken Tunes Here dedicated threads – we watch them constantly.
- Send an PM to one of the moderators. (Hint: If you hover over a user alias and it says “Staff,” you found a moderator!)
Please do NOT post any song DB errors in the song comments – a helpful forum message will reach us much faster than a song comment!
Please include songinfo proof in your reports/submissions: include a link to the original webpage / source where the information can be found, or a description of how to find the correct information.
Thank you very much for supporting Nectarine, and keep sceneing!
Added by
MyO (Last Updated: 4 years, 2 months) [Top]Q. I want to download that tune!
Some songs have download links in their info or profile (usually through Soundcloud, Pouet.net or other sources).
Many tracks are missing download links. However, you can search for them on such websites as Modland, Modarchive, Amiga Music Preservation, Remix64, Remix.kwed.org and elsewhere online.
Speaking of that – please help us improve song information to make sure everybody gets it!
If you've found a good download link, you can use the "Edit Information" link that is on every song page to submit the download link. Please put the download link in the Comment field (not the Info field!).
Added by
Saga_Musix (Last Updated: 4 years, 11 months) [Top]Q. Do you have some hints about how to use tags?
Tags should be used to group songs that cannot be queried in any other way. So, for example, using tags to aggregate songs by the same group, or by the same artist, or for some platform doesn't make sense. Similarly, demo name tags shouldn't be used. Be mindful that tags cannot have spaces. And search for existing tags before adding new ones. It's not cool to add "DOS", "MSDOS" and "MS-DOS".
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sqrmax (Last Updated: 4 years, 3 months) [Top]Q. Where can I change my flag?
You can change your flag by going into the menu called 'Edit My profile' located at the top right of the webpage.
The flags code is a 2 characters code, that is corresponding to this table: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_3166-1_alpha-2#Officially_assigned_code_elements
Flags are intended to show your real-world location or home country. If you don't want to advertise your location, that's fine; you don't have to set a flag at all.
Use of flags for political purposes, such as setting your flag to that of a country which is having a dispute with another country to "show support", is not allowed here.
Added by
nyingen (Last Updated: 3 years, 3 months) [Top]Q. I heard that there are some flags which are not mentioned in ISO 3166...
Yes, there are some. 
Some country codes are available for countries which do not appear in the list mentioned above or for those who want to look cool:
eu
fam (uses the colors of famfamfam site)
wales
england
scotland
catalonia
Mind that for these codes you need to use the name which is placed by the flag, not any abbreviation (example: if you need Catalonian flag, type "catalonia" in the Country code input field).
(from the profile of 
Koekkenbakker – now defunct, sadly)
Added by
MyO (Last Updated: 4 years, 11 months) [Top]Q. Where can I find a current list of all smileys?
The list of smileys can be found on this page. Have fun
Added by
LittleWhite (Last Updated: 4 years, 6 months) [Top]Q. Where can I find a list of all BBCode commands, along with examples?
You will find the list of tags in this thread: BBCode and Smilies
Added by
LittleWhite (Last Updated: 4 years, 11 months) [Top]Q. Did you know that... ?
- You can see user's role
If you move your mouse over user link such as this 
Danger, you can see if it's "user", "staff" or "admin".
- You can connect user's profile with artist's
Just contact any moderator to do it for you!:)
- Stream is down songs:
1: They Stole a Million
2: Forbidden Forest (Spider Surfin')
- Various bits of information:
Statistics: 
NerdN.
More statistics: 
Phlubby_Gnome.
Even more statistics: sqrmax.
Emoticons, oneliner info, bits of history: Koekenbakker.
More info: Terrasque.
Assorted photos: Elrinth.
Nectarine banners: 
maep.
Added by
Danger (Last Updated: 4 years) [Top]Q. I wanna chat! Is there an IRC channel or similar?
When Nectarine was shut down in 2018, a Discord server was created as an alternative gathering place. As of 2020, a few people frequent it, and it's probably a good place to look in case of some sort of outage. https://discord.gg/64sxyRjd7y
For those who prefer secure, decentralised chat via completely open-source software, Nyingen runs #nectarine:matrix.org.
There is (was?) an IRC channel on EsperNET, #necta, but it is no longer being maintained as far as I am aware. The old #nectarine channel is defunct, or at least, not run by the current site staff. Neither channel is likely to be useful in the event of a site outage or other problems, but you could try, I guess.
Added by
Saga_Musix (Last Updated: 1 year, 9 months) [Top]Q. Is there an API for Necta?
Sort of. Check out Necta Web API for more details.
Added by
Starchaser (Last Updated: 4 years, 11 months) [Top]Q. What to do when song information is wrong?
Please use the "Edit Information" link that you can find on each song page allowing you to change various stuff. The changes have to be approved afterwards by a moderator. If you edit a song multiple times in a row without approvement by a moderator in between, make sure to do all changes you did everytime again.
The Link "Add Links" allows you to add various additional links as Youtube, Spotify, CVGM, CSDb,...
After adding links, these have to get approved by a moderator.
For things you can't do with these two links please use the thread Correct DB Info to post the wanted changes and link to the track.
Added by
anni (Last Updated: 4 years, 2 months) [Top]Q. How can I add or change artists to a tune, or edit artist info?
If you want to change the artist on a given track or want to add a second (or third,...) artist to a track:
Open the song page, click on the "Edit Information" Link and select the artist(s) in the dropdown box. If you want to select multiple, hold down the "Control" or "Command" key on your keyboard.
After selecting them click on "Submit Data" and wait for a moderator to approve the changes.
If you want to change the info of an artist (e.g. changing country or name), please use this thread and give the needed information. It will then be added/fixed by a moderator.
Added by
anni (Last Updated: 3 years) [Top]Q. HE MAN? Confirmasse? AMIGAAAA? What the hell does it mean?
Ah, I see you wish to get a glimpse of the demoscene catchphrases and references. =) Ask the locals in the Oneliner – they’ll gladly enlighten you.
Most of these are popular silly sayings or references to other songs, such as 
He-Man. And we really love Amiga for reasons.
If you wish to learn even more, you might try skimming through the Enlighten the ignorant newbie, perhaps? thread on the Pouet.net BBS.
Added by
MyO (Last Updated: 4 years, 11 months) [Top]Q. How do I get a gold star?
It has to be awarded by an admin.
Added by
Starchaser (Last Updated: 4 years) [Top]Q. What happened to the old Nectarine?
Originally, Nectarine was coded and maintained by Chris "Yes" Le Sage, the platform was resurrected several times after hard disk failures. In mid-2008, a script kiddie decided to hack the last incarnation of Yes' work, Nectarine v6, abusing a security hole in one of its components. That way, the whole server was wiped out. Sadly, Yes' backup HDD also died a few days before this, so all backups were lost. Luckily, most of the data from the HDD could be restored by professionals, however this only includes the song database. Additionally, after this incident, Yes decided not to work on Nectarine anymore. After changing hands a few more times, the site was shut down in 2018, apparently due to a dispute between the administrator and some users. The current site is run by a team of co-administrators.
If you had an account on a previous incarnation of Nectarine, and would like it reactivated, contact an administrator. Don't make a new one just yet!
Added by
Saga_Musix (Last Updated: 11 months, 1 week) [Top][Back To Top]