When the DAD application has started one will see five buttons across the top of the screen with the clock in the center. Along the bottom will be six Priority Play buttons. The center area can be considered the 'desktop' of DAD where one can open various machines. 

There are two icons on the left side. The trash can which is used for deleting cuts from the Library or from a Playlist. Next to the trash can is a Machine Section icon. When one selects the icon for the Machine Select window in the upper left corner next to the trash can one will see a larger screen version of this icon. Here users can click on a machine icon to open and display this to open that respective machine.  

To select a machine users double left click on the desktop to open the Machine Select window.  When one selects the desired machine it will open for use. 

Machine icons and the Machine Select window

When one double clicks on the DAD Desktop or uses the small Machine selection icon, a larger screen version will appear. This displays all of the machines one can select for use in DAD. The icons are as follows.

The first row of icons represent Record Decks number one through number four.

The second row represents the four Playback Decks.

The third row will allows one to select Mini-Array 1, Mini-Array 2, the QUAD deck and the Script Machine.

The bottom row selections are, Mini-Playlist Modify & Library, 4PLAY, MasterLog and AirPLAY.

The DAD Library contains all of the cuts for the system as a whole. These cuts could be audio files, rotate cuts or command cuts.  The information for each cut is saved in a database.  Once a cut has been entered into the system, it is immediately available to any other workstation on the network.  

By default, cuts are saved in the CUTS database and directory.  The library database allows users to have up to 99,999 cuts. The cut number will always be a five-digit number and duplicate numbers cannot exist in the same library.

Playing and Editing cuts in the Library

	To play a cut in the Library, simply select the cut and press the PLAY button. To stop the cut, press the button again.
	To EDIT the cut, select the cut and press EDIT. This will open the cut into the DAD Editor. The Editor allows for one to see the waveform of the audio file and place markers such as Head / Tail, for the start and end of the cut along with markers such as Segue as the Segue Head starts the next cut in a playlist.

Modifying database information

	One can select a cut and press the Modify button in the bottom center of the Library. This opens the Modify screen displaying all information about this cut. Here one can update the Title or any other field.
	To save any changes press Save and Stay to keep the Modify screen open or Save and Close to save and exit the Modify screen.

Recording a New Cut

To begin the recording process, press the Next Recording bar in the center of the Record machine. The data fields will turn from blue to white. When the fields are white, users can enter information into the fields.

DAD will automatically enter a Cut number for you to use. If one would like to use a different number, enter it into the CUT field. All cuts entered into DAD use a five-digit number. The Record Deck will assume zeros for a cut entered with less than five digits. For example if a user enters ‘50’, DAD will automatically enter the cut as ‘00050’.  

After a number has been entered, users can Accept, Cancel or Append.

Pressing Accept will create a new entry into the Library database with the cut number entered.   

Pressing Cancel will clear the Record Deck.

Append is used to add audio to an existing audio cut. The new audio will be recorded at the very tail end of the existing cut.  

	After making a selection such as Accept, pressing REC will cause the button to flash. This can be considered a Record Ready state. Users can check input levels and make any adjustments necessary.
	To begin recording, press the PLAY button (while REC is flashing). STOP will stop the recording or playback.
	EDIT enables you to perform a variety of editing functions on material immediately after recording it.

Producers should get into the habit of pressing the UNLOAD button after they have recorded their file. Unload will clear the currently loaded cut from the record deck. This helps prevent accidental erasing or re-recording of an existing audio file.  

Adding cut via the CD Ripper

To Rip cuts into DAD, from the Library screen one would press ADD then press the CD Ripper button. 

The CD Ripper can be a quick and easy method of adding audio files to the library. The resulting cut can automatically be encoded with either MPEG Layer2 or kept in its default PCM16 format. Users can also have the audio file normalized to a defined value.

	To use the Ripper, place an audio CD into the CD Rom of the physical computer.
	Open the Ripper screen and select the tracks one want to extract. The checkbox will become green with a check.
	Next, select the FIRST track you want to rip. Enter the Cut number for this cut into the CUTID field. Add the Title if necessary and verify both the Location in the LOC field and the audio format in the FORMAT filed.
	Once this has been done one MUST press UPDATE SELECTION. This will update that cut and will automatically generate Cut numbers for each of the selected tracks.
	At this point one can either press BEGIN RIPPING to start the ripping process or one can select the second track to be ripped and repeat the above process. In this case one might only need to update the Title. Again, one should press UPDATE SELECTION to update the data before one rips.

Creating and saving a Playlist:

To create a simple playlist, users can drag and drop audio files from the Library into Playback machine 1.

To save the playlist, right click on the PLAYLIST bar and select Save Playlist. Enter a name and press SAVE. 

To LOAD a saved Playlist, click the PLAYLIST bar and select the desired playlist from the screen. To UNLOAD a Playlist, click the PLAYLIST bar and select UNLOAD.

Note: Users can also perform Load and Unload from the right click menu.