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Various questions/feature requests
Hi Rui,
Could you let me know on the below whenever you have time, please? There's no rush for any of them.
1) MIDI CONTROLLER DATA - AUTOMATIC SLOPES
Is there any way to draw in a continuous "slope" of data in the bottom pane of the MIDI Editor window? By this I mean you choose start/end points and Qtractor fills in the values in between automatically (spaced as per Snap/beat setting). I think Rosegarden allows you to do this, but I haven't used it for ages so am not sure.
I know you can draw a line of events freehand, but for long crescendos/diminuendos it'd be nice to have a continuous slope determined automatically. I also realise that you can achieve this with automation nodes, but I'd prefer to have the data contained within the midi file for export, if possible, so that people can use it in other DAWs.
If such a "slope" feature doesn't already exist, would you consider a (non-urgent) feature request?
2) MIDI CONTROLLER DATA - SLIGHT MISALIGNMENT
When drawing freehand as per the above, there seems to be a gap between the first point and all subsequent points. Is there a reason for this, or is it a minor bug? The attached freehandDrag.png shows what I mean (FYI, it was taken with Beat/64). I don't think this used to occur - I think it's something that may have appeared in recent months.
Similar to this, when dragging the mouse quickly, fewer points are drawn - e.g. if you set Qtractor to Beat/64 then drag quickly, the number of points will be far less than 64. Is this a feature or a bug?
3) AUTOMATION - DRAGGING MULTIPLE NODES
As I discovered from another post here, you can Shift/Ctrl-click to drag multiple automation nodes left/right. Is there any way to drag them up/down? This would be very handy for changing the overall level etc. of an automated passage in one go. Again, if this feature doesn't exist, would you consider adding it at some point?
4) "VALUE TYPE" SHORTCUTS
Would it be possible to add shortcut keys for "Value type" (Note Velocity, Controller, Pitch Bend etc. info) in the MIDI Editor please? I switch between these all the time and a shortcut would improve my workflow no end. The addition of the Snap/beat shortcuts via another post here was great for me and this would be a further improvement.
Ideally, shortcuts would cover "Parameter type" too, but as there are 128 of these I'm not sure if that's viable (though they obviously don't need to be assigned default shortcuts). Perhaps "Note type" could also be added for completeness, though there are only 2 of these so it's not a big issue.
Thanks as ever for your time and efforts.
| Attachment | Size |
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 freehandDrag.png | 1.12 KB |
re. Various questions/feature requests
1) MIDI CONTROLLER DATA - AUTOMATIC SLOPES
Is there any way to draw in a continuous "slope" of data in the bottom pane of the MIDI Editor window?
yes there is. however it only applies to current selected events and on non-freehand drawing mode (ie. Edit/Select Mode/Edit On), on whether ../Edit Draw (free-hand pencial switch) is:
a. OFF: click+drag will draw a straight line over the event-value bars view (ie. lower pane), being suitable to draw perfect linear value ramps;
b. ON: click+drag will draw free-hand over and capping the same selected events;
again, note that it only affects current selected events and nothing else.
2) MIDI CONTROLLER DATA - SLIGHT MISALIGNMENT
there seems to be a gap between the first point and all subsequent points. Is there a reason for this, or is it a minor bug?
that's obviously not a bug but rather some kinda mouse gesture acquisition effect, or better said, it copes with how fast and precise you want your mouse pointer click+drag movement to be: rule is, i'm afraid you cannot have both :) you either do it slow and precise or fast and gross ;)
one other thing is that a mouse click+drag gesture is detected to start only after you drag it over a few pixels around, often a 2..4px displacement from first click point, so you'll certainly will get this equivalent gap in the drawing alond the timeline, especially on smaller snap-to-beat settings and greater zoom-out levels.
3) AUTOMATION - DRAGGING MULTIPLE NODES
Is there any way to drag them up/down?
no. dragging of selected automation nodes do only work horizontally. you can however double-click on one single node en have a value entry field (a spin-box) to change its vale, but yeah, it's not what you asked.
4) "VALUE TYPE" SHORTCUTS
Would it be possible to add shortcut keys for "Value type" (Note Velocity, Controller, Pitch Bend etc. info) in the MIDI Editor please?
maybe. will have to make it brand new menu trees for that, just like the View/Snap/... ones have been imposed years before. as a matter o fact maybe a couple of new menu items should enter the scene: View/Note Type/... and then the one you actually request: View/Value Type/... aha. it could well be one nice holiday project don't you think? ;)
hth.
cheers
re. Various questions/feature requests
Thanks very much for the reply.
1) MIDI CONTROLLER DATA - AUTOMATIC SLOPES
Ah, I see! It took me a while to work this out but I have it now. Basically,
- Edit on and Edit Draw on
- draw series of events
- Edit off
- select events
- Edit on, Edit Draw off
- drag line over events
I'd seen that broken line before but couldn't for the life of me work out what it did :-)
2) MIDI CONTROLLER DATA - SLIGHT MISALIGNMENT
The screenshot was actually taken with me drawing very slowly, but your "detected to start only after you drag it over a few pixels" comment answers the question. Perhaps I didn't see the gap earlier as I was using bigger intervals or something.
3) AUTOMATION - DRAGGING MULTIPLE NODES
OK, thanks for the info anyway. If you do end up adding this at some point in the future it'd be very welcome.
4) "VALUE TYPE" SHORTCUTS
Thanks for considering this. Again, if you do get chance to add it in the future that'd be great.
Will document 1) and 3) in the wiki.
re. Various questions/feature requests
1) MIDI CONTROLLER DATA - AUTOMATIC SLOPES
you don't really need to set Edit off to select a group of elements, you can certainly use shift/ctrl+click and drag a lasso or rubber-band over the events to (un)select as usual and that applies to all modes.
hth.
cheers && thanks
re. Various questions/feature requests
Thanks for the tip. That makes it much quicker :-)
re. Various questions/feature requests
4) "VALUE TYPE" SHORTCUTS
done. on todays git head master aka qtractor v0.7.2.5+
http://sourceforge.net/p/qtractor/code/ci/db65d1
https://github.com/rncbc/qtractor/commit/db65d18
please test && tell
cheers
4) "VALUE TYPE" SHORTCUTS
Thanks very much for this. It's really helping my workflow and will hopefully do so for others. The addition of "Parameter type" shortcuts would make it even better, but as mentioned above there are loads of these so I'm not sure if you'd want to go that far.
In any case, the shortcuts themselves appear to be working fine, but there's an issue with the associated "Parameter type", in that it doesn't update correctly. For example:
- For the Value type default of "Note Velocity", Parameter type will be a greyed-out musical note (e.g. "7 - G-1") [no particular problem]
- If you use a shortcut to switch to a Value type which has an accompanying Parameter type (Controller, RPN, NRPN, Control 14), the Parameter type info will not update, giving you a combination of "Controller" and "7 - G-1", which doesn't make sense
- It seems that, even though the menu is labelled incorrectly, the controller information in the lower pane of the MIDI Editor will be correct. For example, for "Controller", "7 - G-1" will actually correspond to "7 - Volume (coarse)"
- Selecting a different Parameter type with the mouse doesn't fix the problem, but selecting a different Value type does
In addition, it's not related to this issue but I've just discovered that it's possible to set shortcuts which throw an error in the Messages pane, such as QAction::eventFilter: Ambiguous shortcut overload: C. In my case, I have "C" assigned to the Connections window in the general shortcuts, which seems to be what's causing the error. Should there be a check for such overloads, with a dialogue box displayed for the user (anyone who doesn't have the Messages pane displayed wouldn't know what's happening)? This only seems to occur with the same key assigned in the two shortcut menus, as if you try to assign the same key within the same menu Qtractor will correctly warn "Keyboard shortcut (x) already assigned".
4) "VALUE TYPE" SHORTCUTS
oops. sorry for the little inconveniences :) probable fix is under way to git head master aka qtractor v0.7.2.8+
http://sourceforge.net/p/qtractor/code/ci/9a3c4c
https://github.com/rncbc/qtractor/commit/9a3c4c5
re. shortcuts which throw an error in the Messages pane
i'm afraid there's not much we can do about that--the warning message is emitted by Qt framework itself to stderr which in this case falls outside of application programming control. the cases where it might happen are often the ones you set a keyboard shortcut on the MIDI clip editor that is already assigned to the main application window already, especially on the main Transport menu commands.
hth.
cheers
4) "VALUE TYPE" SHORTCUTS
sorry for the little inconveniences :)
On the contrary, thanks for helping out with my various requests :-) Just checked this and it seems to be working now, which is great.
re. shortcuts which throw an error in the Messages pane
OK, no problem. Will mention this in the wiki next time I update it in case it catches anyone out.
Sorry to keep hassling you, but just to check on one more related issue, which happens with either shortcut or mouse - if you switch Value type between Controller and Note velocity, your selected Parameter type will be correctly saved/restored. For example, if you have Controller/"7 - Volume (coarse)", then switch to Note velocity, then switch back to Controller, Controller 7 will be restored. If, however, you switch from Controller to Pitch Bend or Chan Press, then back to Controller, Parameter type will reset to "0 - Bank Select (coarse)", meaning that you have to select it again. This seems to be because Pitch Bend/Chan Press have completely blank Parameter types, while others have either active or greyed-out ones.
Would it be at all possible to store the Parameter type even if the user switches to Pitch Bend/Chan Press? If so it'd be very helpful.
re. store the Parameter type
not atm. sorry again.
happy holiday season
cheers
re. store the Parameter type
OK, no problem. It's a pity as it's quite fiddly, but I'll live with it. And all the best to you and your family for the festive period.
Midi Step Recording
Not sure if this feature exists and I'm just missing it or it doesn't exist. "Back in the day" I used Studio Vision Pro which had a great step recording feature; You would select your quantization (say 1/16 notes) push record then play in the notes off your controller. If you wanted a rest you would push space. Holding shift would tie the note.
This worked great for building drum tracks as well as getting out all my crazy ideas.
Any chance something along these lines can make it's way into Qtractor?
Thanks!
EL
re. Midi Step Recording
there's two feature you can try to have something like what you ask:
1) main menu's MIDI Clip/Record, or MIDI clip editor's menu File/Record, to set overdub recording mode;
2) View/Options.../MIDI/Capture Quantize, to set MIDI record quantization (eg. Beat/4 = 1/16 notes);
hth.
cheers
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