Re: [Rosegarden-user] Any way to continue a song with different studio?
On 4/26/19 7:57 AM, Sami Jumppanen wrote: The problem is how to continue with old songs made for the two-port studio setup? There are at least these possibilities: 1. Settings: always use default studio when opening songs. That option came about when I raised these same issues with the original developers. Device configuration should be detached from sequencer work, it makes very little sense anyway. Firstly mixing the terms device and port. One MIDI port can feed many devices (synthesizers) by daisy chaining (or other splitters/processors), so it's not rational to think about a MIDI port as a "device". I raised such arguments with the original developers. Part of the solution to understanding what they were thinking with this design is to understand what "device," "port," and "instrument" mean within Rosegarden's framework. My attempt to explain this to users was the foundation that developed into the book I wrote. Rosegarden was originally trying to pretend there was no such thing as a "port." It was supposed to be a more friendly model that abstracted certain concepts and hid them from the user for ease of use, or something like that. It's fair to say I disagreed with it philosophically, but by the time I arrived on the scene, it was well established. In the years since, I pretty much just learned to deal with it. I haven't thought about this in so long I'm not in a good position to explain it now. I'm pretty sure the explanation I wrote back then in about 2004 is available on the wiki somewhere. Just to be able to send MIDI out, I need to define a device, but defining a device requires defining patches as well. That's a problem I was trying to address with the all-numbers.rgd and raw-numbers.rgd contained in the collection of devices that ships with Rosegarden. I'd say their usefulness in the real world has been less than I would have hoped. At this point in the game, I definitely have no interest in rearranging a model that has been in place for 20 years, and I have had similar problems working on old files with other software. I mostly work with audio now, and I mostly use REAPER on Windows. At one point, I doubled the size of my recording rig and rearranged what microphones were connected to which inputs. If I load files from before that change, everything is hooked up incorrectly, so if I want to go in and record new material, I have to spend some time making adjustments manually. When I load old files into Rosegarden, everything is hooked up incorrectly, and I usually just spend some time making adjustments manually. I think the bottom line is that working with old files in anything comes with a set of issues you just have to deal with. With that being said, one of the tools I have used is to go hack the XML manually. I have occasionally managed to cut XML out of this file and paste it into that file without breaking things. I'm curious if other users have come up with better solutions than mine over the years. If I was an expert once, I'm certainly no longer an expert. I haven't thought about these problems in years. I definitely feel your pain here. This is exactly the issue that sucked me into contributing to this project, and eventually resulted in my becoming a developer here. A frustrated, burnt-out, retired developer who didn't achieve most of his goals, I might add. This stuff is hard. That's why I pay somebody else to write the software now, and even then. -- D. Michael McIntyre ___ Rosegarden-user mailing list Rosegarden-user@lists.sourceforge.net - use the link below to unsubscribe https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/rosegarden-user
[Rosegarden-user] Any way to continue a song with different studio?
Hi, I'm having problems with my changed hardware synth studio (physical MIDI ports) and continuing the old songs. I have found and tried different ways to migrate songs to new studio, but none of them seem to work well or at all. I did not find anything specific from bug tracker with the word "studio". The status: I have defined a new studio and naturally saved the latest correct setup as the default studio. Works fine when starting new songs. My old studio had two MIDI ports (IN + OUT) and now I have the old two plus 8 new. The old ports are not connected, it is better to connect everything to the new USB MIDI 8x8 interface for it's internal routing (playing something without computer). The problem is how to continue with old songs made for the two-port studio setup? There are at least these possibilities: 1. Settings: always use default studio when opening songs. 2. Open the old song and then import a new studio from a newer RG file. 3. Import song to the default empty studio project. 4. Import MIDI file to the default empty studio project. 5. Open the new studio (template) AND the old song and copy segments from the old song to the new? No, seems the segments cannot be copied between songs. I think I managed to use the option 1 yesterday, but then the studio only included two devices: they were named like the old devices, but one of them was connected to the the first port of my new MIDI interface. Only one port was correct, and all the other ports were missing from the new studio. Option 4 works (when I first open the old song "as is" with the old studio and export it to MIDI file), but it naturally loses segments. As a bonus, all the unused tracks are cleared, so I lose my studio template. The other options either crash or leave me with one port of the new MIDI device. Something like this. Device configuration should be detached from sequencer work, it makes very little sense anyway. Firstly mixing the terms device and port. One MIDI port can feed many devices (synthesizers) by daisy chaining (or other splitters/processors), so it's not rational to think about a MIDI port as a "device". Just to be able to send MIDI out, I need to define a device, but defining a device requires defining patches as well. I know I could begin with GM set and live with it or rename patches as I go along. And I eventually created some banks, for my drum machine and two synths, but they are tied to MIDI ports I no longer use. I have them in my new studio but the new studio cannot be used for old songs. If we could have the MIDI port (from a list of ports visible to ALSA) selection in the track settings. Also, *if* the selected device matches a predefined bank of patch names, those settings could be used. If no settings are found, so what? Just display patch numbers. I understand that the MIDI device world is not consistent with number of patches and all the bank selections and whatnot. 128 programs is, however, a standard by the MIDI program change. What I like in Rosegarden is how the sequencer really works: it sends note OFFs correctly when I stop it, and it even sends note ONs when I press start in the middle of the notes. Not all DAWs do this. The lack of features or problems just weigh quite much, and I hate I cannot do anything really, no programming nor spend time for "trying things out", not in this part of my life. I do want to create a more accurate step by step report on the song / studio import problems if those are not widely known. I'm quite as messed up with these issues as my post here is :D Thanks. -- Sami Jumppanen http://netti.nic.fi/some-e ___ Rosegarden-user mailing list Rosegarden-user@lists.sourceforge.net - use the link below to unsubscribe https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/rosegarden-user
