On Tue, 17 Dec 2024 09:28:29 +0100 Kristian Amlie <krist...@amlie.name> wrote:
>I recently bought myself a Zynthian (Open Synth Platform with a >Raspberry Pi inside), and I'm trying to integrate Yoshimi with it. So >far it's going pretty well (you saw my LV2 fix the other day, Will), and >things are working and playing fine. > >But one issue I've bumped into is with channels. The way that the >platform works is that you load LV2 presets (a Yoshimi state file, >basically) for each instrument you load in their Zynthian UI [1]. This >works well as long as I'm playing on channel 1. But each track that I >add on the device (they are called "chains"), uses a new channel by >default, and if I load Yoshimi on a track which is not set to channel 1, >then the MIDI messages will go to a disabled Yoshimi part, since the >state file will only contain the instrument in the first part. > >There are several ways that this could be handled, but I'm a bit unsure >which one is the best. > >1. Make an exception in the Zynthian software to always convert to >channel 1 before sending to the plugin. Zynthian already has such hacks >for some plugins, so such exceptions are not unheard of. Still, I don't >really like this approach; it feels nonstandard, and I also think it >will be difficult to maintain because of [2]. > >2. Load the same instrument into all 16 parts, and save that in the >state file, so that at least one of them will play after loading it. >This uses 16 times the memory, which is especially bad for Padsynth >patches. It's also bad because if you bring up the UI to actually edit >the patch (possible by using remote connection), then it's very >confusing which one you have to edit. And if you save it, it won't even >be loaded correctly if you add it to a track with a different channel >next time! To fix that you'd have to manually copy it 15 times! > >3. Make a special "Omni" mode for Yoshimi, where the part that has it >enabled reacts to messages from all channels (for example it could be >channel 0). I think this is the one I like the best. > >4. Something else I'm overlooking? I have a quite poor understanding of >the Solo mode in the Mixer, for example. Is there anything to harvest here? > > >Footnotes: > >[1] You can't load an instrument directly, it has to be a state file. >I'm planning to make a script to quickly convert the existing banks into >state files. Alternatively, you can load the instruments using the >regular Yoshimi UI, and save it as a preset on the device, but this will >take ages for all the banks. > >[2] Even if I finish all this, I don't think I will aim for integrating >Yoshimi into their platform as an offering. There isn't enough value for >them since they already have ZynAddSubFX, and there are very few Yoshimi >instruments that are truly Yoshimi-only. So I'm simply aiming for >"possible to install" support, for people such as myself who prefer >Yoshimi despite ZynAddSubFX being available. This means that adding >Yoshimi specific code fixes is something they will probably be reluctant >to do, and I don't blame them. More likely I will aim for having an >install layer somewhere, which gives you simple instructions on how to >install it yourself, if you already have one of their units. > My first thought is that you should be able to set part 1 to look at channel 2 (or any other), and this would be saved in the state file. I use this frequently when running standalone. Have you tried that? Also I'm wonder what affect all of this will have on Vectors or MIDI-Learn. I've never tried either with LV2. If an 'Omni' option is the way to go, then I think an extension to Solo would be the simplest route - it already does quite a bit of channel/part manipulation. Finally, are you running the basic Yoshimi LV2 or Yoshimi multi? Andrew and I had quite a lot of discussion about that, but I'm afraid I've almost completely forgotten it all, so can't say if it's relevant :( -- Will J Godfrey _______________________________________________ Yoshimi-devel mailing list Yoshimi-devel@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/yoshimi-devel
