Re: [iiwusynth-devel] Pitch bend, filter, sysex, LADSPA,...

[Josh Green]

On Sat, 2002-04-06 at 17:01, Peter Hanappe wrote:
> On Sat, 2002-04-06 at 23:39, Josh Green wrote:
> > On Sat, 2002-04-06 at 15:59, Peter Hanappe wrote:
> > > On Sat, 2002-04-06 at 18:11, M. Nentwig wrote:
> > >
> > > > I have written a small perl-Tk script, that shows a couple of sliders in
> > > > a window, which allow real-time control of effect parameters (chorus,
> > > > reverb, overdrive,...)
> > > > This is not included, but if anybody would like to try, I can make a
> > > > 'bundle' (soundfont, plugins, script).
> > > 
> > > A GUI interface would be great. I think that's what's really needed now
> > > to make the synth get a wide acceptance (eye candy).
> > > 
> > 
> > Swami? :)
> 
> Yes, Swami, off course. 
> 
> But it would be nice to extend it with a compact interface with many
> sliders so you can control a lot of parameters easily. Also, I'd like to
> see an interface with sliders and knobs build from images so it can be
> designed by a graphics designer. Call them skins if you like. People
> coming from Windows and Macintosh are used to these interfaces and I
> must say I sometimes like them.
> 

Yeah, I've been thinking about this a lot lately actually. I could make
a nice layout widget in GTK that would allow the placement and sizing of
boxes that contain controls. If this was just a generic container
widget, you could put anything you wanted inside it. It could be a
pixmap based control for instance (for the knobs and stuff you
mentioned). I think Paul Davis has done some graphic controls for his
programs. Perhaps a peek at that would give some nice ideas (although
its C++ for gtkmm). Neat things could be implimented, like drag and drop
of generator items from the Generator view list to a control window
where it could be positioned and resized.

I've been seriously starting to think about extending Swami beyond just
a sound font editor. To be more of a real time composition tool. I have
trouble using track or piano roll based MIDI sequencers, when really
what I want to do is try and compose things in real time. With loops and
algorithms and the like. I've thought in the past that this should be
the job of other programs. But I'm realizing that the closer bound the
sequencing program is the more it could control the synth patches, etc.

> 
> 
> BTW: I installed swami yesterday. Everything compiled fine (had to copy
> ltconfig to the swami directory, also autoconf doesn't check for an
> installed libsoundfont) but had some troubles when running it. I fiddled
> with it a bit, doing nothing in particular, and then opened a sf2 file
> after which it crashed. I didn't take the time yet to check it out in
> detail. 
> 

Markus Nentwig also had this problem. Its a bug that only occurs when
you don't have any config files written yet (written apon exiting the
program). So just start Swami up and exit once. Then things should work
after that. I've fixed it, but not committed to CVS yet.

> It's about time to work on the swami+iiwusynth integration now that the
> DSP part of the synth has improved a lot (thanks Markus!).
> 

Yes yes :) I thought it would be good to make a list of things to
accomplish before LinuxTag. Here is what I'm doing:

- More editing operations (Paste, New Item) and improve item properties
widget (not yet in CVS)
- Sound font saving (some things to do in libsoundfont)
- Audio file loading (needs GUI interface, but implimented in libswami)
- Impliment more GUI interface synchronization to libswami sound font
tree
- Real time controls for generator effects
- Real time setting of sample loop points?
- Squash bugs


Major things missing that I probably won't get around to before
LinuxTag:
- Sound font item locking (in theory there are some multi-thread issues
with iiwusynth and Swami even now, that might bite when doing extensive
editing operations while the sfloader is doing stuff).
- Undo support


So for iiwusynth it would be cool to:
- Implement an API for controlling generator effects in real time
(including sample loop point control)
- Add a function to the sfloader to notify when a iiwu_sample_t is no
longer being used (so it can be managed)

Cheers.
        Josh Green