Fwd: Re: [linux-audio-dev] XAP: Pitch control

[Nathaniel Virgo]

On Thursday 12 December 2002 9:33 pm, David Olofson wrote:
> On Thursday 12 December 2002 21.25, Nathaniel Virgo wrote:
> > Basically what I'm saying is that the note_pitch idea goes some way
> > towards making scales work, but not all the way,
>
> The issues you have described are based on the assumption that there
> is such a thing as "global music theory". Well, there is *not*, as
> far as I'm concerned.

No, no, I was trying to point out that there isn't.  I do agree with what 
you're saying here, which is why I joined in on this thread in the first 
place.

> > and I think it's
> > going to keep making things more and more complicated when they
> > could be really simple if we just said "if it can be done in linear
> > pitch then fine, otherwise let the sequencer handle it."
>
> No. It's as simple as "Don't mix scale oriented plugins with scales
> they don't understand." No API support required, whatsoever.

I suppose.  I'm still worried about user interface complexity though:

[from a different mail]
> You're forgetting that a distinction between note pitch and linear
> pitch makes hosts aware of the difference, and thus, allows them to
> keep track of which pitch data is in what format. That is, it's
> possibly to guide users of scale converters quite a bit, while other
> users don't even have to know about the excistence of scale
> converters.

I don't really understand how this hiding is going to take place.  Especially 
if there's going to be non-standard scale converters about that that need to 
take MIDI pitch bend as well as note_pitch, I can forsee users being 
perplexed by confusing networks of plugins when all they really want to do is 
apply some portamento or vibrato.  This situation would be doubly bad if 
implicit casting was allowed.

It's not the complexity of the API that I'm worried about, it's the 
complexity of the graphs that will be needed to accomplish sometimes quite 
trivial tasks.

Everything else you said is a good point, so basically I more-or-less agree 
with you again now -- but I'd still like to see the outline of an algorithm 
whereby, with or without the use of a complex system of hints, a host can 
make all this reasonably transparent to the user.