[LAD] jack transport vs. MIDI for control

Len Ovens len at ovenwerks.net
Sun Jul 27 16:32:05 UTC 2014


As refered to earlier, I am working on an app to use a standard computer 
keyboard for DAW (or other) control. I have started with actkbd and am 
moving from there. actkbd remains fully usable, but I have added things to 
make it useful for control of DAW apps. My first attempt at jackd 
interface was to allow keys to control the jack transport. The actions I 
set up are:
roll
stop
zero
forward 1 sec (48kframes)
forward 10 seconds (480Kframes)
back 1 sec
back 10 sec

Because of how actkbd is set up, the key use for these is fully 
configurable. I have been using the numeric keypad:
Enter = roll
0 = stop
+ = forward
+ repeat = fast forward
etc.

The repeat can be used or ignored. In the future I would like to set up 
the forward and back so the user can configure the number of frames rather 
than having just two choices, but I am more interested in proving the 
concept first.

My next thing is to set up (jack)MIDI out (the port shows on the graph so 
far :)

However, while testing this (with ardour as happens), I am wondering about 
the merrits of using jack transport at all. That is, would it be better to 
only use midi to control one application's control of the transport rather 
than controling the transport directly? In this case the user would have 
the option of which to use because they do not have to configure any keys 
to send transport actions. But I am wondering if it would cause problems 
that could be easily solved by not offering transport control at all.

Lots of things still to figure out:
  - send unused keys to another system kb interface so X will grab it 
(allows spliting the keyboard)
  - output MIDI info on both jack and alsa.
  - gracefully not use jack outputs if jack is not running
  - detect jack showing up and start using jack outputs
  - create some sample, but useful config files for those who don't want to
  - create a GUI to make config files

So far, I have been using a second keyboard which is "grabbed" so tha X 
doesn't see it.

--
Len Ovens
www.ovenwerks.net



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