[linux-audio-user] sfc-0.014 Released and horgand new homepage

Rocco linuxmedia4 at netscape.net
Tue Jan 13 07:01:08 EST 2004


holborn at telefonica.net wrote:

> Hi
> 
> I released sfc-0.014 (SoundFontCombi) a MIDI router who emulates a 
> synthesizer, storing routes as sounds using MIDI soundfonts or other MIDI 
> capable devices.
> 
> Cosmetic changes only.

I downloaded, compiled and worked with this program all night. It is 
exactly what I was looking for. It allows me to take my favorite sound 
font, put a different instrument on a different mixer slot, adjust 
different volumes, pans, octives settings, transpose settings (to name a 
few) for each instrument. I appreciate you creating it. It's filled a 
big gap for my studio. And I'm very excited about it's ability to split 
the keyboard into eight different instruments. Very nice...

I just wanted to mention a few things in case anyone wanted to try this 
program out in hopes to save you some time. It may just be me, but I 
didn't understand the "README" that explained how to use it. But it's 
actually very easy to use. Although, I did notice that the ability to 
connect to any devices (like midi ports or soft synths) from the program 
itself wasn't working. But that's no problem. I just used kaconnect 
after starting up my soft synths and then SoundFontCombi.

The approach is actually very easy. I just didn't know how to save 
"banks". And several hours of careful mixing of sounds was lost in a 
single mouse click. But I realized that all I had to do was set up each 
individual mixer with my favorite instruments (by choosing the program 
number of my choice in each mixer slot), adjust each volume slider and 
pan pot, octive (or whatever) to to what sounds pleasing. Then go to the 
upper right feild marked "Name" and give that "set of mixes" a name 
(just below it you can include "notes"). Here's the important part... 
when you go to the "banks" menu *do not* left click on a bank. If you 
do, you will loose all your hard work. Make sure you *right* click a 
bank to "put" the set of mixes in the chosen bank. Left clicking will 
*load* already created mixes. So store mixes into banks with a *right* 
click. You can (then) create a new set of "mixes"... give it a name (and 
comments if you care to)... go to the "bank" menu and right click a 
different "bank". You can fill up "banks" of "mixes" this way.

Here's the other thing that took me a while to figure out (and lost a 
lot of good sounds figuring it out) is that you can save the "current 
mix" as a ".sfc" file on your disk (from the file menu on the main 
interface of the program), *or* you can save a "set of banks" to a 
".sfcb" (bank) file (from the bank --> file menu). Well... when I saved 
the "current mixes" from the main file menu as a ".sfc" file, the 
"banks" weren't saved with it. I lost whole "banks" of "mixes" that took 
me hours to put together. So now, after I create "banks" of "mixes", I 
then save from the bank --> file menu as a ".sfcb" (bank) file.

Here's the good part... you can start the program (and load your 
favorite banks of mixes) by the command sfc -b YourFavoriteBank.sfcb. I 
can't see saving anything from the main file menu. I just create banks 
full of mixes... save banks of mixes... and load banks of mixes on start up.

Of course, you can also load banks of mixes while the program is running 
by going to the bank --> file menu.

My impression is that you created the progam to save from the main file 
menu because it's (supposed to) save all the connections to your 
devices. That doesn't seem to be working so I don't even use the main 
file menu. I just load, save and start up the progam via .sfcb files.

I hope this will be an aid saving any time for anyone that cares to try 
out this very good program.

Rocco




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