17 Jan
2004
17 Jan
'04
6:28 a.m.
On Fri, Jan 16, 2004 at 03:32:17 -0500, Dave Robillard wrote:
On Thu, 2004-01-15 at 14:46, Mike Rawes wrote:
There more to it than that, take a look at the nord modular UI (it has the
best modular synth UI IMNSHO):
http://www.clavia.com/pictures/nordmodular/patchwindowlarge.jpg
I dont think you are going to get that quality of module layout and space
efficiency and ease of use with automatic GUIs.
It's when you have several connected plugins
forming a single module
(I'll roll out my old example of an ADSR, a few DCOs, DCA etc) that GUI
generation really falls down. An alternative is that used in gAlan
(http://galan.sourceforge.net), where you build up your UI and hook it
up to whatever ports you like. Or PD - which lets you do ... just about
anything.
I suppose you have a point, nice UIs for a subpatch would be a nice
thing. Not a very complicated thing to implement in a host though,
especially in something like AMS which already has the ability to
control pretty much any parameter (right now from MIDI). Literally
defining in the subpatch "these things should be on the master subpatch
GUI" (just a big list of params) and letting the app draw them as it
pleases, as with current normal LADSPA plugins. 
The GUI code need not be anywhere remotely close to
the engine code,
it's not necessary to have some message-passing interface to accomplish
this.
I keep coming back to this, but I dont think I've made the point well
enough - the external UI control data has to be routed to the host -
the host needs to keep a (sample accurate) log of all the control data
that is sent to the plugin so that it can have reproducability.
If you use OSC-like systems that doesnt require that the data flow through
the host, but its much easier if it does.
- Steve