[Keoki]

I need to record the active sensing MIDI messages of one of my
keyboards and save to a General MIDI sequence. I tried various
sequencer programs to accomplish this, from Easy Beat all the way to
Logic Pro 7.2. They all ignored Active Sensing MIDI messages by
default, and I did not find any switch either that I could turn on to
get it recorded. (I know Active Sensing messages are getting through
to the Mac because this keyboard's editor software uses them
extensively.)

If anyone knows a Mac tool (or even a PC one) that will let me capture
these elusive Active Sensing messages please let me know. Grateful
thanks in advance

George

[Gareth Magennis]

"Keoki" wrote in message
...
I need to record the active sensing MIDI messages of one of my
keyboards and save to a General MIDI sequence. I tried various
sequencer programs to accomplish this, from Easy Beat all the way to
Logic Pro 7.2. They all ignored Active Sensing MIDI messages by
default, and I did not find any switch either that I could turn on to
get it recorded. (I know Active Sensing messages are getting through
to the Mac because this keyboard's editor software uses them
extensively.)

If anyone knows a Mac tool (or even a PC one) that will let me capture
these elusive Active Sensing messages please let me know. Grateful
thanks in advance

George


I think you will have a lot of difficulty finding one. Active Sensing is
only designed to be used in real time at the time of transmisson. It is not
really part of the MIDI data at all, just a real time timing signal of
sorts.

Maybe you cold explain why you want to do this?



Gareth.

[hank alrich]

Gareth Magennis wrote:

"Keoki" wrote in message
...
I need to record the active sensing MIDI messages of one of my
keyboards and save to a General MIDI sequence. I tried various
sequencer programs to accomplish this, from Easy Beat all the way to
Logic Pro 7.2. They all ignored Active Sensing MIDI messages by
default, and I did not find any switch either that I could turn on to
get it recorded. (I know Active Sensing messages are getting through
to the Mac because this keyboard's editor software uses them
extensively.)

If anyone knows a Mac tool (or even a PC one) that will let me capture
these elusive Active Sensing messages please let me know. Grateful
thanks in advance

George


I think you will have a lot of difficulty finding one. Active Sensing is
only designed to be used in real time at the time of transmisson. It is not
really part of the MIDI data at all, just a real time timing signal of
sorts.

Interesting. How is it employed? What potential benefits does it offer?

The data would, in theory, be recordable, wouldn't it?

Maybe you cold explain why you want to do this?

--
ha
Iraq is Arabic for Vietnam

[Laurence Payne[_2_]]

On Tue, 29 Jul 2008 10:12:46 -0500, (hank alrich)
wrote:

I think you will have a lot of difficulty finding one. Active Sensing is
only designed to be used in real time at the time of transmisson. It is not
really part of the MIDI data at all, just a real time timing signal of
sorts.

Interesting. How is it employed? What potential benefits does it offer?

The data would, in theory, be recordable, wouldn't it?

It's an "I'm still here!" message. After receiving an AS message, the
receiving device looks for another one (or some other MIDI data). If
it doesn't receive one after 300ms it performs All Notes Off. It's
for killing stuck notes when a MIDI cable falls out. It isn't
universally implemented, and required by the receiving device - if it
never sees AS at all it doesn't care.

[Gareth Magennis]

"Laurence Payne" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 29 Jul 2008 10:12:46 -0500, (hank alrich)
wrote:

I think you will have a lot of difficulty finding one. Active Sensing
is
only designed to be used in real time at the time of transmisson. It is
not
really part of the MIDI data at all, just a real time timing signal of
sorts.

Interesting. How is it employed? What potential benefits does it offer?

The data would, in theory, be recordable, wouldn't it?

It's an "I'm still here!" message. After receiving an AS message, the
receiving device looks for another one (or some other MIDI data). If
it doesn't receive one after 300ms it performs All Notes Off. It's
for killing stuck notes when a MIDI cable falls out. It isn't
universally implemented, and required by the receiving device - if it
never sees AS at all it doesn't care.


If you were to record MIDI data including the AS message, and then (as you
usually do) edit it afterwards, you will no longer have the byte strobing at
the correct frequency, so All Notes Off may be triggered eroneously on
playback. Not surprising then that most software isn't at all interested in
recording it. I wonder why the OP is.


Gareth.

[hank alrich]

Laurence Payne wrote:

On Tue, 29 Jul 2008 10:12:46 -0500, (hank alrich)
wrote:

I think you will have a lot of difficulty finding one. Active Sensing is
only designed to be used in real time at the time of transmisson. It is not
really part of the MIDI data at all, just a real time timing signal of
sorts.

Interesting. How is it employed? What potential benefits does it offer?

The data would, in theory, be recordable, wouldn't it?

It's an "I'm still here!" message. After receiving an AS message, the
receiving device looks for another one (or some other MIDI data). If
it doesn't receive one after 300ms it performs All Notes Off. It's
for killing stuck notes when a MIDI cable falls out. It isn't
universally implemented, and required by the receiving device - if it
never sees AS at all it doesn't care.

So if I understand this rightly...

- it's a feature of the hardware device (perhaps in firmware?), looking
at the stream and at a stopwatch, too, to turn a channel off if nothing
shows up in the stream within the alloted time.

- it is not a property of the MIDI stream itself, and hence, the usual
DAW suspects would have no reason to capture it.

Looking forward to learning what Keoki wants to do with that data.

--
ha
Iraq is Arabic for Vietnam

[gareth magennis]

"hank alrich" wrote in message
...
Laurence Payne wrote:

On Tue, 29 Jul 2008 10:12:46 -0500, (hank alrich)
wrote:

I think you will have a lot of difficulty finding one. Active Sensing
is
only designed to be used in real time at the time of transmisson. It
is not
really part of the MIDI data at all, just a real time timing signal of
sorts.

Interesting. How is it employed? What potential benefits does it offer?

The data would, in theory, be recordable, wouldn't it?

It's an "I'm still here!" message. After receiving an AS message, the
receiving device looks for another one (or some other MIDI data). If
it doesn't receive one after 300ms it performs All Notes Off. It's
for killing stuck notes when a MIDI cable falls out. It isn't
universally implemented, and required by the receiving device - if it
never sees AS at all it doesn't care.

So if I understand this rightly...

- it's a feature of the hardware device (perhaps in firmware?), looking
at the stream and at a stopwatch, too, to turn a channel off if nothing
shows up in the stream within the alloted time.

- it is not a property of the MIDI stream itself, and hence, the usual
DAW suspects would have no reason to capture it.

Looking forward to learning what Keoki wants to do with that data.

--
ha


If he wants to implement Active Sense on a system that doesn't have it, he'd
be better off manually creating a separate MIDI "click track" of AS bytes.


Gareth.

[Laurence Payne[_2_]]

On Tue, 29 Jul 2008 12:04:27 -0500, (hank alrich)
wrote:

So if I understand this rightly...

- it's a feature of the hardware device (perhaps in firmware?), looking
at the stream and at a stopwatch, too, to turn a channel off if nothing
shows up in the stream within the alloted time.

- it is not a property of the MIDI stream itself, and hence, the usual
DAW suspects would have no reason to capture it.

I fail to see the distinction. It's a MIDI message. Firmware or
programmable - who cares?

[Keoki]

Looking forward to learning what Keoki wants to do with that data.

If he wants to implement Active Sense on a system that doesn't have it, he'd
be better off manually creating a separate MIDI "click track" of AS bytes.

My plan was to capture the Active Sensing messages to a General MIDI
sequence that I can set to loop endlessly. This would play them back
at the correct repeat rate (one every 300 milliseconds). If I can
achieve the same thing with a manually created click track - I'm game.

The reason why I'd like to have a copy of my keyboard's active sensing
messages is to fool its Mac editor program into working even when the
keyboard is not present. (I often need to access it for various
reasons in such a situation.) Normally it listens to the board's
Active Sensing messages and it stops functioning one second after they
cease. There is no optional toggle where this sensing function could
be turned off.

[Mike Rivers]

hank alrich wrote:

So if I understand this rightly...

- it's a feature of the hardware device (perhaps in firmware?), looking
at the stream and at a stopwatch, too, to turn a channel off if nothing
shows up in the stream within the alloted time.

It's a MIDI system real time message (others are stop, continue, start,
and the timing clock) so it's not real MIDI data as such. If a
noisemaker supports active sense, when it receives an active sense
message, it goes into the active sense mode where it's on the lookout
for this "hello, world" message which occurs a couple of times a second.
If it stops receiving the active sense message, it turns all notes off.
The idea behind this is that if the sequencer failed (or the MIDI cable
became unplugged) while a note was sounding, there would be nothing to
tell that note to shaddap. It was never very widely implemented.

The only reason why I can see to trap and record the message is to
verify that it's there and working.



--
If you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring and reach
me he
double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo -- I'm really Mike Rivers
)

[Mike Rivers]

Keoki wrote:

The reason why I'd like to have a copy of my keyboard's active sensing
messages is to fool its Mac editor program into working even when the
keyboard is not present. (I often need to access it for various
reasons in such a situation.) Normally it listens to the board's
Active Sensing messages and it stops functioning one second after they
cease. There is no optional toggle where this sensing function could
be turned off.

In that case, I'd look for a different program. Suppose you connected it
to a keyboard that didn't support active sensing? It's optional, I
believe, but it's been many years since I've read the MIDI
specification, and it's probably also been many years since all
manufacturers followed every provision of the MIDI spec.


--
If you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring and reach
me he
double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo -- I'm really Mike Rivers
)

[Keoki]

On Jul 29, 8:53 am, Mike Rivers wrote:

In that case, I'd look for a different program.

Hello Mike,

Thank you for your reply. Since we are looking for a new tool already,
I rather look for a new program to capture Active Sensing once in a
lifetime than to replace a real good editing program I use every day.
(As long as we find a way.)

I emailed the keyboard's customer support today to inquire what is my
keyboard's active sensing byte in Hex. If they tell me, I'll only need
to find a way to enter this byte to a sequence manually and I'll be in
business. I looked at MIDIMonitor on my G5, it displayed the
keyboard's idle pulses as "clock". Well, I don't think it's clock
data, it must be active sensing. Clock information is device
independent, my other plugged-in keyboard from the same manufacturer
ought to keep the editor software running then, but it sure doesn't.
So we are dealing with a (keyboard model-specific) active sensing
message, then.

[gareth magennis]

"Keoki" wrote in message
...
Looking forward to learning what Keoki wants to do with that data.

If he wants to implement Active Sense on a system that doesn't have it,
he'd
be better off manually creating a separate MIDI "click track" of AS
bytes.

My plan was to capture the Active Sensing messages to a General MIDI
sequence that I can set to loop endlessly. This would play them back
at the correct repeat rate (one every 300 milliseconds). If I can
achieve the same thing with a manually created click track - I'm game.



Active sense is the single byte 0xFE. Just fill a bar with one of these
bytes every 300 mSecs or less, and copy and paste bars to the end of the
song. There's your AS click track sorted.


Gareth.






The reason why I'd like to have a copy of my keyboard's active sensing
messages is to fool its Mac editor program into working even when the
keyboard is not present. (I often need to access it for various
reasons in such a situation.) Normally it listens to the board's
Active Sensing messages and it stops functioning one second after they
cease. There is no optional toggle where this sensing function could
be turned off.

[drichard]

Hi,

I would hope the program has a way of ignoring AS messages. There is
no reason for it not to work fine with the keyboard turned off. Your
"solution" seems far more work than it should need to be.

Dean

On Jul 29, 12:55*pm, Keoki wrote:
Looking forward to learning what Keoki wants to do with that data.
If he wants to implement Active Sense on a system that doesn't have it, he'd
be better off manually creating a separate MIDI *"click track" of AS bytes.

My plan was to capture the Active Sensing messages to a General MIDI
sequence that I can set to loop endlessly. This would play them back
at the correct repeat rate (one every 300 milliseconds). If I can
achieve the same thing with a manually created click track - I'm game.

The reason why I'd like to have a copy of my keyboard's active sensing
messages is to fool its Mac editor program into working even when the
keyboard is not present. (I often need to access it for various
reasons in such a situation.) Normally it listens to the board's
Active Sensing messages and it stops functioning one second after they
cease. There is no optional toggle where this sensing function could
be turned off.

[Mike Rivers]

Keoki wrote:

I emailed the keyboard's customer support today to inquire what is my
keyboard's active sensing byte in Hex.

I looked at MIDIMonitor on my G5, it displayed the
keyboard's idle pulses as "clock". Well, I don't think it's clock
data, it must be active sensing. Clock information is device
independent

So, as far as I know, is active sensing. I'm sure it's in the MIDI
specification but they don't publish that for free. I see that Gareth
has already given you the code.

Active sense does only one thing and it really works in one direction -
from the controller to the instrument. You can test whether your
keyboard has it by sending a continuous note from your sequencer
program, then unplugging the MIDI IN cable to the keyboard. If the note
continues playing, it's not using active sensing. If it shuts off, then
it is.

I suspect that the reason why the editng program doesn't work without a
keyboard connected is because it expects to be able to play what you've
just edited so you can hear it, and it doesn't see anything attached
that can play a sound.



--
If you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring and reach
me he
double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo -- I'm really Mike Rivers
)

[gareth magennis]

"Gareth Magennis" wrote in message
om...

"Keoki" wrote in message
...
Looking forward to learning what Keoki wants to do with that data.

If he wants to implement Active Sense on a system that doesn't have it,
he'd
be better off manually creating a separate MIDI "click track" of AS
bytes.

My plan was to capture the Active Sensing messages to a General MIDI
sequence that I can set to loop endlessly. This would play them back
at the correct repeat rate (one every 300 milliseconds). If I can
achieve the same thing with a manually created click track - I'm game.



Active sense is the single byte 0xFE. Just fill a bar with one of these
bytes every 300 mSecs or less, and copy and paste bars to the end of the
song. There's your AS click track sorted.


Gareth.




You won't be able to directly insert an Active Sense message, this is never
done manually. You will have to dig around your software until you can find
some way of inserting/editing a MIDI message (eg SysEx, Song Start) then
edit it down to just "FE". Or you can just play in notes and edit those
down to the FE byte.


Good luck.


Gareth.

[Keoki]

Poking around the Net, I assembled a list of all the slots in "wild &
woolly" 0xfN ending chapter of the MIDI spec from 0xf0 (sysex) to 0xff
(system reset). If I don't get a reply from my keyboard's
manufacturer, I'll try all 14 sensible values from this list (from
0xf1, undefined through 0xfe, active sensing) to see if either keeps
this program running when fed to it in 300 ms intervals.

There's no other part in the MIDI spectrum where a manufacturer could
"expropriate" a byte without causing a MIDI train wreck, right? All
the preceding territory from 0x00 through 0xe0 have been already taken
by various MIDI note, controller, etc. events, I believe?

[Keoki]

I just finished looking at the MIDI data exchange between the keyboard
and its editor program with MIDI Monitor. This is crazy, Fort Knox is
probably secured with fewer passwords. Besides the steady stream of
sensing messages output by my keyboard, at launch the editor goes into
a handshake with more than 10 steps, five to thirteen byte SysEx
strings flying thick and fast back and forth.

This has nothing to do with wanting to sense a keyboard, it's some
kind of copy protection scheme that uses my keyboard as a (giant)
hardware dongle. All right, Mike is probably correct, it will be
simpler to just create my composition with a different tool.

[gareth magennis]

"Keoki" wrote in message
...
Poking around the Net, I assembled a list of all the slots in "wild &
woolly" 0xfN ending chapter of the MIDI spec from 0xf0 (sysex) to 0xff
(system reset). If I don't get a reply from my keyboard's
manufacturer, I'll try all 14 sensible values from this list (from
0xf1, undefined through 0xfe, active sensing) to see if either keeps
this program running when fed to it in 300 ms intervals.



I don't understand what you are saying. The AS byte is 0xfe, also known as
FE, or 1111 1110. Period. Your keyboard's manufacturer will say the
same. ?????


Gareth.

[Laurence Payne[_2_]]

On Wed, 30 Jul 2008 01:52:39 -0700 (PDT), Keoki
wrote:

I just finished looking at the MIDI data exchange between the keyboard
and its editor program with MIDI Monitor. This is crazy, Fort Knox is
probably secured with fewer passwords. Besides the steady stream of
sensing messages output by my keyboard, at launch the editor goes into
a handshake with more than 10 steps, five to thirteen byte SysEx
strings flying thick and fast back and forth.

This has nothing to do with wanting to sense a keyboard, it's some
kind of copy protection scheme that uses my keyboard as a (giant)
hardware dongle. All right, Mike is probably correct, it will be
simpler to just create my composition with a different tool.

Handshakes are common when MIDI devices exchange e.g. patch data - no
need to read anything more into it.

This thread is nearly 20 messages long, you still haven't revealed
WHICH keyboard, WHICH program we're discussing!

[Keoki]

I don't understand what you are saying. *The AS byte is 0xfe, also known as
FE, or 1111 1110. * *Period. *Your keyboard's manufacturer will say the
same. *?????

Now that I saw how my keyboard's Mac program does a whole 10-step
sysex string handshake dance at startup besides watching for the
board's active sensing bytes (see my other post) yeah, my keyboard's
manufacturer will probably answer that Active Sensing is 0xfe and that
will be all they'll tell.

[Laurence Payne[_2_]]

On Wed, 30 Jul 2008 02:30:48 -0700 (PDT), Keoki
wrote:

Now that I saw how my keyboard's Mac program does a whole 10-step
sysex string handshake dance at startup besides watching for the
board's active sensing bytes (see my other post) yeah, my keyboard's
manufacturer will probably answer that Active Sensing is 0xfe and that
will be all they'll tell.

That's all there IS to tell about Active Sensing!

Perhaps this program acts directly on the keyboard's internal memory.
Witout the keyboard connected it has no data to work on and so quite
reasonably shuts up shop. But we're only guessing, because you won't
reveal the details :-)

[Mike Rivers]

Keoki wrote:

at launch the editor goes into
a handshake with more than 10 steps, five to thirteen byte SysEx
strings flying thick and fast back and forth.

This has nothing to do with wanting to sense a keyboard, it's some
kind of copy protection scheme that uses my keyboard as a (giant)
hardware dongle.

Is this a dedicated editor for that keyboard? If so, I'm not surprised
that it wants to make sure that it's talking to that keyboard and one
whose synth engine it knows nothing about. It's been many years since I
dealt with MIDI patch editors, but I recall that most were written
around a singly synth or family, with only one or two "universal"
products. Even those had a library for each synth product and a suitable
handshake and data exchange so it knew which library to load.

I'm curious as to what application you have for the editor without
having the keyboard connected. And what's the program you're using? This
is getting skullduggerous.


--
If you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring and reach
me he
double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo -- I'm really Mike Rivers
)

[drichard]

Hi,

No, it is not a copy-protection scheme, or anything like that. The
editor is communicating with the keyboard to find out various
settings. That's all. Sysex messages are used for communication
specific to a particular keyboard or MIDI device. Chances are that
every time you make an edit the software and keyboard communicate.

So now I have a better picture of what's happening. It's likely that
the reason your software expects the keyboard to be there is because
it is sending all edits in real time to the keyboard. Your AS string
will probably not fix the problem anyway. Most people don't edit synth
patches without the synth attached. Why do want to do edits that you
can't hear?

Dean

On Jul 30, 3:52*am, Keoki wrote:
I just finished looking at the MIDI data exchange between the keyboard
and its editor program with MIDI Monitor. This is crazy, Fort Knox is
probably secured with fewer passwords. Besides the steady stream of
sensing messages output by my keyboard, at launch the editor goes into
a handshake with more than 10 steps, five to thirteen byte SysEx
strings flying thick and fast back and forth.

This has nothing to do with wanting to sense a keyboard, it's some
kind of copy protection scheme that uses my keyboard as a (giant)
hardware dongle. All right, Mike is probably correct, it will be
simpler to just create my composition with a different tool.

[Keoki]

It's likely that
the reason your software expects the keyboard to be there is because
it is sending all edits in real time to the keyboard.

To answer the questions regarding make and model, the keyboard is the
Korg Triton Studio, and the program is Karma Triton.

The reason why I'd run this program without the keyboard is because I
centralize my resources. For example, all my best Akai, Emu, Wav,
Kontakt, EXS24 and softsynth sounds from my 400 CD/DVD file pile are
selected and centralized to one place, Kore 2. So any sound I need -
bam! It's there in less than 2 seconds. (It only took me 5 years to
set this up, going through ever single sound on every single disc.)

I'm trying to centralize now all the interactive MIDI patterns (Korg
Karmas, Yamaha arpeggios, Xphraze patches, Kontakt Scripts, etc. etc.)
the same way as I did my sounds, by trying to assemble them all in ONE
central pattern management app. This could be the Karma Triton, if it
could travel around on my laptop to gather patterns from any new
device I encounter on my sessions. But, user friendly and visually
appealing as it is, if I can't get it to work unless I lug a 65 lbs
hardware dongle (my non-traveling Triton Studio 88) around with it...
well, I'll be forced to begin considering alternatives.

In terms of the 10-step handshake, my Triton's manual on page 271 it
lists the recognized system messages (MIDI), and the first message
observed by MIDI Monitor is Device Inquiry all right. However other 9
steps of the communication are not, and the manual stays totally mum
about those, it doesn't even list any kind of 15 byte MIDI string as
observed (F0 7E 00 06 02 42 50 00 37 00 00 00 01 00 F7) whatsoever.
Given that if you don't load the matching soundset in the keyboard
manually, the software will just play its MIDI patterns oblivious to
what sound is stored at the given location (e.g. play harp patterns on
a sax patch), the purpose of the mysterious 10-step handshake is
definitely not patch parameter syncing or transmission, my friends.

[Mike Rivers]

Keoki wrote:

To answer the questions regarding make and model, the keyboard is the
Korg Triton Studio, and the program is Karma Triton.

Well, this is a program designed to support a specific range of Korg
synthesizers. It's not interested in talking to all of your others. If
this isn't correct, perhaps you might do better asking around in the
rec.music.makers.synth newsgroup, assuming it still exists. Maybe they
know some hacks over there.




--
If you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring and reach
me he
double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo -- I'm really Mike Rivers
)

[Keoki]

On Jul 30, 10:12 am, Mike Rivers wrote:

Well, this is a program designed to support a specific range of Korg
synthesizers. It's not interested in talking to all of your others.

It runs all of them just fine as long as there is *one* Korg Triton
running somewhere on the MIDI chain. If the Triton is turned off or
disconnected, Karma Triton stops pumping out its MIDI music right
away, but otherwise it will feed it happily to just about any device
on its output channel. It even has a Device ID parameter, "only
necessary for devices that receive SysEx messages containing Device
IDs to change banks such as the Roland Sound Canvas SC-55" says its
manual.

So the Korg Triton keyboard checking is clearly not intended to
prevent Karma Triton from playing just about any MIDI synth (as it
does around my place). It's intended to make you buy a Korg Triton as
well. Well, I did that, I just don't want to lug that mother
everywhere I'd need to take Karma Triton. Hence the whole matter.

[gareth magennis]

"Keoki" wrote in message
...
On Jul 30, 10:12 am, Mike Rivers wrote:

Well, this is a program designed to support a specific range of Korg
synthesizers. It's not interested in talking to all of your others.

It runs all of them just fine as long as there is *one* Korg Triton
running somewhere on the MIDI chain. If the Triton is turned off or
disconnected, Karma Triton stops pumping out its MIDI music right
away, but otherwise it will feed it happily to just about any device
on its output channel. It even has a Device ID parameter, "only
necessary for devices that receive SysEx messages containing Device
IDs to change banks such as the Roland Sound Canvas SC-55" says its
manual.

So the Korg Triton keyboard checking is clearly not intended to
prevent Karma Triton from playing just about any MIDI synth (as it
does around my place). It's intended to make you buy a Korg Triton as
well. Well, I did that, I just don't want to lug that mother
everywhere I'd need to take Karma Triton. Hence the whole matter.



Well that makes things bit clearer then.

If I understand correctly, you want something to emulate exactly what the
Triton is doing, including the handshaking, otherwise the program won't run.

The only workaround I can see is to record all that handshaking malarky onto
a MIDI track and delete all the data coming from the Mac, leaving just the
replies from the Triton, and gaps where the Mac transmissions were. When
the Mac sends its first request for data, you start the MIDI track playback
and the Mac thinks its talking to the Triton and getting meaningful replies.
Add the looped Active Sense data after this and the Mac should be none the
wiser.

I don't know off hand how long a machine will wait for an answer after a
request for it before bugging out, but I think it may be indefinately, so
your timing may not be at all critical. It may be prudent to lengthen the
gaps just in case the Mac doesn't always respond in the same time interval.


Sounds like a right palaver, but it might just work.


Take Mikes suggestion and go looking for hacks as well, you can't be the
only one with this problem to solve.



Cheers,


Gareth.

[gareth magennis]

Assuming of course that the Mac and the Triton always exchange exactly the
same data.

If it really is a dongle, which I doubt, then perhaps that may not be the
case.




Gareth.

[Les Cargill]

Keoki wrote:
It's likely that
the reason your software expects the keyboard to be there is because
it is sending all edits in real time to the keyboard.

To answer the questions regarding make and model, the keyboard is the
Korg Triton Studio, and the program is Karma Triton.

The reason why I'd run this program without the keyboard is because I
centralize my resources. For example, all my best Akai, Emu, Wav,
Kontakt, EXS24 and softsynth sounds from my 400 CD/DVD file pile are
selected and centralized to one place, Kore 2. So any sound I need -
bam! It's there in less than 2 seconds. (It only took me 5 years to
set this up, going through ever single sound on every single disc.)

I'm trying to centralize now all the interactive MIDI patterns (Korg
Karmas, Yamaha arpeggios, Xphraze patches, Kontakt Scripts, etc. etc.)
the same way as I did my sounds, by trying to assemble them all in ONE
central pattern management app. This could be the Karma Triton, if it
could travel around on my laptop to gather patterns from any new
device I encounter on my sessions. But, user friendly and visually
appealing as it is, if I can't get it to work unless I lug a 65 lbs
hardware dongle (my non-traveling Triton Studio 88) around with it...
well, I'll be forced to begin considering alternatives.

In terms of the 10-step handshake, my Triton's manual on page 271 it
lists the recognized system messages (MIDI), and the first message
observed by MIDI Monitor is Device Inquiry all right. However other 9
steps of the communication are not, and the manual stays totally mum
about those, it doesn't even list any kind of 15 byte MIDI string as
observed (F0 7E 00 06 02 42 50 00 37 00 00 00 01 00 F7) whatsoever.
Given that if you don't load the matching soundset in the keyboard
manually, the software will just play its MIDI patterns oblivious to
what sound is stored at the given location (e.g. play harp patterns on
a sax patch), the purpose of the mysterious 10-step handshake is
definitely not patch parameter syncing or transmission, my friends.

If you are just completely stuck, there's always midilib and Tcl. Works
a treat; ain't that bad of a deal.

--
Les Cargill

[Keoki]

The only workaround I can see is to record all that handshaking malarky onto
a MIDI track and delete all the data coming from the Mac, leaving just the
replies from the Triton, and gaps where the Mac transmissions were.

I'll try it. BTW I also contacted the programmer of Karma Triton. He
replied that there is no way to turn off keyboard checking in Karma
Triton or Karma Oasys.

Well, then (for Korg's sake too) let's hope that the malarkey
recording trick will work. Otherwise, if they don't have a portable
app people can use to gather and play the different (Karma, Xphrase,
Kontakt Script, Roland, etc) interactive MIDI patterns, sooner or
later a bored 18-year old in Kuala Lumpur or Bombay will sit down and
write one (a la mp3 player story) and then it will be game over for
all the commercial players. We'll be buying 4GB MIDI MIDI arranger -
keychain - lighter sticks at Best Buy for $19.95, right next to the
MP3 player - keychain - lighter sticks isle.

Hmm, came to think of it, what am I straining myself here for, then?
Heck, let Korg worry about this :-)

[Keoki]

On Jul 30, 3:18 pm, Keoki wrote:

Came to think of it, what am I straining myself here for, then?
Heck, let Korg worry about this :-)

As I wrote these last sentences of my previous post, I became overcame
with a giant, wonderful, warm feeling of galactic it's-not-my-problem.

From now I'll only compose, and I don't give a damn about gear.
Everything will stay in the studio as it is now. What's sorted now is
sorted, what's not will never be. Program enhancements, upgrades - I
don't give a flying damn. Just saying it as I type it fills me with
sheer joy. I'll work with material, apps and gear that's here now, as
they are now. What I miss because it wasn't sorted, fixed, upgraded,
installed yet - who cares.

If I hit platinum with a work, I won't blow it on a million dollar
recording studio that would only bring me back headaches. Oh no; with
the money, I'll hire twenty pretty secretaries to sit in my lap in
shifts, instead. That'll probably lead to happier music anyway. Thank
you all for your posts. I had no clue a state like this exists, but
today I achieved my peak transcendence of music technology. Bliss to
you all.

[gareth magennis]

"Keoki" wrote in message
...
The only workaround I can see is to record all that handshaking malarky
onto
a MIDI track and delete all the data coming from the Mac, leaving just
the
replies from the Triton, and gaps where the Mac transmissions were.

I'll try it. BTW I also contacted the programmer of Karma Triton. He
replied that there is no way to turn off keyboard checking in Karma
Triton or Karma Oasys.



I would start by at least doubling the gaps between Triton transmissions. If
the transmitted and received data overlaps at all it won't work. There may
be little, if any wait time between transmit and receive when directly
connected.


Good luck, let us know if you have any sucesss.


Gareth.

[gareth magennis]

"Keoki" wrote in message
...
The only workaround I can see is to record all that handshaking malarky
onto
a MIDI track and delete all the data coming from the Mac, leaving just
the
replies from the Triton, and gaps where the Mac transmissions were.

I'll try it. BTW I also contacted the programmer of Karma Triton. He
replied that there is no way to turn off keyboard checking in Karma
Triton or Karma Oasys.


The program may need to know exactly which Triton, with which
features/expansions or global settings, and what version of the Operating
System it is using to boot up to the appropriate state.

If you remove the Triton, the program may quit so that you can connect a
different one, which the program will then interrogate and set itself up
appropriately for.



Gareth.

[Mike Rivers]

Keoki wrote:

if they don't have a portable
app people can use to gather and play the different (Karma, Xphrase,
Kontakt Script, Roland, etc) interactive MIDI patterns, sooner or
later a bored 18-year old in Kuala Lumpur or Bombay will sit down and
write one (a la mp3 player story) and then it will be game over for
all the commercial players.

I didn't realize that the program was a sequencer ("player?"). I thought
it was a patch editor and librarian. I'm not sure what "interactive MIDI
programs" means, but if you have keyboards with built-in patterns, you
should be able to capture those as MIDI files in any sequencer. I guess
I still don't understand what you have and what you're trying to do, so
I guess I really don't have any further information for you.

Good luck with your experiments.


--
If you e-mail me and it bounces, use your secret decoder ring and reach
me he
double-m-eleven-double-zero at yahoo -- I'm really Mike Rivers
)

[Keoki]

On Jul 31, 1:46 am, Mike Rivers wrote:

I'm not sure what "interactive MIDI
programs" means, but if you have keyboards with built-in patterns, you
should be able to capture those as MIDI files in any sequencer.

Hello Mike,

The interactive MIDI patterns which Karma Triton generates are in
essence cool, tiny arrangements or solos. A great compositional idea
trove, or a sure way to bore listeners by playing them one-finger
style over 32 bars, as how to remain interesting with them on the long
run when music constantly evolves has not been fully solved yet. "Now
that any 'board sounds good" my favorite music store clerk told me,
"its these interactive MIDI patterns manufacturers are moving into
heavily to sell units." (A case in point, I counted 20 mostly Korg R&D
names on Karma Triton's patch credit & splash screens.) So we'll be
soon up to our necks in these interactive patterns, with every new
'board and audio plugin doohickey sporting thousands. A need to manage
them will become evident to everyone. Yes, you can record one in a
MIDI sequencer, but will it know how to add musically pleasing
variatons based on your playing at playback time? Not the sequencers I
know today.

I only wrote this little blurb to answer your question. Yesterday at
3:18 pm I achieved my state of transcendence. I savor every second of
the pleasurable feeling now how suprimely unconcerned I am now with
anything gear-related anymore, able to exclusively focus on creating
music. I guess this is the real-life version of "getting to the next
level". It does exist.

[Keoki]

On Jul 30, 10:34 pm, "Gareth Magennis"
wrote:

The program may need to know exactly which Triton, with which
features/expansions or global settings, and what version of the Operating
System it is using to boot up to the appropriate state.

If you remove the Triton, the program may quit so that you can connect a
different one, which the program will then interrogate and set itself up
appropriately for.

Gareth.

Hello Gareth,

Thank you for your great suggestions. The Karma Triton expects the
user to tell it what Triton model is used via a pulldown menu. It also
expects the user to load the correct soundset into the Triton on his
own; it the user doesn't, Karma Triton will play its MIDI patterns
through whatever patches the Triton has. So the elaborate 10 step
handshake I observed clearly serves a very different purpose.

And all this is Korg's problem now. :-)

George