BillFM

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  • in reply to: 2 questions about panel:sendMidiMessageNow #118567
    BillFM
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      Hi.
      FYI…
      DX11 sysex uses 0-f in the channel nibble of sysex to represent MIDI Channel 1-16. The upper nibble of this sysex byte is used to identify different function formatting.

      The DX11 service manual illustrates this:
      https://www.manualslib.com/manual/966757/Yamaha-Dx11.html?page=31#manual
      (you can also download entire manual from the link)

      Have a look at the DX81Z panel as it’s compatible to DX11.

      in reply to: Chords #118144
      BillFM
      Participant
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        I’m not sure why, but after pasting the Amazon book weblink, the picture of the book took its place. So, I’ve broken the weblink into 2 lines. You can copy paste them together to arrive at Amazon.

        https://www.amazon.com
        /Pocket-Idiots-Guide-Piano-Chords/dp/1592574599

        Hopefully, that works.
        Bill

        in reply to: Chords #118141
        BillFM
        Participant
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          Hello Tedjuh.

          Below is the book I use for everything you mentioned about chord construction (and for scales). It’s a very easy read. Lots of illustrations of each chord. I paid $4.49 at a used book store (10 years ago).

          “The Pocket Idiot’s Guide to Piano Chords” by Karen Berger
          ISBN 1592574599, 9781592574599

          One thing about chords (and I’m no expert), you can play the notes of a chord is any order. It’s referred to as inversion. This leads to efficient movements of your fingers on the keyboard. And, the notes of a chord don’t even have to be played within the same octave. This is all detailed in the book.

          Sounds like an interesting panel. Good luck with it.

          in reply to: LCD Synth to LCD Ctrlr #117745
          BillFM
          Participant
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            Hello.

            A few suggestions below. I don’t have an N1. I only read the manuals.
            On the N1, there are some keyboard menu items that need to be manually set/cleared in order to get MIDI sysex messages in/out of N1.

            Can you verify the setting under the Global Mode menu. This is shown on page 65 of the User Manual. “EXCL” should not have an X. The N1 does not respond to sysex messages if EXCL = X.

            At the same time, also check setting under Global Mode menu. Same as above, “EXCL” should not have an X.

            Check the setting under the Utility menu.
            Item: All Prog
            to: MIDI OUT

            From the screen captures, it appears N1 is set to MIDI channel 1 (30).

            As an experiment for the LCD, can you try changing the LCD backlight colour.
            Send sysex:
            F0 42 30 4C 7D 00 F7 this is green colour.
            Maybe use a Uibutton to toggle between the 2 colours.
            F0 42 30 4C 7D 01 F7 this is orange colour.

            If the colour changes, then you know N1 is listening to sysex messages. If the colour does not change, then more investigation is needed to understand why the colour did not change.

            Let us know what happens.

            in reply to: How to lock panel in window to stop it from scrolling? #117466
            BillFM
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              Well, much to my dismay, it turns out, holding down the ‘shift’ key to prevent panel (within the window) from scrolling, only works in ‘panel mode’. That’s when I tested this ‘anti-scroll’ method.

              So, back to my original problem. When not in Panel Mode, and zoomed in on panel, moving the mouse wheel over the slider thumb causes the window to scroll up and down.

              That said, I found the DX7 panel did not scroll when zoomed in (not in Panel Mode, holding shift key down while moving mouse wheel). This is desirable panel behaviour. Yet, the Demo panel Look And Feel, does scroll (when zoomed in, not in Panel Mode). Not desirable.

              Any other suggestions?
              Thanks.

              WinXP, 5.3.201.

              • This reply was modified 4 years ago by BillFM.
              in reply to: Updating ctrlr slider to reflect hardware knob #117389
              BillFM
              Participant
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                Hello and welcome to CTRLR.

                Take a look at this link:

                what do you need to know in order to make panels?

                Scroll down to msg #34128, DEC 23, 2014. There you’ll find a great source of info on pulling data from a MIDI message, as well for sending MIDI patches.

                Follow the advice other people suggested to work out the MIDI implementation for your synth.

                Also, to know if your synth is sending out data, use the MIDI Monitor ( CTRLR Toools menu) built into CTRLR. Be sure to activate Monitor Input (and Monitor Output) in the Monitor VIEW menu. It’s a valuable tool for debugging.

                Good luck with your project.

                in reply to: Suggestions/help for processing binary sysex #117176
                BillFM
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                  Hello.

                  There are functions (methods?) to get/test bits in bytes/bit-positions. You could then assemble a normal byte to represent the single synth parameter byte. I’ve not tried this (and I’m no Lua expert) so you may need to experiment a bit. Maybe it’s somewhere to start.

                  getBitRangeAsInt (value, startBit, numBits) : Get’s a number of bits (numBits) starting at position startBit as an Integer and returns that integer.
                  setBitRangeAsInt (value, startBit, numBits, valueToSet) :
                  clearBit (value, bitToClear) : Clears a bit at position bitToClear in the value and return that modified value.
                  isBitSet (value, bitPosition) : Return true if a bit at position bitPosition in value is set, false otherwise.
                  setBit (value, bitToSet) : Set’s one bit in an integer at position (bitToSet) and return the modified value with the bit set.

                  in reply to: How to lock panel in window to stop it from scrolling? #116280
                  BillFM
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                    Thank you. That’s absolutely PERFECT.

                    in reply to: Slider jumps when mouse down, mouse not moved #85927
                    BillFM
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                      Hello Possemo.

                      You described my ‘thumb’ observation perfectly.

                      Originally, I tried making the thumb larger but it didn’t help. I then made the thumb as small as possible but then I couldn’t land the mouse perfectly on a 1 pixel tall thumb. So, that didn’t work out either.

                      I think the best solution is to use the technique you suggested, using mouse wheel to change thumb position/value. When using a laptop, my touchpad didn’t offer a wheel. I’ve attached a USB mouse with wheel to laptop and all is good.

                      I tried looking at the source code to understand why mouse click/drag works properly for a rotary, but not for a linear slider. But, s/w is out of my area of expertise. I don’t fully understand the flow.

                      I’ll call it solved. Now I can continue making a panel.

                      Thanks for the help.

                      BillFM

                      in reply to: Slider jumps when mouse down, mouse not moved #85888
                      BillFM
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                        Hello Possemo.

                        I discovered how to set the menu bar font size. I had to really expand (horizontally) the Properties list (element properties menu on the right). A little box is now displayed that allows me to type the font size. Phew!!!

                        I’d still like to solve the issue of slider-thumb jumping when click mouse on thumb. I’m not sure where to look next.

                        BillFM

                        in reply to: Slider jumps when mouse down, mouse not moved #85887
                        BillFM
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                          Hello Possemo.

                          You had the right idea in previous posts. My problem is when I click-hold the left-mouse button directly on slider-button. The slider-button will jump up (or down) to a new value. The slider-button should remain at it’s current value and wait for me to move the mouse. Ideally, slider-button should behave just like a Microsoft window vertical scroll bar…, the window doesn’t move until I move the mouse with the mouse click-hold on window scroller.

                          I agree, clicking anywhere else on the slider will cause slider-button to move and this is normal behaviour. I’m okay with this behaviour.

                          You passed along some important information I didn’t know. I can hover the mouse over the slider and move the mouse wheel. That’s GREAT news. It works as expected. No sudden slider-button jumping. It’s a good work-around for my thumb problem. An interesting side effect is, if the panel is zoomed-in a bit such that the window has a vertical scroll bar, moving the mouse wheel first scrolls the window up (or down) to its limit, then, the slider button begins to move. The same funny effect applies to rotary’s when the panel is zoomed-in.

                          And, thanks for the ‘font’ size info. I hadn’t explored that yet. But, now that I have, how do I change the ‘menu bar font’ size back to something reasonable. I found the font size control, but the font becomes too small, or too large. I can’t set the size to something in between. And the font type doesn’t change. Oooooh the learning curve.

                          BillFM

                          in reply to: Slider jumps when mouse down, mouse not moved #85830
                          BillFM
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                            More attempts…

                            I installed 5.3.201 on a friends WinXP SP3 32bit machine. I left all options ‘checked’ during the install. Same issue with linearvertical-slider and linearhorizontal-slider. Slider thumb jumps to new position when click-hold mouse on slider thumb. Ideally, thumb should only move when I move the mouse.

                            I un-installed CTRLR, deleted …appdata\CTRLR folder. Installed 5.3.201 with only 32-bit options checked. Same issue.

                            On a 3rd WinXP machine, same issue.

                            For all above testing, I’m running standalone, not VST mode.

                            I don’t think I’m doing anything wrong with CTRLR installation. It’s pretty straight forward.

                            One thing I did notice was how the window menu bar (File Edit View…) changed font size, dependent on which panel I opened. When trying ‘demo’ panels, the menu font stayed the same size (large). When trying other panels (TX7, JX8P,…) the menu bar font got smaller. After closing the panel (leaving CTRLR window open), the font reverted back to the larger font only after the mouse moved over the menu bar (did not require a click). This in itself is pretty weird. CTRLR did this on all 3 computers.

                            BTW, ‘demo’ panels also exhibited the issue of thumb jump.

                            So, does CTRLR 5.3.201 (and earlier versions I tried) have a bug (for WinXP 32-bit) or, is something missing in the build that handles mouse position relative to thumb graphic?

                            I’m not a s/w programmer so this is quite a bit beyond my capabilities. What do I try next?

                            BillFM

                            in reply to: Slider jumps when mouse down, mouse not moved #85694
                            BillFM
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                              Hello Possemo.
                              I tried that too. Actually, I had to delete settings file/CTRLR-folder or else I could not install 5.3.201.exe without it crashing after being launched.

                              This time I left all the install options checked…, same result.
                              I also tested a DEMO panel with the vertical slider…., same result.

                              Any chance there’s a debug window I can open to see what’s being read from the mouse? Or, some sort of trace message window to observe what CTRLR is seeing?

                              I appreciate the help you guys are passing along.
                              I’ll also mention, the PC has WinXP Service Pack3, all updates applied.

                              And just out of curiosity, I inserted vertical slider controls in an Excel spreadsheet (part of Visual Basic). The thumb does not jump there.

                              BillFM

                              in reply to: Slider jumps when mouse down, mouse not moved #85674
                              BillFM
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                                Hello Dasfaker. Another good suggestion. But…,

                                The slider style is set to LinearVertical when I look at Componentproperties (in Panel Mode, General,and Utility tabs).

                                I also tried Roland MKS-7 panel. These sliders also jump when click-hold mouse left-button.

                                If I zoom waaaaaaaay IN the panel and I can get the mouse arrow directly on the horizontal-centerline of the thumb, then it does not jump. However, this is highly impractical (from a user perspective).

                                I also tried changing the vert/hor size of the thumb. Didn’t help.

                                I’m guessing, somewhere in CTRLR source code (or LUA?), the mouse down button code should be looking within the area occupied by the slider thumb to determine if the mouse click is inside or outside the area of the slider thumb. In my case, the code always thinks the mouse click is outside this area.

                                I’ll change some of the other slider Component values and see if this helps.

                                BillFM

                                in reply to: Slider jumps when mouse down, mouse not moved #85670
                                BillFM
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                                  Thanks for the suggestion. 5.3.201 gave the same result.

                                  One of the panels I tried was the TX7 v1.0, built using 5.3.122. The lowest CTRLR version I could find was 5.3.191 (my error for listing 5.3.1 in original post). I read it was better to use a CTRLR version similar to the one used to make the panel. That’s why I didn’t use latest release.

                                  I also tried the latest, 5.5.2 and it would not launch:
                                  CTRLR-Win32.exe – Entry Point Not Found
                                  The procedure entry point CreateSymbolicLinkW could not be located in the dynamic link library KERNEL32.dll.

                                  Rotary components work just fine.

                                  It’s only the slider that jumps as soon as I click-hold the left mouse button on slider thumb. It does this with both horizontal and vertical sliders.

                                  When installing CTRLR, I unchecked options for 64bits and VST. I’m running 32bits, stand-alone.

                                  Since the slider jumps with any panel I download, I suppose it could be a compatibility issue with my Dell laptop. BTW, I also tried a USB mouse (as opposed to laptop touchpad), same result.

                                  I’ll keep digging.
                                  BillFM

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