[azslow3, gadeuvall2000] X-Touch Compact, audition preset

Started by azslow3, January 06, 2017, 05:17:09 PM

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azslow3

AZ Controller version 0.5r5b366 or later is required for this preset

That is specialized audition preset, there is no lights on buttons nor encoder rings. For this preset purpose, visual feedback is irrelevant

Beta version. Development in progress.

Requirements
AZ Controller, Sonar X or later. The preset probably works with early Sonar versions, but untested.
The system should support Windows sounds in parallel with Sonar, for example YouTube should be audible while Sonar is in focus.
Microsoft Speech API (SAPI5) is default component in all recent Windows versions, its settings like the voice and its speed can be changed throw Windows Control Panel.
For the interface audition, Sonar Accessibility window should be switched on in windows registry. If you already use other Sonar accessibility tools, the audition will be duplicated.

Installation
1. Install the latest release of AZ Controller: http://www.azslow.com/index.php/topic,6.0.html
2. Connect X-Touch Compact. Load attached here LayerA_MIDI and LayerB_MIDI preset into the device, see next post for details.
3. Add AZ Controller to Control Surfaces in Sonar Preferences, set Input and Output to X-Touch

Functionality
The preset is build on top of Gamepad preset, http://www.azslow.com/index.php/topic,342.0.html. And Gamepad can be used with this preset, so in parallel with X-Touch Compact. Compare to dedicated preset, this combined preset in respect to gamepad has: help mode, can insert tracks and buses and has a bit different layout.

The preset has build-in audible Help for all controls. To activate it, press and hold the leftmost lowest button on the surface, so the button under the first fader. You should hear "Help" once you press it. As long as you hold this buttons, touching faders, pressing other buttons, turning or pushing encoders will describe particular control functionality. In help mode controller is not changing Sonar parameters so you can not corrupt your project. Some controls have different functionality in different modes.

In Sonar there is one and only one current strip in focus. It can be bus or track. Many operations in this preset use this focused strip. In help it is mentioned as current. The preset track the focus, including changed by mouse, computer keyboard or other controllers. The focus is also changed by touching faders.

The strip section of X-Touch compact, explained later in details, controls so call "Where Am I" (WAI) region of 8 strips. The preset automatically change the region to include current strip in focus. The region is always aligned by 8 strips counted from the very first strip, so regions start at the track 1, 9, 17, etc. Current strip has no fixed position in the region, for example if current strip is track 3, it is the third in the region. If that is track 10, it is the second in the region.


The lower row of buttons under faders, unlike in usual setups are general action buttons and not strip specific. Left to right:
1. Help modifier, effective when it is hold
2. Shift modifier, effective when it is hold
3. Alt modifier, effective when it is hold
4. Audition current strip or send volume. With alt, toggle parameter changes and the interface audition.
5. Save project. With shift, new project. With alt, save as.
6. Undo. With shift, redo.
7. Insert audio track. With shift, insert midi track. With alt, insert stereo bus.
8. Toggle metronome for current transport state, play or recording. When stopped, toggle playback metronome, with shift recording metronome.
9. Mode changer. From strip control it switch between to sends control or with shift to plug-in control. In sends or plug-in control modes it switches back to the strip control mode. See modes for more details.
10. and 11., which are layer buttons can not be defined

6 transport buttons, which are right from the master fader, left to right, top to bottom:
Rewind and Fast forward. Move to or set loop or punch in and out, depending from modifier keys. With shift set points. Without shift go to points. With alt works with punch, without alt works with loop.
Loop. Toggle loop playing. With alt toggle punch recording.
Record. Start recording or stop when already in recording.
Stop. Stop transport, playing or recording.
Play. Play or pause.

Two encoder on top of rewind and fast forward buttons are:
Strip selection. Change the current strip in focus. With shift move the bank of 8 controlling strips by changing focused strip to the next or previous bank. Push to switch between tracks and buses. Turning with alt change which but Master fader controls.
Jogger. By measures, with shift by beats, with alt by markers.

Two encoder on top of the first 2 are:
Target selection. See modes.
Quick dial. Once some continues parameter is changed with strip faders, encoders or 4 right plug-in controls, this encoder start controlling the same parameter. With shift it controls it with fine precision. Use Help modifier to check which parameter it currently is. Turning with Alt when some plug-in is selected navigate throw its parameters without mapping. This parameter can then be controlled or mapped in the plug-in mode.

Topmost 4 right encoders are controlling focused plug-in. They work with shift, so can control up to 8 continues parameters and 8 switches. Use help modifier to check which parameters they currently controls and see later how to select some plug-in.


Master fader controls one of the buses, which can be changed using the strip selector encoder with alt modifier.

Modes

Strip selection mode is the default.
In this mode target selector without modifiers choose effect on the current strip, pushing it selects that effect.
With shift or with shift and alt the effect tree can be navigated to choose an effect you want to insert. Pushing with alt and shift inserts that effect.
With alt but without shift the synth can be chosen, pushing with alt selects it.

Strip faders controls strip volume.
Strip encoders controls pan, with shift gain, with alt output, with shift and alt input. If pushed, they reset pan to center, with shift reset gain to 0db, with alt reset volume to 0db, with shift and alt audition current input and output.
The buttons are toggling: solo or echo with shift, mute or interleave with shift, record arm or automation recording with shift.

In the send Control mode:
Target selector choose the send number all strip controls are working with. Corresponding send of the current strip is pronounced, for orientation. Each surface strip control the send for corresponding strip in sonar. Current strip still can be moved and in strip mode, including banks.

Strip faders control send volume.
Strip encoders controls send pan, with shift output. If pushed they reset the pan to center, with alt they reset the send volume to 0db.
The topmost buttons enable or disable sends, middle buttons toggle between pre and post and lower buttons open Send Assistant dialog for corresponding strip. Because of a bug in Sonar, Send assistant called that way is not working for buses.

In plug-in mode:
Target selector change preset in selected plug-in. Pushing it opens plug-in user interface. There is no audition for that operations.

Strip faders, encoders and buttons are controlling selected plug-in parameters. After selecting parameter using the Quick Dial encoder with alt and pushing that encoder with Alt enters the mapping mode. The parameter can be assigned to any strip control or 4 topmost right encoders. Each right encoder can control 4 different parameters, turning with and without shift and pushing with and without shift. Strip encoders can control 2 parameters, turning and pushing. To assign new parameter, use the combination you are going to use. For example, to assign current parameter to right encoder with shift you should turn this encoder with shift during the mapping. Even in the mapping mode, help button is still working with all control. So you can check which controls are already assigned. To final confirm the mapping you should use Sonar interface, it display corresponding dialog which can not be controlled from within preset. You can use keyboard buttons enter or escape for that. Your screen reader should inform you when that confirmation is needed. Note that VST3 mapping is not working because of Sonar bug.

Plug-in control
4 right encoders in all modes and strip controls in plug-in mode are using dynamical mapping to focused plug-in. This mapping can be changed using so called "ACT Learn" procedure. The work is in progress to make that process accessible. Also note that all Sonar versions have many bugs related to that mapping. You will need to use AZ ACT Fix utility.

Layer B
There are several problematic decision, made be Cakewalk and Behringer and there are some related bugs in Sonar. All that makes using Layer B not convenient.
I have not found a good workaround to make Layer B work as a MIDI controller.

The row of buttons under faders, except mode button, transport buttons and jogger encoder are working as on the Layer A. All other controls are not used.

Note that any changes in parameters currently controlled by faders in the Layer A, when made with Layer B selected, will not be restored once you are back in the Layer A. If unsure either you have changed something, shortly switch X-Touch to other mode, for example to Send Control and back to reposition faders.


Change-log:
6.1.17 Initial version
10.1.17 Audition jogging and automation arming. Sends mode for strips.
11.1.17 Fix in audition send volume pan values, shift encoder in the sends mode change the send output, actions buttons shifted (help button in the first now)
12.1.17 Some redundant actions removed, Record stop when already recording, some audition changes
13.1.17 Rearrangements in the actions buttons, input output strip settings, fast forward and rewind, right encoders.
14.1.17 Fixed input/output, removed control, shifted Share.
19.1.17 Rewritten preset, many functions are modified.
20.1.17 Bug fixes, direct plug-in parameter control with Quick Dial, dynamic mapping.
21.1.17 Bug fixes
23.1.17 X-Touch layout is changed, prepared for bypass mode testing
24.1.17 Sonar Accessibility window audition, parameter changes audition can be switched off
26.1.17 Removed MIDI mode for buttons in the Layer 1, can not work correctly due to Sonar bugs and Cakewalk/Behringer questionable decisions. LayerB.
22.2.17 Disabled MIDI mode again. A workaround is not working.
28.6.17 Function buttons 5-7
17.7.17 Changes in gamepad operations
27.7.17 Changes and fixes for gamepad and X-Touch

azslow3

Uploading hardware preset to X-Touch

X-Touch Compact can be in two hardware modes, one is Mackie Compatible and another is MIDI. The preset for AZ Controller assumes you device is in MIDI mode, with special layouts loaded.
To upload the hardware preset into the device, use Behringer X-Touch editor. You can download it from Behringer site: https://downloads.music-group.com/software/behringer/X-TOUCH/X-TOUCH-EDITORv1-21.zip

The editor requires no installation, just unzip it and run.

The editor is not accessible. I have prepared app module for NVDA: http://www.nvaccess.org/ . In case you use other screen reader, you can install NVDA as portable. In this case it will not replace anything in your system. Install the following addon http://www.azslow.com/index.php?action=downloads;sa=downfile&id=50 into userConfig/appModules

To load hardware preset attached to the previous post, start the editor, switch the device into MIDI mode the gesture NVDA+Shift+m. Then load the preset from file, gesture NVDA+Shift+l. And then upload it to the layout A, the gesture NVDA+Shift+a. For the layer B the gesture is NVDA+Shift+b. For all operations, the editor asks for confirmation. NVDA should announce the dialogs, but they are also not accessible. Press enter, you should hear that the focus returns to the editor.

gadeuvall2000

Just wanted to publicly announce that the preset is working properly so far.

Klaus

Hi Alexey,

wow, impressive list of functions!

Interesting, that you made this preset for X-Touch Compact's Mackie mode instead of MIDI mode.
Any advantages? Just curious...  ;)

I will certainly test your preset but it will take a couple of days before I'm able to do it.


OT, but while I'm here, a quick question regarding Sends:

I'm not able to control Send Volume (Action list: Send +0 parameter Volume) for Aux Tracks in SONAR.

It works for Tracks, Buses, Mains but not if I insert a Send directed to an Aux Track.

Can you reproduce this?

(new project, SONAR 22.10 r0 b19, AZ Controller 0.5 r3 b344)

Thanks and Frohes Neues!

Klaus


azslow3

Hi Klaus! Frohes Neues!

We have plans to switch into MIDI mode. We plan to test either in MIDI mode faders have the same precision as in Mackie (original MCU has 10bit, but Behringer editor shows 0-127, even for PitchBend event type, I do not know how to interpret that). Also I want to check what happens with faders if Layout A and Layout B have exactly the same presets. For this plug-in purpose, I want the device is not doing anything when these layers are switched by mistake or check that I can be informed when layout switch has happened.

In Mackie mode, 6 right encoders are buttons only and 2 right encoders are not pushable. But layout buttons and "normal". So the difference (with AZ Controller...) is 2 more buttons vs loosing 6 encoders and 2 encoders buttons. That is not "fair" trade...

Sends to AUX are not controllable from surfaces. Sonar bug, since introduction of AUX tracks. I have reported that to CW, but you know how fast they normally react...

Cheers,
Alexey.

PS. There was many internal changes between b344 and current b351... some have uncovered bugs which was then fixed, but in general b351 should be better. I plan to add several small functions and release 0.5r4 soon.

Klaus

Damn, I almost knew this would be a bug in SONAR and not in AZ Controller! ;)

Wait and see, but it's most probably not high on their list of fixes...
My workaround for now is using a Send to a bus first (bus' output to the Aux Track) and then hide the bus. Works.

I'm really interested in your tests how the X-Touch faders behave in the two different modes.

I didn't notice a difference when I tested it in Mackie mode first, but that means nothing because I switched rather quickly to MIDI mode because of the limitations you mentioned (loss of 6 encoders and 2 encoder buttons).
(actually that was only one reason because I knew I could change a lot more to my liking with AZ Controller, e.g. Buttons S/M/S (MCU) to M/S/R like in SONAR, and Select buttons to the row below the faders...and a lot more) :)

And thanks for the heads up regarding b344/b351, I had every version downloaded already but was a bit lazy... :)

Best,
Klaus

azslow3

We have tested several things yesterday, the result:
1) X-Touch Compact faders have low (7bit) resolution, in both modes
2) when the same message is assigned to the same control in both layers, Compact updated current layer only, "remembering" previous value for other layout. I have not tested what happens when messages are different.
3) while the editor indicates static table on which Compact reacts (like always CC for faders), it reacts on reassigned MIDI. Either it reacts also on shown messages I have not checked.

Its not only AUX...  When send is pointing toward side-chain, the output is not controllable. Also I have hard time to "find" Synth and Buses related to current track.

gadeuvall2000

Right now, the preset is being advanced in midi mode.   More features and functions to be added.   Slow steady process makes it much easier.


When preset is stable and many features are added, I will make a YouTube video.

gadeuvall2000

I am going to do a large youtube video series on this plugin.  I have been getting inquiries about this setup so I thought I would do a video series to reach other blind/visually impaired users.