[ardour-users] bcf2000 + ardour2.0.2 problems

[Kevin Cosgrove]

On 29 May 2007 at 19:02, Joe Hartley <jh at brainiac.com> wrote:

> Kevin Cosgrove <kevinc at doink.com> wrote:
> > I'll go back to B-Control mode and follow those instructions
> > in great detail, and I'll see how it might differ from ardour
> > 2.0.2.

When the BCF is in "B-Control" mode, then I used your Generic
MIDI stuff, below, but left the Mackie stuff unselected.  Also
"MTC", "MMC", and "MIDI Parameter Control" need to be checked in
the "control" row of the "MIDI" tab of the Options Editor window.
At this point I can program a button for mute and solo in the
mixer window, and I can program a gain slider.  I can operate
with ardour and watch the BCF change and I can operate with the
BCF and watch ardour change.  I don't seem to be able to program
record enable as hovering over it and holding control-MMB doesn't
bring up an "operate controller now" pop-up.

> Very very quickly, I found that besides making the MIDI connections 
> via QJackCtl as documented,

Done.

> I needed to choose the following things in Ardour:
> 
> Options -> Control Surfaces -> Generic MIDI  checked
> Options -> Control Surfaces -> Generic MIDI Controls -> Feedback   checked

When the BCF is in "Logic Control" mode, then I did the same
things for the Mackie control surface.  These must be done
_before_ checking the options below, which by the way need to be
checked in the "mcu" row.  If I check the "mcu" options first,
then I get an error about the mackie already being connected and
the qjackctl MIDI connections get disconnected.

> Options -> Send MTC   checked
> Options -> Send MMC   checked
> Options -> Use MMC   checked

I find that I only need to check "MIDI Parameter Control" in the
"mcu" row for some communication between the BCF and ardour to
work.  I leave "MMC" and "MTC" checked in the "control" row.

> I could then move the fader and affect the volume (after
> binding with ctl-MBB) but more often than not, moving the
> Ardour fader would then crash Ardour!  More to come...

I don't need to bind with ctrl-MMB.  Checking Mackie does that
for me.  In fact buttons on the BCF control the mute, rec and
solo ardour.  The sliders on the BCF change the gains in ardour.
Nothing I do in ardour changes the BCF.  Another thing that is
still a problem is that after I use the slider to change ardour's
gain, then the slider moves back to the bottom of it's range.
At least it leaves ardour's gain where I set it.  If I hold the
slider in place, then it quits trying to drop to the bottom.

For what it's worth.  It appears the magic for me to get my BCF
to mcu input trace working was to check the "MIDI Parameter
Control" button.

So, more is working with my setup for ardour 2.0.2 now.  But, I
haven't figured out how to make it work as well as it does with
ardour 2rc1.

I looked at the webpage for how to save a sysex file to program the
BCF to control ardour.  With ardour 2.0.2 (I didn't look at any other
version) I see that ardour created some stuff in my ~/.ardour2/ardour.rc 
file, specificly this section:

  <ControlProtocols>
    <Protocol name="Generic MIDI" feedback="1" feedback_interval="10000" active="yes">
      <controls>
        <controllable name="gaincontrol" id="86" event="0xb0" channel="0" additional="0x51" feedback="yes"/>
        <controllable name="mute" id="105" event="0xb0" channel="0" additional="0x4a" feedback="yes"/>
        <controllable name="gaincontrol" id="19" event="0xb0" channel="0" additional="0x58" feedback="yes"/>
        <controllable name="solo" id="104" event="0xb0" channel="0" additional="0x42" feedback="yes"/>
        <controllable name="gaincontrol" id="101" event="0xb0" channel="0" additional="0x52" feedback="yes"/>
        <controllable name="gaincontrol" id="116" event="0xb0" channel="0" additional="0x53" feedback="yes"/>
        <controllable name="gaincontrol" id="131" event="0xb0" channel="0" additional="0x54" feedback="yes"/>
      </controls>
    </Protocol>
  </ControlProtocols>

I'm hoping that I might program the ardour interface with the BCF by 
changing the simpler ardour.rc file rather than doing sysex stuff.
I had a grep at the source and found "recenable" in track.cc which
_might_ be the control name for record enable.  I'm not exactly sure
how to build the rest of the info that might be desired here.  Hmmm.

It looks like, for my setup anyway, that B-Control mode on the BCF 
and Generic MIDI in ardour are going to be the way to go.  I wish I 
could use the Mackie preset stuff, as it already did a lot of the 
work for me in 2rc1.  But, it seems that some programming of the BCF 
setup is all that stands between me and ardour/BCF convenience.


Thanks....

--
Kevin