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A project log for rPi bare metal vGuitar rig

An attempt to create a working live guitar rig that includes effects, midi synthesizers, loopers, controllers, and user feedback systems.

patrickPatrick 09/03/2019 at 00:250 Comments

Getting back to the project after a month of playing with 3D printing.

I have cleaned up slightly, recompiled and somewhat tested all the example test programs.

This *might* be an opportunity to grab a copy of this *preliminary* source code.

The "ui" branch and the "4 track recorder" are broken (and obsolete as is).

The next things I want (need) to work on is basically the integration of the UI and Audio systems along with MIDI.

This "triangle" is fundamental.   The UI reflects and modifies the state of the audio devices (vu meters, volume controls, etc).  As well, The UI should be able to create  a generalized MIDI control and the audio devices themselves should react to, and possibly generate MIDI events.  I am struggling a bit with "who is in charge" and how to best compartmentalize and factor this functionality.

It also plays into the linking of things.

Although interesting at first, the emulation of the static initialization of the Teensy Library objects (and the Arduino like setup() and loop() methods) is proving to be awkward and constraining.   Circle dynamically allocates the kernel, and static initialization of major objects does not fit well with it's model.   Furthermore statically creating audio objects means that they cannot be deleted consistently at run-time. This is particularly bad for AudioConnections, but relevant for all the audio objects.   A better model, going forward, is that things like connections between audio devices, as well as the audio devices themselves, are entirely created at runtime, allowing for the configuration (audio routing) to be modified more consistently.  

Finally, the UI System (wsWindows) is so-so as it is.  I have been struggling to avoid the complexity of a true windowing system with a zOrder for all windows objects, with appropriate clipping, so that windows are "updated" and the visible portions are redrawn as necessary even when other windows are popped up over them.  It's really complicated to implement and I can't decide how important that behvior is.   It is expected from a full blown windowing system, but perhaps may not be needed for this targeted use of the rPI.

So as I get the AudioDevice-MIDI-UI triangle sorted out a bit, I am going to try to rework my old "4 track recorder" example into the new wsWindows environment and see how it feels.

Anyways, just wanted to let you know I'm back on it ...

- Patrick

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