Is "Instrument Macros" meta-device really needed?

Help, Support & Bugs
1

I think that the “Instrument macros” meta-device is redundant and could be easily replaced by the already existing “Instr. MIDI Control” and “Instr. Automation”.

in the first case, a standard MIDI CC scheme for the 8 macros could be defined (f.e.: CC #81-88), plus other standard parameter controls (f.e.: global instrument volume at CC#07)

in the second case, the “Instr. Automation” could automatically recognize that the linked instrument is a standard XRNI and expose its standard controls (macros, global volume, global pan, …)

this could help interchanging between MIDI, Plugin and Sample-based instruments more easily: if I want to replace one with another now, I should delete the meta-device (which means automation would be lost) and then add the new one and recreate automations

2

And what if you are layering an external hardware synth with internal samples?
If the external synth is listening to CC #81 and higher? then you have a specific control problem…

3

yes, of course those default MIDI CC should modifyable in order to avoid such issues

4

Not sure what you mean …
But let me make myself clear …
I created a wavestation like instr…4 separate waveforms …each waveform has it’s own instrm …fx +gainer, Assigned gain slider 1.2.3.4 to a macro control …1.2.3.4.
Now in in order to do vector crosffading bewteen the waveforms with an xy pad, I need to have acces to these macro’s (which control the gain of each waveform ) , the only way is to load a macro metadevice …so why would you want to delete it ?
Unless I am totally mistaken

5

suppose you have created a song using a MIDI instrument, then you feel unsatisfied with the MIDI sound and want to subsitute it with a sample-based sound. the only way to re-assign the parameters of the MIDI instrument to the new one is to delete the “Instr. MIDI” device (this operation will delete all automations associated with it) and replace it with “Instrument Macros” meta-device and rewrite every automatons from scratch.

I don’t see any advantage in creating a dedicated meta-device for macros, as everything it has is already contained into the other two meta-devices and also the MIDI one has even more capabilities (PB controls and Control Changes), which may be useful in future expansion of XRNI.

at least it should be easily possible to choose among the three meta-devices by exposing the macros to the other two devices

6

yes but what if you want to control the macrometadevices with an xy pad ?

7

I also felt that it seemed a bit redundant. Why not just expose the macros as parameters in the Instrument Automation list?

8

you can already use MIDI mappings to bound a Macro rotary to your pad, and this is not in contrast with what I am proposing.

the whole idea behind new XRNI format was in the beginning to progressively reduce the distance between samples, MIDI and plugin instruments. In my opinion this new meta-device does not go into this way, at least as long as it is the only way to automate the macro values from inside the pattern