Re: [Traverso-devel] jack bus confusion

[plutek]

Excerpts from Remon Sijrier's message of Thu Aug 26 16:33:10 -0400 2010:
> > greetings!
> 
> from earth :)

oh dear,you're stuck THERE, are you?!

> You probably are using an existing project. When you have jack as the audio 
> driver, and add a new track, only then jack ports are created (in/out) for 
> that track, and the ports have the same name as the track name.
> These jack ports are stored so after a project close/open the jackports will 
> again show up in the patchbay.
> These 'audiobuses' are stored separate from the track itself, so right now 
> they are persistent even if the track itself is removed. Maybe not that good 
> an idea after all hehe.
> 
> the confusing part is when you look in the input/output routing section, 
> there 
> you will see an item that has the exact same name as the track name.
> it's the 'container' that holds your jack ports. it's internally called 
> 'audiobus' in Traverso, and it's simply a list of jack ports, or alsa 
> channels 
> (the grayed out ones, which have the Capture 1-2 names etc)
> 
> I guess the solution is to detect the driver in use for a project, and then 
> simply create jack in/out ports for each and every track, and not showing 
> them 
> in the in/out routing section of the track manager ?
> (that means you can't use the post send feature on jack ports, that is, 
> changing gain send and balance)
> 
> The idea behind making it possible to 'remove' those jack ports is that you 
> can add them back later, or re-use jack ports for another track...
> 
> The mechanism for adding/removing jack ports is there, I just need to add a 
> button to add/remove them so right now, once you removed the jack ports they 
> can't be re-added.

ok... thanks for all the explanation. certainly maximum flexibility is a big 
bonus. the only downside is that we will need documentation, since things might 
not be what most humans expect. that's ok by me.

> Anyway, suggestions are welcome!
> 
> My own suggestion:
> * the new track dialog gives the option to create a track with n channels (so 
> no longer mono/stereo, just n channels defaulting to 1)

yes, arbitrary channel counts for tracks are important.

> * this channel count is stored in the project file, and when the driver == 
> jackd, then create channelcount in/out ports.

makes sense.

> * maybe differentiate in/out ports i.e. have the option to only have jack in 
> ports, only jack outports or both. (a checkbox for in and a checkbox for out)

i suppose, although i can't think of too many situationsin which we would want 
exclusively one or the other.

> * the channelcount can be changed during the lifetime of the track.??

probably not necessary. (?)

> P.S.
> The qwerty navigation in git is a little bit broken...

right -- looking forward to when it works!
also, vertical zoom doesn't appear to work currently.

anyway, thanks again for all the work, remon! it's exciting to see all this 
development. i love how traverso is carving out a unique niche amongst 
available DAWS.

cheers!


-- 
.pltk.