How to detect channel correctly?

[RadekPilich]

For most synths, the auto-detected MIDI channel is wrong.

What can I do about it?

needsChannelSpecificDetection doesn't make a difference.

Can I force KK to force load MIDI channel from the adoption file?
(considering I keep my physical setup fixed)

I know I need to better understand createDeviceDetectMessage and channelIfValidDeviceResponse if I want to try to improve the adoptions.

[christofmuc]

From the adaptation programming manual:

"

Confusion about MIDI channel and "Device ID".

Note that many synths call the individual setting its Device ID and not the MIDI channel. Think of the Device ID as a channel used only for sysex messages. The idea was if you have more than one device of the same type, you still want to be able to communicate with each device separately, so you would set them to different device IDs in their setup and then the computer. In many documents (and the Orm) this gets confused/mixed up/used interchangingly with MIDI channel, so please be aware there are subtle differences.

Note that also many synths while allowing to specify a device ID actually will ignore it when being addressed. Many implementations are incomplete.
"

What works mostly:

createDeviceDetectMessage is called either once or 16 times, once for each MIDI channel. That depends on the return value of needsChannelSpecificDetection().

channelIfvalidDeviceResponse() should return -1 on a message that is not from the synth, and the MIDI channel when it is correct. Sometimes, you cannot spot the MIDI channel from the message, then I just return 0.

channeIfValidDeviceReponse() might additionally detect the sysex device ID of the synth. This can be stored in a global variable in the python module and later be reused when creating messages with a specific device ID.

On startup, the "Quick detect" is run - this calls createDeviceDetect with the stored MIDI channel to the stored MIDI interface, and expects a positive answer via channelIfValidDeviceResponse().

The process is a bit quirky given there are so many different ways to do this. Check the settings file (%APPDATA%\knobkraftorm\knobkraftorm.settings ) before launching the Orm, and then check the MIDI log (without running manually the autodetection) to see if the synths were probed on the correct channels and devices.

[RadekPilich]

Chris, I've read this before.... except the last paragraph, which is exactly what I needed to move forward. Thanks 👍

[christofmuc]

Glad I could help!

[RadekPilich]

(EDIT: mentions of auto-detect below actually refer to quick detect)

So I can edit the settings file and make it read-only.
Not ideal, but good enough.
How to deal with the discrepancy afterwards?
I use Summit on channel 8, but the auto-detect sees it as channel 2.
If settings file has channel 2 set, auto-detect works, not with other channels.

Given that auto-detect takes the setup channel, I have to edit the settings file to channel 2.
Then maybe I could force change the channel that adoption uses?

I can't get it to work though. It seems the settings always override the adoption, which makes sense.

I've tried to force bankSelect to use channel 8, but program change still doesn't work.
Can I force program change to use a channel specified in the adoption?

Is there some way around this?

[RadekPilich]

Oh, I've found createProgramChangeMessage in the Matrix 6 adoption.

But that will probably get me only half way

[christofmuc]

The Novation summit's implementation:

def channelIfValidDeviceResponse(message):
    if (len(message) > 9
            and message[0] == 0xf0  # Sysex
            and message[1] == 0x7e
            and message[2] == 0x7f
            and message[3] == 0x06
            and message[4] == 0x02
            and message[5:8] == novation_id
            and message[8] == 0x33  # This ought to be the Summit
            and message[9] == 0x01):
        # From that reply we cannot find out on which MIDI channel/Device ID the Summit is setup
        return 1
    return -1

It seems the device reply allows no conclusion on what the MIDI channel is, and there is also no documented way to find out. I think we need to store manually set MIDI channels differently from auto detected channels, in a separate field in the settings file. Then it would use those for quick detect on startup?

[RadekPilich]

That could work I guess.