Port to windows 8?

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Joe Soap
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Re: Port to windows 8?

Post by Joe Soap » 09 Feb 2013 05:17

Hey Phil - preliminary research indicates that Emulator can be ahhhhh . . . emulated . . . with Max. In fact you can go quite a bit further than simple alpha-channel transparency to reveal stuff further down the z-order.

Whole new paradigm sh*t really! ;)

Zee
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Re: Port to windows 8?

Post by Zee » 09 Feb 2013 20:00

The problem with MAX is that do not send Keystrokes to another program like Cubase, Protools etc, you need some java plugins but i found a program named "Midi Translator" that can get midi data from a device and convert to keystokes so this can be a solution with other soft running on touch screens.

Emulator Pro cost 99$ 1 year subscription..what?. :roll: and is focused in DJ. Support for keystrokes?, dont know.

There is another program for touch screens from PyMT developers, named Kivy.

And why to posible support windows RT and not windows itself?

Phil999
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Re: Port to windows 8?

Post by Phil999 » 09 Feb 2013 23:21

Kivy, another touchscreen controller I haven't tested yet. I tried, but too complicated for me. Couldn't even install that thing. Yeco, an Ableton controller application, is also based on Kivy.

There is also http://www.gesturespark.com/. Has been talked about a while ago, but it doesn't seem to come to surface. The website is on at least.

Heard of a Windows version of MorphWiz.

Surface Editor is still a good thing, just to say. If you don't mind poor graphics, but fully functional.


I think the next software I want to go into is ctrlr. Simple MIDI controlling, and finally bitmaps!
Formant+Eurorack, PPG wave 2.2, Korg MS-20, etc., EWI 4000s, QuNeo, etc., Mixbus32c, u-he, MadronaLabs, Samplemodeling, NI, etc., iPad2/4/Pro

Joe Soap
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Re: Port to windows 8?

Post by Joe Soap » 10 Feb 2013 00:17

For me it's about building an integrated system of complementary (oftentimes overlapping) tools to do the many jobs involved with music / audio production and performance. It doesn't have to be an either / or setup at all - I'm sure I'm not alone in thinking this way.

So I've no qualms about using Bomes MIDI Translator, various loopback / virtual drivers . . . hell, throw Autohotkey into that equation too if you want to go seriously meta on systems integration. At this point I have to thank you guys for the headsup on other toys to investigate - you never know when you'll stumble upon something that has a unique function or appeal to your workflow. So cheers, ears! :)

I rag on Lemur a lot basically because while it's certainly the best allround multipurpose Swiss Army tool of the lot - it's hella primitive and old-fashioned and clunky too. The pace of development is pretty glacial also, which is frustrating as it keeps the learning-curve steep for non-programmers once you step beyond the absolutely trivial case of MIDImapping naked Objects to parameters outside of Lemur.

The learning curve, BTW - did not drop one iota with the release of v4. The Editor still sucks, if anything it appears to be getting worse in terms of stability with each successive release . . . where are the in-depth tutorials? Not even a FAQ section on the forum. Guys, gals . . . it's been over a year?

That all said - I've really begun to enjoy building my shizzt in the beast. Probably because it's such a struggle that the reward of working code is a bit of a buzz!

The future is probably Max though. It's not infeasible to build Lemur in Max, and then the pace of development would be in your own hands, or it could be opened up to the world.

Bitmaps Phil? I have a fondness for vector graphics myself . . . so purdy (and scalable!) And Expression Blend is a free DL too.

Damn that was all over the shppe no? :P

Macciza
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Re: Port to windows 8?

Post by Macciza » 10 Feb 2013 03:21

Hi
I have followed a few of these various devs over the years . . .
If you think Lemur dev is 'glacial' despite regular updates over the past year I'd hate to see what you think of some of the others . . .
Ctrlr - is Lua based and can be a hell a lot harder then Lemur's c-style scripting . . .
Control - Javascript and not overly developed or supported from from what I've seen
Had not seen GestureSpark - but god it's Knobs look almost identical to Lemurs - same thing with Emulator, clearly ripped off from Lemur . . .
In fact it is amazing how many of the latter-day apps blatantly rip off the Lemur visuals and paradigm . ..
And yes Max is pretty amazing and deep and all that - but you should have seen it 10 or 15 years ago . . . I could not envision its actual progress back then to be what it is now . . .
Or if you really want to code you could look at SuperCollider . . .
Or just XCode, but thats another kettle of fish altogether . ..

The hardware Lemur was invented as one of the first 'multi-touch' devices, invented by the Lemur team. Originally built on an FPGA - Field Programmable Gate Array , think re-purposable processor not actual 'computer' per se .. .
Programmed in VHDL or some similar Hardware Description Language that describes both Behaviour(code) and Structural(logic component/interconnects) and then loaded to a programmable logic device . ..
Pretty amazing (imho) that it got over to the iPad so well in it's first incarnation. Liine responded to a lot of the initial stuff to do with legacy size limitations of various things
Some of the remaining issues are tied to fundamental decisions made almost 10 years ago when the computing landscape looked very different - PowerPC Macs, early OSX , mainly 32bit, WiFI??
I think the InApp editing may have taken a little longer to implement then they would have liked but I think the plan was to get it implemented within the year . ..
There has been a lot of unseen development that will come out later this year - the sort of stuff that can't really be incrementally introduced . . .

And there is a commitment to increased web presence and resources - but everything takes time and they can only do so much in a day, week month etc
There is definitely stuff in the pipeline, just more being put into it then can pass through it so it backs up occasionally, sorry about that . . .
Publishing can be a bit of a bugger at times and take a number of versions etc and re-edits to get to a final release . . .
Maybe I should spend less time on this Forum, and less time on my personal projects, occasional music making and other recreational activities . . .

Anyway there's work to be done so I'll just leave it all at that, and hope to have something for you all soon as . . ..
iMac 2.8G i7 12G 10.6.8/10.7.2, Legacy Dexter/Lemur, Liine Lemur/iPad2, KMI SoftStep, 12Step & QuNeo , B-Controls, Mackie C4 etc
MaxMSP, Live Suite, Native Instrument stuff, etc Modified Virtual Guitar System etc All Projects/Modules © CC-BY-NC-SA[*][/b]

Phil999
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Re: Port to windows 8?

Post by Phil999 » 10 Feb 2013 03:45

personally I like the Lemur editor very much. You can work very fast, and interact in real-time with the Lemur interface. It's perfect, for me at least.

MIDI Translator, Autohotkey . . . very good tools, but not necessary if there is music software that I can control with MIDI or OSC . . . in the attempt to keep it as simple as possible. The problem is (still) that some software does not understand OSC or certain MIDI commands. Then you have to work with key commands, but that is something I don't like much. Just as an example, the Diva plugin I'm working on, has all significant parameters laid out. I can control everything with MIDI, even the Diva modules. The target software is relevant. A DAW or plugin that cannot be bi-directinally controlled by OSC or MIDI is not usable for me. 80's and 90's are gone, in 2013 I want to have full control and full parameter feedback.

But back to the topic. I'd love to see Lemur as a computer application. On a big multitouch screen, that would be fantastic. On the other hand, I find those iPads quite useful in the studio and on stage, I just have to have more than one to have more screen estate. They're small and portable. At the moment I have four, and it's no problem at all to carry them with me. A computer and a big monitor is not portable. A multitouch-laptop is relatively portable, and I'll probably get one this year (still depending on the thunderbolt port). I hope that ctrlr will run fine, or any other controller application. Lemur would be my preference because I know it a bit, but I heard that ctrlr has also scripting options for advanced uses.

That brings us to the market problem. If Liine wanted to expand to Mac/Windows/Linux, that would need a lot of testing, and later, a lot of support. Just think about the retina display update for iPad. Non-retina iPad owners had to wait for a relatively long time until they could read the text without problems. I can imagine tons of problems coming to Liine if they made that step. They will have to hire a dozen professionals just for that porting. They cost money, and I'm not sure if the sales would compensate.

And think about the legacy Lemur. They went out of business because it was no more affordable for customers, at the advent of cheaper multitouch screens and tablets. Luckily Liine took over and released Lemur for iPad. That was probably the best thing that could happen for controller freaks. A Lemur for about $460, affordable to the 'public' for the first time.

Now, what chances would a Lemur application for computers have on the market? There's the aforementioned ctrlr, which is freeware, Surface Editor, also freeware, Kivy, open source, Usine, Emulator . . .

I do think there is a market for a Lemur computer application. The editor, the user base, the knowledge, the easy to learn program language, it's all there. And so far there is not much competition on the market; those open source applications have also their downsides, you'll have to invest quite much of your time to get a working template, while it is rather easy to do in Lemur when you are already familiar with it.
Formant+Eurorack, PPG wave 2.2, Korg MS-20, etc., EWI 4000s, QuNeo, etc., Mixbus32c, u-he, MadronaLabs, Samplemodeling, NI, etc., iPad2/4/Pro

Joe Soap
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Re: Port to windows 8?

Post by Joe Soap » 10 Feb 2013 03:56

Hey Macciza - first I'm just gonna say I appreciate you being a bit more free with the roadmap, again I suspect I'm not alone in this :).

Very interesting to learn the original hardware was implemented in FPGA - my initial reaction was to think this could (would) make the port to iEcosystem easier . . . but thankfully my brain kicked in a little and I realised that no, not necessarily. The hardware guys would have been fairly free to knock up as close to built-for-purpose µarch as possible without going to custom silicon. Hardware RAD as the foundation for a software RAD tool.

Neat!

More to follow, 'cause . . . you know. Work avoidance.

Joe Soap
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Re: Port to windows 8?

Post by Joe Soap » 10 Feb 2013 04:27

Macciza wrote:Hi
I have followed a few of these various devs over the years . . .
If you think Lemur dev is 'glacial' despite regular updates over the past year I'd hate to see what you think of some of the others . . .
Ctrlr - is Lua based and can be a hell a lot harder then Lemur's c-style scripting . . .
Control - Javascript and not overly developed or supported from from what I've seen
Had not seen GestureSpark - but god it's Knobs look almost identical to Lemurs - same thing with Emulator, clearly ripped off from Lemur . . .
In fact it is amazing how many of the latter-day apps blatantly rip off the Lemur visuals and paradigm . ..
And yes Max is pretty amazing and deep and all that - but you should have seen it 10 or 15 years ago . . . I could not envision its actual progress back then to be what it is now . . .
Or if you really want to code you could look at SuperCollider . . .
Or just XCode, but thats another kettle of fish altogether . ..
Well, all of the above may be true but has no bearing on the current pace of development on Lemur.

And no, I DON'T want to code . . . which is why I bought Lemur in the first place - but it turned out that it's not the app I imagined it to be, not by a long chalk. This is not to say it's crap or useless, because it's very useful and versatile. Just nowhere near as far along in its evolution as I'd expected. It's probably fair to say I bought into this whole effort a year too early, but at least I escaped the massive cognitive dissonance that must have accompanied the hardware purchase :D.

So I'm sorta learning how to code for Lemur and it's kinda fun and interesting but damned tedious. C'est la vie, #firstworldproblems eh?

Macciza wrote: Pretty amazing (imho) that it got over to the iPad so well in it's first incarnation. Liine responded to a lot of the initial stuff to do with legacy size limitations of various things
Some of the remaining issues are tied to fundamental decisions made almost 10 years ago when the computing landscape looked very different - PowerPC Macs, early OSX , mainly 32bit, WiFI??
Oh . . . those are a few of my favourite things. Glad to see you guys have learnt your lesson about hitching your wagon to the Apple hors . . . oh. Wait. :/

Alternatively . . . why, is that what the devs are still running? :P

Macciza wrote: I think the InApp editing may have taken a little longer to implement then they would have liked but I think the plan was to get it implemented within the year . ..
There has been a lot of unseen development that will come out later this year - the sort of stuff that can't really be incrementally introduced . . .

And there is a commitment to increased web presence and resources - but everything takes time and they can only do so much in a day, week month etc
There is definitely stuff in the pipeline, just more being put into it then can pass through it so it backs up occasionally, sorry about that . . .
Publishing can be a bit of a bugger at times and take a number of versions etc and re-edits to get to a final release . . .
Maybe I should spend less time on this Forum, and less time on my personal projects, occasional music making and other recreational activities . . .

Anyway there's work to be done so I'll just leave it all at that, and hope to have something for you all soon as . . ..
All good news. Now get cracking before someone implements the whole thing as a Firefox addon* . . .

(Wot - you don't think it's possible? ;) )

Phil999
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Re: Port to windows 8?

Post by Phil999 » 10 Feb 2013 04:40

Macciza wrote: Ctrlr - is Lua based and can be a hell a lot harder then Lemur's c-style scripting . . .
Control - Javascript and not overly developed or supported from from what I've seen
Had not seen GestureSpark - but god it's Knobs look almost identical to Lemurs - same thing with Emulator, clearly ripped off from Lemur . . .
from what I gathered, those open source softwares aren't easy to handle. Lemur isn't either, but with an acceptable learning curve. The other apps can be learned also, I think.

I could say more if I had some first hand experience (will do as soon I have time). I plan to port my Cubase Lemur template to a computer/laptop/tablet, but it works so well on the iPad, and even on the iPhone, that I'm not pressed at the moment. I rather want to free my iPads from simple tasks that my Cubase template does. The iPhone (not mine, but I can lend it when I'm in town) was a real addition to my iPads. Used the iPhone all the time, while using plugin-related templates on the iPads.

Another thought: it is not only the entire screen estate that counts. In certain circumstances, I guess four iPads are more valuable than one big multitouch screen, which have more or less the same screen estate. For reasons I don't really have to explain. You just have more options to switch and adapt to the current setup. Although I never worked with a big multitouch screen; I might change my mind. :) But only thinking about it, and including my very positive experience since one year, I think it is not far away from the truth. But it's always individual how one creates a setup or environment. If I had a big screen, and the Lemur software, I'm sure I would make some multitask template to eliminate the downside of one single controller.
Formant+Eurorack, PPG wave 2.2, Korg MS-20, etc., EWI 4000s, QuNeo, etc., Mixbus32c, u-he, MadronaLabs, Samplemodeling, NI, etc., iPad2/4/Pro

Macciza
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Re: Port to windows 8?

Post by Macciza » 10 Feb 2013 05:35

Hi
Re current dev, last update was in December, next one out soon ( we thought it would be late Jan but it's not quite baked yet)
Several major and minor updates during the year at fairly regular intervals - nightly builds really would not help the majority of users . . .
Plus a lot of 'backroom' dev that is yet to see the light the day but will hopefully 'rock ya socks' when it does come out (I hope it does anyway)
The coding side of things is what provides much of the 'richness' unfortunately - otherwise you get hobbled . . .
As is the case with some of the other apps where you can only do so much and if you don't do it there way you're high and dry . . .
Oh . . . those are a few of my favourite things. Glad to see you guys have learnt your lesson about hitching your wagon to the Apple hors . . . oh. Wait. :/
I probably should have been a little clearer there - and added Windows ME&Windows XP before the 32bit part, as PowerPC were 64 bit by that stage anyway
I probably should not have even bothered really as the FPGA was probably even narrower - perhaps 16bit? maybe
And I did not mean to imply any early tie-in with Mac at that of the game - not sure what platform was used for the VHDL dev, largely irrelevant with embedded stuff . . .
And when they started with the idea of a tablet version the iPad was possibly the only real choice. And I am pretty sure there are a few PCs hanging around with devs anyway

And actually come to think of it I do recall a few web-style controller offerings over the years though can't remember what they were . . .
And I guess html5 will only add to that - I expect webapp controller stuff will be out on W8 soon as they promote 'programming' in html5 . .

Good discussion
Cheers
MM
iMac 2.8G i7 12G 10.6.8/10.7.2, Legacy Dexter/Lemur, Liine Lemur/iPad2, KMI SoftStep, 12Step & QuNeo , B-Controls, Mackie C4 etc
MaxMSP, Live Suite, Native Instrument stuff, etc Modified Virtual Guitar System etc All Projects/Modules © CC-BY-NC-SA[*][/b]

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