Re: [linux-audio-user] Newbie Linux user Struggling with MIDI

Thanks very much for the info! When I did the aconnect -i and aconnect
-o I didn't see any of the through-ports - bad sign?
  client 0: 'System' [type=kernel]
    0 'Timer '
    1 'Announce '
client 64: 'CS46XX' [type=kernel]
    0 'CS46XX '
fractalvibes@email-addr-hidden:~$ aconnect -o
client 64: 'CS46XX' [type=kernel]
    0 'CS46XX '

thanks,

Phil J.

>not suprising that you'd find it confusing. it is confusing.
>
>1) sending MIDI to a h/w synth on a souncard
> a) you need to find out which ALSA sequencer port is representing
> the synth. the simplest way to find out is from the command line
> with the command:
>
> aconnect -o
>
> the output should give you some clue about a pair of numbers
> to use that correspond to your soundcanvas. For example:
>
>---- output from aconnect -o on my system -------
>client 0: 'System' [type=kernel]
> 0 'Timer '
> 1 'Announce '
>client 62: 'Midi Through' [type=kernel]
> 0 'Midi Through Port-0'
>client 72: ' MIDI 1' [type=kernel]
> 0 ' MIDI 1 '
> 32 ' MIDI 2 '
>--------------------------------------------------
>
> that third client, mysteriously enough, is an RME HDSP
> with 2 h/w MIDI ports. the first h/w port would be
> sequencer port 72:0, the second 72:32.
>
> the pattern is: <client ID>:<port ID>
>
> b) then get hold of pmidi, a nice command line tool
> for sending MIDI to an ALSA sequencer port. use this
> command to do what you want:
>
> pmidi -p <clientID>:<portID> yourmidifile.mid
>
> changing the values of <clientID>, <portID> and the name
> of the file to something more appropriate, such as
>
> pmidi -p 72:0 bach_tocatta_and_fugue.mid
>
>
>2) getting audio back
>
> This is actual much harder to describe. It depends on the
> intimate and ugly details of your Soundscape's builtin
> h/w mixer, and without access to it, it will be hard
> to describe what you need to do. Every h/w mixer in every
> card is different, despite the presence of a few
> "standards" for such things.
>
> What you will need is an ALSA program to manipulate the
> h/w mixer. I like alsamixer, which runs in a terminal
> window; I like it because it shows me everything and
> doesn't try to be all cute like a generic windows mixer app.
>
> The goal is to identify which signal stream corresponds
> to the output of the MIDI h/w synth, and select it
> as the capture source (in alsamixer, done by moving
> the "focus" to that mixer/signal stream, and pressing
> the spacebar.
>
> After that, every app that records from the soundscape
> will be listening to the output from the MIDI synth.
>
>If this all appears arcane and absurd, don't worry, it is.
>
>The problem on linux is that we (generally) attempt to use generic tools
>that are independent of the particular h/w installed. For very simple
>things, this works well, but audio + MIDI interfaces really do not tend
>to benefit from the current approach that has been taken, and it
>requires a lot of knowledge on the part of the user to make sense of the
>information that is presented.
>
>--p
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
Received on Sun Jul 31 04:15:16 2005