BTDSys PeerCtrl

Installation

Put BTDSys PeerCtrl.dll in your Gear\Generators folder.

Overview

PeerCtrl is a general purpose control machine. It allows you to:

• Group parameters from several machines into one machine
• Access parameters which normally may not fit on the screen
• Control parameters with inertia, even where the target machine does not normally allow this
• Assign non-linear mappings of slider to control value
• Use a Doepfer Pocket Dial or pitchbend wheel to control Buzz parameters

To use:

• Add PeerCtrl to your song, along with some other machine.
• You don't need to connect anything to PeerCtrl in the machine view.
• Right click PeerCtrl and select Assignment Settings.
• In this dialog, choose the machine and parameter you want to control.
• Click OK.
• Use PeerCtrl's parameters to control the other machine.

Parameters

Global parameters

• Inertia - Sets glide time on the parameters.

Track parameters

• Slaved - If this is switched on, this track is controlled by the slider of the previous track, rather than by its own. This gives you a (primitive) way of controlling more than one parameter at once (a future version will have a better way than this).
• Value - The value to use for the controlled parameter. This is affected by the defined mapping.

Attributes

• MIDI Inc/Dec Amount - this sets the sensitivity, when MIDI increment/decrement messages are used.
• Ctrl Rate - sets how frequently PeerCtrl performs control changes between ticks. When this attribute has a value n, control changes will occur every 256×n samples (as well as on every tick). The exception is a value of zero, which causes control changes to occur only on the tick.
  In general, smaller values result in smoother inertia & MIDI control, but place a heavier load on the CPU.

Assignment Settings Dialog

This is where you assign which parameters you want to control.

• 1. Track list - lists the tracks in the PeerCtrl machine, along with their assigned machines and parameters. The highlighted item is currently being edited.
• 2. Clear button - sets the current track to "No Assign".
• 3. << button - saves the changes made to this assignment. You must click this, if you do not want to lose your changes.
• 4. Machine dropdown - lists all machines in the current song.
• 5. Parameter list - allows you to select the parameter to be controlled. Both [G]lobal and [T]rack parameters are listed.
• 6. Track dropdown - if you select a [T]rack parameter, which track on the target machine will be controlled.
• 7. Value mapping - controls the correspondence of values set on PeerCtrl's sliders, and the actual control values sent. The example shown here is a kind of exponential scale, with positive gradient.
• 8. Info buttons - presents technical information on the currently selected machine and parameter. If this means nothing to you, you probably do not need it ;)
• 9. MIDI CC settings button - opens the MIDI CC dialog (see below).

MIDI CC Settings Dialog

PeerCtrl uses its own MIDI controller features rather than Buzz's (Buzz's can of course still be used, but offer less functionality in general).

• 1. Track information - information on the track these settings will apply to.
• 2. Controller information - move a controller on your MIDI device (including pitchbend wheel, program change control, or incremental dial on Doepfer Pocket Dial) and its number will be displayed here.
• 3. Controller dropdown - use this to choose which controller number to respond to.
• 4. Channel dropdown - use this to choose which MIDI channel to respond to.
• 5. Feedback check box - enables MIDI feedback for use with Doepfer Pocket Dial. In this mode, any parameter changes will be fed back out through your computer's MIDI out port.
• 6. Feedback output device - use this to select which device MIDI feedback will use. This device must also be enabled in Buzz's preferences.
• 7. Inc/Dec check box - enables MIDI increment/decrement messages (controllers 96 and 97) to increment or decrement the controlled parameter. The amount of movement per message (and hence the sensitivity of control) is set in PeerCtrl's Attributes dialog.

History

• v1.0: first public release
• v1.1: fixed crashing on song load bug, added control rate attribute

Contact

If you have comments or suggestions, or if you find any bugs please email me.
This machine is DONATIONWARE, so if you like it, send me something cool (eg CDs, hardware, money etc). Email for details of how to get stuff to me.
Also my website is here... not that there's much of interest there...

Docs and code ŠEd Powley (BTDSys), September 2002 - March 2003
Thanks to everyone who alpha tested this machine, suggested features and pointed out bugs - especially Matt Jackson for feedback on the Pocket Dial stuff