Midi Page selection still broken in v3.2??

Actually, even more broken?

Formerly the "Select Midi Page #x" hotkey had "Hold" and "Toggle" modes. What was missing was "Trigger".

Now, it only has "Hold". Whoever went to fix it didn't have their best day it seems. Or am I missing something here??? I can't believe they'd break something that simple even more?

Please tell me I'm wrong...

Cheers, h00la

 

Bump... Is no-one using this feature at all???

OK, it was broken from the start, so everyone has a workaround and won't even notice that it's borked? Then it would be consequent if NI simply removed it to save disk space... =)

-h00la

 

The problem with Trigger is that it will latch the new page up and won't release it. With hold you generate one value when pressed and one value when released Trigger only produces a value when pressed. It would be good to have hold and toggle but don't hold your breath.

Phil

 

you can always edit the hotkey file manually. which is what i did. but then you gotta add entries to switch back to the other page otherwise you'll, as phil pointed out, be stuck at that page.

 

Well, in v3.1.3 there were "Hold" and "Toggle". Now "Toggle" was dropped, and with good reason. What is needed for a different scenario as "Hold" is "Trigger".

Let's see if I can explain this.

* The "Hold" scenario is like a "Shift" key where you usually use Midi page #1 and just use pages #2-4 in a 2-buttons-pressed mode. Fine, there are uses for that.

* A "Trigger" scenario is when I want to use Midi pages in a radio-button-mode. That's what I think is the other useful mode apart from a shift-mode. Of course this means that once you trigger page #2, to get back to #1 you have to trigger that. This way when I punch the button for page #2, then I *know* that page #2 is active.

* A "Toggle" mode makes no real sense in my opinion: Assume I start Traktor with Midi page #1 active. Then I toggle page #2 on, then off. Now what is the active Midi page? Page #1? Then this has a "special status" as "Midi page selected when the others are not toggled on". Very awkward. When I tried with v3.1.3 to implement the midi pages, I kept having to punch buttons twice, without any visual feedback as to which page was active.

Are you saying that I can add "Trigger" functionality manually in the hotkey file? May be worth a try; then this would mean that what is "broken" is the preferences GUI, not the Midi page feature itself.

Thanks for your input, Cheers, h00la

 

you just open the .tks file in a text editor (notepad isn't a good choice though...doesn't display the file in a neatly formated way). here's the code from the file. i changed the type to toggle (3) and added these to each page.

the TYPE= changes between the different control types.

 

A couple of good editors if you want to edit these files.
if you do edit these files file BACKUP your originals first. Incorrect edits can hose Traktor and cause it to crash in some cases. That being said this is a godd way to get the functionality you want.
The are a bunch of hacks for the TKS files parhaps a new thread to capture these would be good?

If you need a good editor try either of these two...
TextPad
http://www.textpad.com/


XML Notepad
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...49-787d-4118-ba5f-4f30fe913628&displaylang=en

Phil

 

Thanks for the hints, I'll use my good ole EMACS or Ultraedit (sometimes EMACS behaves funny with unicode).

What would be interesting is if there is a list to correlate the IDs to the functions; otherwise it'll be a bit of saving similar tks's and diff'ing them.

Cheers, h00la

 

Yeah its one of the things we will need to do I think as part the documentation effort. Its stuff we could post into the Wiki when it comes online ;-)

Phil

 

OK, gave it a try. Turns out editing the hotkeys tks file makes the preferences look OK, but either "Trigger" does not do what I want it to do (better: what I think is the only logical thing it could do), or it doesn't work at all.

Here's what I added:

In the Preferences it looks OK, however none of the keys changes the Midi page from #1 to any other.

So it's not just "forgotten to put in the preferences GUI" but the "Trigger" option is not implemented for select Midi page.

Just once more, why I keep bringing it up: One of Traktor 3's main features is the 4 decks. Without proper Midi page implementation, it is not worth half. The only reason I can use them is because the Kontrol-DJ programmer has properly programmed his "Konverter"-util to make 4 decks work.

Can anyone else confirm this? Otherwise there's another bug report headed your way, NI =)

Oh, yeah, the WIKI! Almost forgot =) If anyone reads this and wants to help write up some starting content for the upcoming Traktor-Wiki, go check with Phil for an account!

Cheers, h00la

 

@h00lah00la

read your thread in the kontrol-dj forum.
and so i have landed here. and i can 100% confirm your experiences.
what is missing is the trigger function to make the "change midi page" work 100% properly.

so unfortunately the select midi page function is still useless.

cheers
chill

 

That is only partially true.
It works fine on my BCR2000 where I can chooose button modes. You might check to see which modes your controller can support / produce. Ultimately though you are correct in that Trigger mode need to be added to the list of control types.

Phil

 

@phil

i guess i know what you mean.
if a button has 2 positions e.g. half and full it would work fine, right?

edid:
the kontrol dj just has one button with this function it is the left and right lever, but it is not possible or lets say worth to sacrifice this lever for just the deck changing function, because it has much more powerful meaning in controlling.

cheers
chill

 

MIDI buttons can support 3 modes
Toggle - is where the value produces one value for the first press and release and another for the next then producing the first value for the next press and release. Typically the value of 127 is produced for on and 0 is produced for off.

Hold mode produces an on value (127) when pressed and an off value of 0 when released.

Trigger mode is the simplest of all and produces only an on value (127) when pressed.

Depending on your controller you may or may not be able to program the output but you can also easily find out whch mode it is by running MIDIOX or the MIDI Monitor tool of your choice.

Phil

 

Just for the record -

I wrote to NI's support that a "Trigger" mode should be added and this is what I've got as a reply:

"Hello... ,

As I think, this is a good idea, I will discuss your request with the Product Manager. He has to decide, if and when this can be implemented."

So "it's a good idea" after all... Let's see if they manage to implement it.

To switch the pages via Midi buttons should be possible; in case of the Kontrol-DJ a logical place would be its "konverter" software. But that would be a workaround for something that was simply not fully implemented in Traktor. And with a "Trigger" mode properly implemented you can switch via a simple hotkey, and not sacrifice Midi buttons that are good for other things...

Well, after all, the Kontrol-DJ author has worked his way around the current limitations of the Midi page selection with his "konverter" tool; as I understand several other Midi controllers do sth similarly. So while I think there are loads of cool things that could be implemented if the feature worked properly, for the moment I don't care too much =)

Cheers, h00la

 

@h00lah00la

any news? or did you probably find a workaround?

i am still missing the trigger function in the earliest version of t3 which is 3.2.2.

it would be so great to have this function implemented for usage with the kontrol-dj.

cheers
chill

 

Hi, as long as NI don't fix this, you should use the new knoverter version that was posted to the kontrol-dj forums. Check the sticky threads. That konverter version lets you use all 4 decks nicely and without resorting to the broken NI midipage feature...

Cheers, h00la

 

h00la,

i know. but i am still using the version before the latest because i have totally programmed all 4 midi pages and this took me a few hours.
+ as far as i have in my mind i guess luis made a change with the lever + jog.
meaning i am using the jog in these different ways:
1. pitch bending
2. scratching or better moving in tracks - with lever on
3. searching with - shift on

i guess this would be not possible anymore if i am changing to the latest version.

cheers
chill

 

Yes, he chose to use shift to switch between decks, therefore you have to sacrifice one of the three functions of the jogs...

But with the midi pages as NI implemented them being pretty much useless for now, that's the best workaround I think. Moreover, even with midi pages working properly, last time I tried, the soft takeover feature in v3.x wasn't working either, which again is a pain in the butt if you want to work on 4 decks. Luis fixed this as well with the lastest konverter, so all power to him and I can live with the small setback of only 2 functions per jogwheel.

Rest assured, no later than in Traktor ver 4.7 will midi pages work flawlessly!

-h00la

 

h00lah00la,

just for your information:
at the moment i am changing between the decks with the arrow keys of my keyboard in the following way:
up: a+b
down: c+d
left: c+b
right: a+d

my idea was to simply programm the deck change to the reverse playing function of the kontrol-dj. that is programmed by default to the lever down+shift.
for my needs this would be perfect to change in between the decks and you don't have to sacrifice one jog function. but this is not possible at the moment because of the missing trigger function in t3.

hopefully it will not take ni until vers. 4.7 to change this!
;-)

cheers
chill