Button/toggle automation

Dave Mollen's icon
Max Patch
Copy patch and select New From Clipboard in Max.

This kind of works inside my M4L devices.

But when I record some automation for this, it only takes one bang. After one bang it disables the automation for that button.
Is there any way around this?

ShelLuser's icon

You're creating a loop. By feeding 0 into the live.text object you're also causing it to sent the value out of the left outlet which causes a new 0 to be fed in which causes new output and so on.

You don't need these extra's to get live.text to act as a button. alt-click on a live.text object and you'll get the example patcher window. This also demonstrates how to use the live.text object as a button; just unlock that patch and copy the code.

Dave Mollen's icon

I know the live.text object has a button mode. But instead of clicking it with my mouse I want to control live.text with a midi note through Ableton Live's midi mapping. On midi controllers midi notes are toggles by nature, and that's why it works different from clicking it. This construction with [delay] turns it into a momentary switch, but somehow it messes up the automation.

Max Patch
Copy patch and select New From Clipboard in Max.

I don't think the loop is a problem. Otherwise I can change the message "0" to "set 0". But that doesn't work either. Anyway, I see only one bang for each trigger coming out of live.text. No sign of feedback.

This works with midi notes of course. But I would like the visual feedback of a button. Especially in my automation.

broc's icon

It seems that Live's automation is somewhat confused by the pseudo toggle mode. You may notice that at the same time when the automation gets disabled the red 'back to arrangement' button lights up, and manually switching it off will re-enable the automation. So in theory, re-enabling the automation could be automated again but it doesn't look like an elegant solution.

Dave Mollen's icon

Yes, I noticed that. And indeed, I don't think that's an elegant solution, because I noticed that re-enabling it creates clicks at times. So I think I should go for the toggle mode, the last patch I posted. It doesn't bother me so much as long as the yellow color is turned off. Then you have no visual feedback at all.

But I'm still a little bit surprised by Live's confusion. I think it's supposed to work.