Max For Live device randomly resets interface settings
I've made my own Max for Live device that I use in Ableton, but what I've noticed is that sometimes it will randomly have reset all of the UI settings in the plugin interface. This includes all toggles that I had turned on being set to off, and all number fields which had a value being reset to 0. I haven't been able to establish when this happens or what the cause is. Does anyone know why this might be happening?
Its hard to tell without a patch attached.
What does sometimes mean?
- After relaunching Ableton?
- After relaunching the set?
- During a live session?
Do you use initial values?
How do you store the values?
Etc.
Thanks for your reply,
Unfortunately I haven't been able to pinpoint exactly what precedes this, but my guess is that is happens sometimes when I reopen the live set (which would probably be when I relaunch ableton, since I almost always relaunch ableton). I'm guessing this doesn't happen during a live session. I can't really attach the patch because it is a very large plugin that is very complex. I will try to reproduce this issue with a small plugin and see if it happens at the same time though.
The values are stored inside the live.numbox and live.text objects (for the live.text, I have the "toggle" option enabled, so it acts like a toggle and lights up orange when enabled. Sometimes it saves its state just fine).
I don't use initial values because I figured it would just default to off (which I think it does mostly). I have a feeling that all the internal memory of the plugin is getting wiped somehow, but I'm not sure what could cause this. Especially since it works half the time.
Update:
I've just discovered a new clue. Once I noticed that the state had been wiped somehow, and all numboxes were 0 and all toggles were off. But then I saved the project (yes, I saved it), and then when I reopened it, the state was back. The numbox now showed a non-zero number, and several toggles were now orange (on) again. So, the live set is still storing the state of the plugin, but somehow the plugin doesn't remember its own state sometimes. Overall I'm still confused about this.
This sometimes happened if the Audio Engine in Ableton Live is disabled/no Output Source is selected. Could this be happened in your case? This fixes, as you already mentioned, when the Audio Engine is restarted and you reopen the project.
This sound like your device is having trouble with initialization.
Do you perhaps use loadmess instead of live.thisdevice for some functions?
Do you have Parameter Mode enabled (which is a must have for storing values in Live properly)?
Again, hard to tell without a patch or the device attached. ;)
when live´s audio engine is off, when loading a live set, M4L devices are not loaded correct. I can reproduce this behavior.
Oh, that is true! I forgot about that issue and can confirm it as well.
This could indeed be your issue, since you always restart Live when opening your set again.
Yep, I've now confirmed that this is the issue, thank you for your help! I also found out that if I delete the device and then press undo, it will come back with all the state intact. So that is a quick fix. Thanks guys. If there is a place I can report this bug to Ableton, I will do that. Let me know if there's a way to do that, otherwise I can just email support.