Gert Wilden

I am new to this forum. After having worked professionally with LOGIC ( using LOGIC's Envirionment extensively ) for some 30 years, I also started working withg Ableton a year ago. 

I hoped, M4L would be something similar to LOGIC's envronment, just with more possibilities. 

But I found out pretty soon, that using and understanding M4L is way more basic and complex. You really havo to get into it...

And to be honest, I dont' t have the time for that right now, although I actually would like to be able to program my own stuff some day.

But for the moment I prefer asking some of you for help.

I wonder if there is somebody out there, who can program the following device for me: 

I would like to have a program switcher, which lets me select and switch up to 128 Presets via MIDI program change AND INDICATES THE ACCORDING PRESET NAME in a window, so that I know what I am selecting without having to open the PlugIn (because this might be messy in a live situation...)

I don't expect the device to fetch those names automatically by itsellf from the plugin. 

I rather thought of beeing able to import or copy those names from any kind of external text or databank (or from the Finder) into a table which is intergrated in that device (as you can do with Logic's program change tables)

The presets should be selectable either via a Menu on the screen (showing a list with all names), via up / down buttons (MIDI adressable) and directly via MIDI program change, executed from an external keyboard.

Please let me know, if this is possible for anyone, and what you would charge for this.

(or does such a device possibly already exist somewhere?)

I am new to this forum.  After having worked professionally with LOGIC ( using LOGIC's Envirionment extensively ) for some 30 years, I also started working withg Ableton a year ago. 
I hoped, M4L would be something similar to LOGIC's envronment, just with more possibilities. 
But I found out pretty soon, that using and understanding M4L  is way more basic and complex. You really havo to get into it...
And to be honest, I dont' t have the time for that right now, although I actually would like to be able to program my own stuff some day.

But for the moment I prefer asking some of you for help.
This is my question:

I wonder if there is somebody out there, who can program the following device for me: 
I would like to have a program switcher, which lets me select and switch up to 128 Presets via MIDI program change AND INDICATES THE ACCORDING PRESET NAME in a window, so that I know what I am selecting without having to open the PlugIn (because this might be messy in a live situation...)

I don't expect the device to fetch those names automatically by itsellf from the plugin. 
I rather thought of beeing able to import or copy those names from any kind of external text or databank (or from the Finder) into a table which is intergrated in that device (as you can do with Logic's program change tables)
The presets should be selectable either via a Menu on the screen (showing a list with all names), via up / down buttons (MIDI adressable) and directly via MIDI program change, executed from an external keyboard.

Please let me know, if this is possible for anyone, and what you would charge for this.
(or does such a device possibly already exist somewhere?)

Thanks for your feedback
Gert Wilden


Hello,
I am new to this forum.  After having worked professionally with LOGIC ( using LOGIC's Envirionment extensively ) for some 30 years, 

program-switcher

send me a mail doubleUG@gmx.de if you want, to discuss the the names inport.

send me a mail doubleUG@gmx.de if you want,  to discuss the the names inport. 

that is very easy one, once one gets preset names to store with live set ...

Screen Shot 2021-04-09 at 20.51.00.png

If you read text file containing preset names, that will then get stored as dict

Only missing thing would be what midi event shoud trigger next message...

PG-Change.amxd

My-Presets.txt

If you read text file containing preset names, that will then get stored as dict
in live set.
Only missing thing would be what midi event shoud trigger next message...

funny how logic users always think that VST plug-ins have midi controllers for all parameters or that they would support midi program change. :)

Hey guys, thanx a lot for your reactions! @Roman: I am using AU-PlugIns rather than VST. But there are many products which OF COURSE support midi PG-change. Think of all u-he products, the applied acoustics stuff, most of NI as well. They all offer a bank which can be individually filled with up to 128 presets of your choice and can be selected in many ways. Be it via a software button from the host, be it from an external MIDI device, be it even from an ABLETON clip.

I presume this should be true for the according VST versions of those PlugIns as well...

What I meant in terms of LOGIC (I don't know how familiar you are with that program):

In LOGIC's environment you can easily create are software switcher to adress MIDI PG-Change. It can be switched by a 128 entry table. That table can optionally behave as a table or as a menu and it can be filled with program names from any text file. Hence you can select presets BY NAME.

In LOGIC this is done in literally no time. And I am sure, a M4L guy can do this in very short time as well.

Hey guys, thanx a lot for your reactions! @Roman: I am using AU-PlugIns rather than VST. But there are many products which OF COURSE support midi PG-change. Think of all u-he products, the applied acoustics stuff, most of NI as well. They all offer a bank which can be individually filled with up to 128 presets of your choice and can be selected in many ways. Be it via a software button from the host, be it from an external MIDI device, be it even from an ABLETON clip.
I presume this should be true for the according VST versions of those PlugIns  as well...

What I meant in terms of LOGIC (I don't know how familiar you are with that program):
In LOGIC's environment you can easily create are software switcher to adress MIDI PG-Change. It can be switched by a 128 entry table. That table can optionally behave as a table or as a menu and it can be filled with program names from any text file. Hence you can select  presets BY NAME.
In LOGIC this is done in literally no time. And I am sure, a M4L guy can do this in very short time as well.

hm, but even if a plug-in supports program change you can not count on host programs that this is the way how it would normally talk to the plug-in.

in logic it was the other way round during the first 10 years of VST: it would _only use midi and translate it to VST parameter values, where proper VST hosts would use VST but then sometimes it was a bit difficult to remote that using midi.

note that at that time, only instruements had MIDI support for their parameters, 95% of the effects werent using it at all, even if targeted to VST 2.1. but for logic users... they didnt see this difference. that is what i was making fun of. (or trying to)

now that we have both methods on many plug-ins ... more confusing than a progress if you ask me.

i am not a m4l user so i cant tell you if the live API will easily tell you about the presets names, but i would guess yes. what always works is to make a live device which hosts the VST or AU plug-in, then you can get the list of presets names from the vst~ object (aand also a list of parameter names for that matter) and so with it what you want, inluding sending it to a custom controller device from where you remotely control all your plug-ins and presets in the fashion of NI kore.


hm, but even if a plug-in supports program change you can not count on host programs that this is the way how it would normally talk to the plug-in.

in logic it was the other way round during the first 10 years of VST: it would _only use midi and translate it to VST parameter values, where proper VST hosts would use VST but then sometimes it was a bit difficult to remote that using midi.

note that at that time, only instruements had MIDI support for their parameters, 95% of the effects werent using it at all, even if targeted to VST 2.1. but for logic users... they didnt see this difference. that is what i was making fun of. (or trying to)

now that we have both methods on many plug-ins ... more confusing than a progress if you ask me.

i am not a m4l user so i cant tell you if the live API will easily tell you about the presets names, but i would guess yes. what always works is to make a live device which hosts the VST or AU plug-in, then you can get the list of presets names from the vst~ object (aand also a list of parameter names for that matter) and so with it what you want, inluding sending it to a custom controller device from where you remotely control all your plug-ins and presets in the fashion of NI kore.


Hi, send me an email at contact.marco.accardi@gmail.com! We can discuss the project there.

Program Switcher