FR: Easier patch cable routing view

[pedx1ng]

First off, I just wanted to say that I had no intention of buying another VST anytime soon, because I thought I had enough. But after foolishly installing the demo I was blown away and had to buy it. I didn't think I would get on with a modular setup, due to the complexity, but I love the fact that you aren't limited in the way you sometimes are with pre-patched synths. Great product!

Anyway, on to the feature request. My biggest immediate complaint has to do with how you see the routing of the patch cables (or how you don't see them, rather). When you have a bunch of modules on screen, it's difficult to tell where things are going. I know you can compact them, but that's not ideal because it takes you out of your workflow. My suggestion would be for the option (so I don't get flamed by those who like the current way) of displaying translucent patch cables on top of the modules. What I mean is if a cable is routed to a knob, you would see it leading to and above that knob. By making it translucent you can still see the module underneath. Make sense? If not maybe I can whip up a mock-up in an image editor.

The other thing would be for a more visceral way of connecting the modules. I mean, manually picking up and dragging the cables around to where you want them. I think the Nord Modular software editor does this.

It just seems less intuitive to have to ctrl-click to make a connection, or right-click at the destination and then select the source. I can live with it, but click-dragging cables around would make me happier.

[karmafx]

Hi pedx1ng!

Thanks for feedback ! Glad you like the synth.

The idea with the translucency isn't bad at all.
Unfortunatly I believe that technically, the way it is implemented now, it would be difficult to have the wires drawn on top of the modules.
But I will look into it. I could make the modules translucent, but that is propably not what you want.

Click-dragging for connecting would requre some type of icon for clicking on in order to make this work intuitively, right ? I would feel bad making large changes to the GUI at this point, but if you have a suggestion let me know.

Thanks again, and keep on exploring and enjoying the synth !

[billstei]

This is one of my biggest gripes too, but I can understand that changes like this are difficult, so...a few brain farts:

How about if I click and hold LMB on the drag bar of a module, that any input modules feeding it also light up their drag bars a certain color, and any output paths to other modules light up those module drag bars yet another color. Something similar could happen to knobs when they are tweaked with LMB, their sources could light up. Yet another idea for knobs is that when hovering (or RMB, but not LMB which does a disconnect now) over the LED below the knob, the source modules could light up (and the wires that connect them). For that matter clicking LMB on a wire could do similar light ups, but as noted above they are often hidden whereas drag bars and knobs are not.

Bill

[matthewjumpsoffbuildings]

those are interesting ideas bill, intelligent highlighting like you described would be useful

[karmafx]

How about if I click and hold LMB on the drag bar of a module, that any input modules feeding it also light up their drag bars a certain color, and any output paths to other modules light up those module drag bars yet another color....

Not a bad idea. Thanks!

[dj.tuBIG/MaliceX]

I was thinking, maybe keep the way it is now, but for easy drag-connecting, hold CTRL then drag as you would normally, to pull a wire. (either module or knob)

That could possibly be less taxing in the graphics department, just the implementation I guess.

[karmafx]

I was thinking, maybe keep the way it is now, but for easy drag-connecting, hold CTRL then drag as you would normally, to pull a wire. (either module or knob)

Sorry, maybe I'm missing the point...Isn't that the way it *is* now?

[dj.tuBIG/MaliceX]

The way it works *now* is right-clicking options and going through a series of lists.

What I was thinking was, avoiding the menu entirely by holding a key/hotkey, so a wire automatically appears after clicking a knob, that can be dragged to another end so it connects.

[karmafx]

Sure you can use the menus, but the easiest is to hold ctrl and left click on a modules caption (the mouse cursor changes into a cross), then move the mouse to another module or knob and click again to connect the wire. It has always been like that but maybe I'm misunderstanding your suggestion!? If so please explain

[dj.tuBIG/MaliceX]

Sure you can use the menus, but the easiest is to hold ctrl and left click on a modules caption (the mouse cursor changes into a cross), then move the mouse to another module or knob and click again to connect the wire. It has always been like that but maybe I'm misunderstanding your suggestion!? If so please explain

Oh. it has?!?

Heh, I see, though the difference is, graphically you don't see a cable moving.

[karmafx]

No problem! I like feature requests that are already there...makes my job so much easier...

Heh, I see, though the difference is, graphically you don't see a cable moving.

Oh, yes you do...the wire follows the cross cursor. Please try it out!

[dj.tuBIG/MaliceX]

Okay, I see how it works. (figured it out finally, was pressing knob names instead of the module names.)

Never knew this feature existed. Thank you.

[karmafx]

Never knew this feature existed. Thank you.

Your welcome!!...it is in the manual, page 21(figure) and page 22 (table), but I know how it is... EDIT: Besides, features should be intuitive, right?!

Also, a cool feature to be aware of is that you can connect many modules in a row this way, by keeping Ctrl pressed and clicking on several module-captions, one at a time

[karmafx]

Also, a cool feature to be aware of is that you can connect many modules in a row this way, by keeping Ctrl pressed and clicking on several module-captions, one at a time

btw: This tip is (perhaps not so logically) placed on page 36 in the manual.

[Koshdukai]

The idea with the translucency isn't bad at all.
Unfortunatly I believe that technically, the way it is implemented now, it would be difficult to have the wires drawn on top of the modules.
But I will look into it. I could make the modules translucent, but that is propably not what you want.

Click-dragging for connecting would requre some type of icon for clicking on in order to make this work intuitively, right ? I would feel bad making large changes to the GUI at this point, but if you have a suggestion let me know.

Just bought KarmaFX Synth a few minutes ago (finally ) and thought that Registering here would be the next logical thing to do, while waiting for some sort of email feeback with a link do download it (?).

Anyway, while waiting, did a gmail search on "KarmaFX" to see if I've ever registered here (since I've been following this synth development for a while) and just found a 2007 email I sent you, talking about this same issue of cabling and GUI.

Being a Record+Reason user (might as well confess it right upfront), it's only natural that I miss one very simple (from the user perspective) and very useful workflow feature: the rack flip... in this case, modules flip to expose the available audio ins'n'outs, besides the modulation sources/targets.

I remember, while checking the first KarmaFX demo, instinctively pressing the TAB key to clearly see all the cable routing only to keep reminding myself that this wasn't how KarmaFX GUI was implemented.

Flipping the modules to expose their backs would also allow us to ask for a "Snap to nearby module" option, as a way to keep the "front" of the synth modules tightly together with unnecessary spaces between the modules (the only way now to check the wire routings), and save some screen real-estate.

I'm not expecting this kind of improvement to happen anytime soon on the 1.x version of KarmaFX, but I'm hopeful that something like what I describe would happen, possibly on a KarmaFX 2.0

This (and another little issue, related to the way the MIDI mapping is or was done, I'll have to check on V.1.14) was one of the very few reasons why I've waited 'till now to buy it.

I'll also confess that KarmaFX has been the main inspiration for some full modular device requests/suggestions on PropellerheadSW Forums... but I got tired of waiting for either side to make me happy on this specific issue and decided to just bite the bullet, finally buy the "darn" thing and ReWire Reason with Ableton Live, just to access both, KarmaFX and my Reason rack

(this is getting a long post, so I'll end with just this)

As I said, I'm not expecting module-flipping to become available any time soon, but, since translucent modules were mentioned, I must say this is a very usable temporary and useful solution to implement, where a toggle mode could be available (through the TAB key?) where the user could easily turn translucency mode ON or OFF to clearly see the wire routings, the sources and the targets of both the modulations and audio path.

Turning it off to more easily tweak the parameter knobs

I would be quite happy with such a solution, if module-flip isn't possible yet.

ok... gotta end this with a...

Thank you for such an inspiring virtual Synth/FX unit!

/<osh.

[karmafx]

Hi,Thanks and welcome!!
Glad you've decided to become a registered user...and thanks for the post!!

It's certainly a valid FR (flipping), and you're not the first to suggest it.
As you mention flipping is a big feature request (i.e., v.2.0+), but translucency would actually not be that hard to do with the new GUI rewrite I did.

Just to be clear, I assume your talking about making the modules e.g., 50% transparent so you can see the wires clearly at the touch of a key?
It would propably also be technically possible to make the wires appear on top of the modules...I don't know what people would prefer?
Anyway, I'll bump it on the FR list!

PS: You should have received your download link by now! Hope you're having some fun with the synth!

[Koshdukai]

I assume your talking about making the modules e.g., 50% transparent so you can see the wires clearly at the touch of a key?
It would propably also be technically possible to make the wires appear on top of the modules...I don't know what people would prefer?

Yup, that's exactly what I thought you were talking about when you mentioned module translucency/transparency.

I also thought (but I could be wrong) that all the existing functionality was still active i.e. all module controls were available for tweaking (though transparent) and wire routing (now more visible) would still behave as expected (CTRL+click, etc).

If all of this is true, then I think it would be a good compromise between what's available now and having full module flipping (where wire dragging would be expected and we would loose access to the module controls while flipped).

I'm not sure what to say about having solid(?) colored cables on top of the module's front... would it allow us to drag the cable wire ends (as one would expect if flipping was implemented)? ...but then, this would prevent us to easily access and/or see what's on each module front. It would be almost a module-flipped mode behavior without having the actual module (visually) flipped, I guess... which might be a bit confusing for some (maybe?).

Opting for one of these two would necessarily involve some testing with a draft version or mockup, IMHO... all depending of what was possible to implement that would mess with the current expected behavior.

Thanks for the interest on this and quick reply

oh, and yeah, been playing and messing around with the synth since yesterday.
I almost forgot how fun that was, since using the demo!