Load gig File as it was saved: Setlist View et al

Hello Gig Performer community,
I’ve recently moved my setup from Presonus Studio One to Gig Performer.
S1 is great as a daw…not quite so good for on-stage computing.

In the main, I’ve found Gig Performer to be a great design for on-stage and gigs. The Global Rackspace and SetlistView are…well inspired…so good!

But…there’s a few issues that really make GP more frustrating than it needs to be. These are generally simple fixes (for GP development) as well…

If GP development could look at these, it would make a lot of happy customers! :slight_smile:

1. Gig File Saved in Setlist View. Gig File Loaded in Rackspace View. Why?!?!?
As anyone who has gigged will say, on gig night, the focus is on the performance. Stuff like tech, computing, clicking/checking software is a distraction from that.

So when I load GP, I would expect it to load in exactly the way I saved it - in this case, in Setlist View!
I have to change it every time GP loads. ‘Well it’s only one click at startup’? Hmmm…not after a power cut (which happens all too often at gigs)!
This is a really simple thing for GP development to fix…a couple lines of code.
Please, please! GP add this!

2. MIDI. GP’s #1 Responsibility
It’s probably pretty safe to say controlling/managing MIDI messages is one of the main reasons GP exists; alongside VST management.
Trouble is, pretty much every time I launch GP, at least one of my MIDI devices is not being received by GP, even though it’s connected and sending (MIDI-OX sees it, GP does not). Unplug the MIDI USB and re-plug, oh now it works (mostly)! In fairness to GP, this is Windows, and Microsoft are renowned for one of the worst USB implementations on the planet.
It would be so so great if GP would:

  1. Remember what MIDI devices were connected from the last save (like what DAWs do)
  2. Report at load-time if one or more MIDI devices are missing/can’t be communicated with from last save
  3. Attempt a USB reset to the OS for missing/disconnected devices to restore communications
  4. Ideally, a ‘MIDI Device Status’ pane so the current MIDI status of all MIDI devices can be seen at a glance

If MIDI isn’t working with GP, every time, all the time, and especially right before a gig, it’s not going to be very useful. Not everyone has a roadie tech to check all this stuff. Having to manually check every MIDI device through a MIDI monitor to make sure it’s working is major backside pain.

  1. This one is more of an RFE Enhancement Request - Setlist MIDI CC for everywhere!
    The MIDI options for Setlist View are awesome! If anyone is not using Setlist View, now is the time to start!

I don’t use it as a setlist though (no backing tracks) - I use it because I can easily map my FCB1010 CC’s et al to Rackspace Variations, PC, custom msgs…so easy,. So powerful! The Setlist View MIDI support is, THE BEST thing about GP!

If GP used this same mechanism everywhere else MIDI is used/needed (Rackspaces, PgmCh, scriptlets, Variations, system actions etc) literally everywhere MIDI is configured, GP would be the most awesome music audio tool around.

It would remove the need for PgmChange to control things, which would relieve a real headache of MIDI and the myriad implementations across old and new devices/controllers etc.

Thank you for listening! GP is an awesome tool.

In the options you can decide which view is set when starting gig performer

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For most (if not all) of your issues, there is already something on board to help you.

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Why do you think that is only a couple lines of code?

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Because as a developer, seeing there’s view functionality already there, and that Setlist View is a new thing (new in v6 I believe?), it just needs to be added to the existing functionality.

Hmm, this was suppose to be a reply to pianopaul’s comment, but looks to have added as a separate one. ¯_(ツ)_/¯

Hi pianopaul, thank you for the tip! I will try that! :+1:

V6?
The actual version is v4

And that change you believe is just a couple lines of code?
Do you know the code?
As a developer you know for sure that jus adding some lines of code without deep thinking about the consequences can end in disaster,

Oops! Sorry, you’re right! It’ll be a well known feature by v6! :joy:

Yes, every line of code needs deep thought about the consequences! I didn’t mention the design meetings, documentation and test time for those lines of code! Are you involved in the development of GP? Of course, I don’t work for Deskew so I haven’t seen the code. It seems well enough designed to be able to take enhancements without breaking unrelated stuff, but of course I can’t know that for sure.

No doubt. Something like the Setlist MIDI config (ability to use e.g. CC msgs to control other parts of GP) and putting that into other MIDI config areas…now that really is a major change that would effect many components, and would have a lot of bw compat issues to contend with… the Setlist MIDI config is really good…would be fantastic to see it wherever MIDI config is involved. :+1:

…thinking…we could modify this…
screenshot_241

…with a drop down box like this…
screenshot_242
…and then we could select this…
screenshot_243

Shouldn’t take more than a couple of lines of code…

Oh wait … we did this already!

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In that case, an inexpensive UPS might be worth the investment!

Does it see it at the same port?

How do you know GP doesn’t see it?

Did you have the Global MIDI Monitor open?

What does that mean?

What same mechanism?

Hi, Yes pianopaul pointed me to that. So that’s good.
It’s a little different than what I was mentioning - i.e. A gig file is saved. it looks and feels exactly as it should be for the gig. But wait, when I load it isn’t.
The Initial View is one way to get the view functionality, just a bit less intuitive and I guess is global to GP (doesn’t follow the loaded gig file), but that’s ok, there’s plenty of things to like about GP!

I’m referring to the way Setlist configures/handles MIDI for ctonrolling the Setlist view/parts etc. It can take CCs, Note, pretty much any MIDI message and use it to change things like song part variations and send custom msgs out to external gear…fantastic! (might not have the nomenclature right, but hopefully you know the bit I’m taking about).
This is a truly brilliant part of the product. It’s so good, it’s way more useful than just for Setlists (although yes, great for that too!).
So I use ‘Setlist View’ to control ‘Rackspace Variations’ - not really anything to do with setlists, as my show is live. So would be cool to use the same idea in other places (for example the MIDI section in the Rackspace editor - more than one line of code for this one! :slight_smile:
Hopefully that clarifies what mean?

Sorry - still no idea — what exactly do you want to be able to do? Perhaps an explicit example? There’s nothing special about setlist view and CC messages - you can assign any message you want to select a particular song part.

Hi, yes I’ve used the Global Monitor, which is pretty useful for checking/testing MIDI.
The DAW-like thing of saving current MIDI config would be really cool, but isn’t a trivial feature to add.
Windows does create all kinds of USB headaches, but for example, I (virtually) never have MIDI connectivity errors with my DAW (unless of course something is actually disconnected :joy: !)
But for whatever reason, I almost always get at least one not connecting at GP startup, and some devices connect, some do sometimes, the combination can tend to change with every load. Sometimes, they all work and no problem. On gig night, it’s the not knowing that is the problem. I’ve got 5 MIDI devices that I connect on stage, so not that many.

If this kind of issue is a ‘new’ thing for GP - i.e. others aren’t seeing this, it could be that one of my MIDI devices isn’t playing ball and causing an issue (some MIDI vendors don’t have USB experts :grimacing:), so I will try a stress test with different combinations.

Thank you for taking an interest! :+1: