Use your mobile phone to control your guitar or keyboard effects

Here’s a new blog article:
https://gigperformer.com/use-your-mobile-phone-to-control-your-guitar-or-keyboard-effects/

My goal with OSC was to try to find free (or trial, at least) software for Android and show step by step how to configure at least one button and a knob, so readers can try it immediately and develop their setups/ideas further. Readers generally lose interest if there is no trial (like Lemur or TouchOSC). They want at least to try it themselves and then buy software if they find it useful.

My criteria were:

  • Sofware is free (or at least trial or has in-app purchase)
  • Software is up to date (I’m not interested in abandonware or software that isn’t updated since 2015. etc)
  • Software is well documented

Results were disappointing:

  • OSC Surface (my phone shows compatibility issues since it isn’t updated since 2015)
  • LittleOSC (too simple, doesn’t have sliders, no custom design, just 4 buttons)
  • OSC.knobs (too simple)
  • Osc Control (no documentation at all, I spent 30 mins trying to configure it, to no avail. It simply doesn’t work, although there are guys that reported they managed to get it running…)
  • Control (OSC + MIDI) (abandonware)
  • … … …
  • I’ve checked all alternative software presented on: https://alternativeto.net/software/touchosc/
    … but majority of them are, unfortunately, removed from Google Play or abandonware. OSCPad was promising, since it was allegedly compatible with TouchOSC templates, but it’s abandonware now…

OSCAR and Open Stage Control were the only apps worth writing about.

Feel free to post here your Layouts with OSCAR.

2 Likes

Hello @npudar, I’m starting to get interested in using OSC, which I’m not at all familiar with.
I’ve followed the procedure described in your blog USE YOUR MOBILE PHONE TO CONTROL YOUR GUITAR OR KEYBOARD EFFECTS but to no avail: the widgets don’t communicate in either direction even when the Windows firewall is disabled.

I’m using my phone as a router, and my laptop’s wifi is connected to my cell phone’s mobile access point, which is active.
My PC is receiving data from my phone (internet is working) but in Oscar settings/Network information, “Connected wifi” says: not connected and there’s no option to connect it.

Have I missed an important point?
I checked the IP addresses etc.

Can you ping the IP address on your mobile phone from your computer (and vice versa)?
What are the defined IP addresses?

I don’t know anything about networks, I can only copy information or examples (like in the blog).
Can you point me to a tutorial, I tried to find it myself on the internet but I didn’t understand any of it. :grimacing:

IP 192.168.0.22 (phone)
IP LEFT 192.168.0.21 (GP)
OUTGOING PORT LEFT 6000
INCOMING PORT LEFT 6001

in th PC do I type ping 192.168.0.22 in the terminal ?

Received:
Statistiques Ping pour 192.168.0.22:
Paquets : envoyés = 4, reçus = 4, perdus = 0 (perte 0%),
Durée approximative des boucles en millisecondes :
Minimum = 2ms, Maximum = 3ms, Moyenne = 2ms

The first step is making sure that the IP addresses are correct.

The second step is making sure that they can talk to each other.

This command in Android’s Terminal gives you the IP address of your phone.

(in my case 192.168.0.222)

Then you can PING the IP address of your computer (make sure that the computer’s IP address is correct). Example of the ping command from the Android’s Terminal:

I installed a terminal application in my phone and typed : ip addrees
I have a long list of lines that I can’t understand because I can’t traduct in french and even in french I wouldn’t understand a word.

Do these green lines tell you anything ?
127.0.0.1/8
192.168.43.1/24
192.168.43.255

I’m tempted to say (well, I guess I am saying) to forget the free stuff and just get TouchOSC. Multi platform. A number of users here.

I just checked, there is a user-friendly way to check for your phone’s IP address.

Thanks for the suggestion, but I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure out how it works with Oscar (which isn’t free, I’m using the trial version) and which should theoretically work correctly.
My problem comes from the configuration of the devices and I may have found the reason for the malfunction.

My problem comes from the configuration of the devices and I may have found the reason for the malfunction: I’ve just realized that the IP address of my phone that was displayed in Oscar was that of my internet box, not that of the phone.
Having disconnected the box, Oscar now displays IP 0.0.0.0.

As I won’t have an internet box on stage, does this mean that my phone’s mobile access point doesn’t act as a router for sending and receiving data to and from the laptop?
Do I have to use an external router?

This is the best option.

Ok, I’ll be looking for the smallest and lightest model possible, as I sometimes have to take trains and buses to go playing, and I need to optimize the weight and size of the hardware as much as Windows with the utimate guide. :wink:

Thanks for your help, I hope to do better with a router and I’ll try to do it myself.

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I think that @dhj uses a decent and inexpensive router.

The most recent one he’s using (Ubiquiti) isn’t in my budget, and I don’t know the reference number of the previous one (Linksys) he used, but I imagine there are many inexpensive and reliable models for my use among the recognized brands.
It’s mainly the dimensions that will influence my choice, and my use will be for one or two OSC guitar controllers with the router 1 meter away. :slightly_smiling_face:

Be careful with your choice. Be aware that you have to be able to deal with interference from lots of audience members whose phones are trying to find WiFi devices

Is there a particular feature or manipulation to avoid this?
A specification that a router must have?

Ah, yes! True.

So the trick is to make your connection private, so that only your computer can connect and not be bombed with (say) hundreds of computers/phones, that want to connect to your network. (and possibly cause intereference/connectivity issues)