Bar View Proposal - Suggestions/Comments Needed

ckurz_7000 · Post by **ckurz_7000** » Mon Mar 14, 2016 7:42 am

a_zimuth wrote:Hey Chris, You're absolutely correct regarding Ralph and this forum. I can count on one hand the number of developers I'm aware of who support and encourage such user involvement to such a level.
My perspective on other users desired changes is probably skewed somewhat because Jamstix truly just "clicked" with me from the beginning. To me it was very intuitive but I also do have some experience working with drummers.That might be part of the reason why it all just makes sense and seems intuitive.

In other forums and reviews JS is described as powerful yet hard to master with a steep learning curve. I can find my way around it fine but that took some time. And I still cringe at the sometimes clumsy way it forces me to do things. Sometimes they are tiny quirks such as not being able to clear a bar by hitting ctrl-A followed by Delete. Or being virtually unable to discern the different sounds in the bar editor.

Wouldn't it be just great to have, e.g., a picture of your kit and simply drag instruments to specific places in the bar editor to create a hit?

Or the counter-intuitive way in which tuplets are handled.

Or adding an easy way to add a part as the first part in a song. Currently I can only paste a part AFTER another one.

You see, about half of the improvement could be achieved by taking care of all those loose ends. The remaining half is a general revamp of the current GUI paradigm.

That apart, JS lives and dies with Ralph's attitude and support.

But just imagine what a joy it would be to work with JS if it really had a good user interface. I predict that a lot of people would take notice and switch over.

-- Chris.

Azimuth (Archive) · Post by **Azimuth (Archive)** » Mon Mar 14, 2016 9:54 am

Hi Chris, you don't have to sell me on your ideas. I'm all for any idea which would make [b:dcfcd8a807]every[/b:dcfcd8a807] JS user as happy as I am with the software. Yes there are some "quirks" and I feel that they're tolerable, others don't. I personally think the learning curve is average for such a complex software package and having to put some effort into it is a good thing. I'm a PLC programmer by trade and if you can deal with Allen Bradley software, you can deal with anything. I've learned a lot nailing down how JS works and I feel I remember it better because there was some effort involved. I also know that there are aspects of it I've never even used. You want to talk complex, take a look at EW Symphonic Choirs. Anyway, whatever makes others happy is cool with me. This software is a dream come true for me and I've wished for such an instrument for 25+ years.

keys_reaper · Post by **keys_reaper** » Tue Mar 15, 2016 11:00 pm

I would certainly use the suggested grid style editing of multiple bars/parts. Need to include all the parameters tho including time signature for each bar etc.

minerman_1 · Post by **minerman_1** » Wed Mar 16, 2016 1:07 am

keys_reaper wrote:I would certainly use the suggested grid style editing of multiple bars/parts. Need to include all the parameters tho including time signature for each bar etc.

Yes, I'd like the grid thing too...

Something I'd really like to see is have the fills' timing match up with the groove. IE: The main beat is 20ms ahead, so the fill should follow with that.
I have to do this via automation to make the fills match the groove, unless I'm missing something obvious.

So overall, if I add the 20ms the song already has, then need to speed it up for a single fill, I could run out of "headroom" for the timing automation lane (it goes from -50 to + 50 ms)...

R Green · Post by **R Green** » Wed Mar 16, 2016 9:22 am

I would like to suggest a bit of user configurability for this new windowif possible.
For example, the option to have the count-in appear on its own row. This would mean less of the subsequent parts being split over two rows on many songs when a two bar intro is involved.
Also, perhaps the 16 blocks could be configurable to 15 or whatever for those that like odd meters?
Another suggestion: for each colour block have a V, C or whatever within it that is just a couple of saturation points different. So it's hardly there when you are concentrating on the data within the block but still evident when your attention zooms out. It may work, it may look awful.
Personally, I do most of my work with the song wizard and the power knob. So the more control we have at song level the better for me. For example, the choice of fills following drummer or groove is per part - while it would be good to have some form of easy control for it on this new page, even better would be for it to be like the song power knob - so it could be set at song level. Even DAW-automatable? The no groove switch also.
While I'm here I'd like to suggest a new part type for the song builder - Y(Cymbal-rage).
Looking forward to JS4 but happy with JS3.

ckurz_7000 · Post by **ckurz_7000** » Wed Mar 16, 2016 10:58 am

I think this is a great pot of ideas brewing here. Some of them will already be in JS4, some will probably never make it. But I think it is a good for a developer to know what people are often looking for but could never find.

-- Chris.

Post by **Ralph @ Rayzoon** » Wed Mar 16, 2016 3:17 pm

minerman_1 wrote: Something I'd really like to see is have the fills' timing match up with the groove. IE: The main beat is 20ms ahead, so the fill should follow with that.

I can't replicate this issue. Can you send me a saved JS song that shows this issue?

Kevin_W · Post by **Kevin_W** » Wed Mar 16, 2016 7:32 pm

Hope this isn't straying too far off topic, but as we seem to be discussing suggestions for making JS easier to use, I think this enhanced bar view could also allow for a bar by bar power level, rather than the single power knob for the song. When I saw the impact of automating the power knob, it really changed my opinion of Jamstix. Making that feature more obvious and /or easier would be a great thing, IMO. Would be nice if we didn't have to rely on daw automation.

keys_reaper · Post by **keys_reaper** » Fri Mar 18, 2016 7:57 pm

Kevin_W wrote:Hope this isn't straying too far off topic, but as we seem to be discussing suggestions for making JS easier to use, I think this enhanced bar view could also allow for a bar by bar power level, rather than the single power knob for the song. When I saw the impact of automating the power knob, it really changed my opinion of Jamstix. Making that feature more obvious and /or easier would be a great thing, IMO. Would be nice if we didn't have to rely on daw automation.

Yes that's a great suggestion. +1

chill_human · Post by **chill_human** » Sat Jul 23, 2016 3:26 pm

I guess this is pretty far off topic of the thread, but if we're talking feature requests it would be nice to be able to either select the DAW you're using, or put configuration items into a file in maybe XML format to suit different DAWs differently. I know that Ableton sends midi notes differently than JamStix interprets them for instance, so a "+/- octaves on midi in", or more simply a host selector, would be nice.