MOZAIC - Create your own AU MIDI plugins - OUT NOW!

skrat

Yesterday I was writing and debugging my Mozaic script and experienced a nasty bug: after upload, the script was running, but the code was gone. After upload, you are switched to the Log screen, when I switched back to Code, there was no text. Honestly, I don't remember now if the code area was even editable. I tried closing and opening AUM, the code wasn't there, also the script wasn't working. The I have found out there was update in App store containing bugfix, so I updated, closed AUM and opened again, started to continue with the script from the older saved preset. But then this happened to me yet several more times, approximately every 10th upload of the script. Not related to syntax or other errors, it happened also on working code.
Did anyone experienced something similar? Thanks for help.

HW: 9,7" iPad 2017, latest iOS.

Peblin

I have experienced this as well.

• Added code from my editor by copy/paste
• Upload
• Script runs fine
• "Accidentally" click Upload again
• Script is gone

Not sure it's consistent but I've only experienced it since I updated to latest version - but maybe I just didn't trigger it before.

Peblin

On the workflow tips and tricks topic, the way I do it is using

• VSCode on the Mac (set to "Coffescript" which seems to be the syntactially closest match).
• Code lives on GitHub.
• "Deployment" uses simple Copy on Mac, Paste on iPad/iPhone using the handover features of MacOSX/iOS.

Makes for very easy editing/refactoring and still a reasonably fast round-trip to Mozaic.

brambos

@skrat said:
Not related to syntax or other errors, it happened also on working code.
Did anyone experienced something similar? Thanks for help.

Yes, sorry about that... I have already sent in a fix for review. It should (hopefully) be available quickly.

It's a stupid bug introduced by me trying to keep memory usage down. The issue I'm trying to circumvent has to do with the standard iOS text editing feature that Mozaic uses (which basically everyone has to use for editing text). It is ridiculously memory hungry:

• each Mozaic instance takes <11Mb ram currently. This includes the UI, the virtual machine, all variables, all code, etc.
• however, there is one component in the UI which has a variable memory footprint: the editor, which depends on how long the script is

It turns out that putting a 50Kb text in the editor, adds 120Mb+ of memory to the footprint of the instance. For a 200Kb text, the memory claim goes well over 200Mb This is a serious problem when AUv3 plugins are limited by a hard memory cap.

So to mitigate the issue I added "lazy loading" which keeps the code editor empty when you're not looking at it. For people who never edit scripts but just load presets this will keep everything nice and lightweight. But this is where the bug snuck in.

So I really hope Apple review&approve the update quickly For now only hit the Upload button when you're actually looking at the code

skrat

@brambos said:

@skrat said:
Not related to syntax or other errors, it happened also on working code.
Did anyone experienced something similar? Thanks for help.

Yes, sorry about that... I have already sent in a fix for review. It should (hopefully) be available quickly.

It's a stupid bug introduced by me trying to keep memory usage down. The issue I'm trying to circumvent has to do with the standard iOS text editing feature that Mozaic uses (which basically everyone has to use for editing text). It is ridiculously memory hungry:

• each Mozaic instance takes <11Mb ram currently. This includes the UI, the virtual machine, all variables, all code, etc.
• however, there is one component in the UI which has a variable memory footprint: the editor, which depends on how long the script is

It turns out that putting a 50Kb text in the editor, adds 120Mb+ of memory to the footprint of the instance. For a 200Kb text, the memory claim goes well over 200Mb This is a serious problem when AUv3 plugins are limited by a hard memory cap.

So to mitigate the issue I added "lazy loading" which keeps the code editor empty when you're not looking at it. For people who never edit scripts but just load presets this will keep everything nice and lightweight. But this is where the bug snuck in.

So I really hope Apple review&approve the update quickly before more people lose scripts

Thanks, good to know it's addressed already.
But it's crazy how the goddamn text field can fill up so much memory... Isn't there some 'lightweight' text component for iOS?

brambos

@skrat said:

@brambos said:

@skrat said:
Not related to syntax or other errors, it happened also on working code.
Did anyone experienced something similar? Thanks for help.

Yes, sorry about that... I have already sent in a fix for review. It should (hopefully) be available quickly.

It's a stupid bug introduced by me trying to keep memory usage down. The issue I'm trying to circumvent has to do with the standard iOS text editing feature that Mozaic uses (which basically everyone has to use for editing text). It is ridiculously memory hungry:

• each Mozaic instance takes <11Mb ram currently. This includes the UI, the virtual machine, all variables, all code, etc.
• however, there is one component in the UI which has a variable memory footprint: the editor, which depends on how long the script is

It turns out that putting a 50Kb text in the editor, adds 120Mb+ of memory to the footprint of the instance. For a 200Kb text, the memory claim goes well over 200Mb This is a serious problem when AUv3 plugins are limited by a hard memory cap.

So to mitigate the issue I added "lazy loading" which keeps the code editor empty when you're not looking at it. For people who never edit scripts but just load presets this will keep everything nice and lightweight. But this is where the bug snuck in.

So I really hope Apple review&approve the update quickly before more people lose scripts

Thanks, good to know it's addressed already.
But it's crazy how the goddamn text field can fill up so much memory... Isn't there some 'lightweight' text component for iOS?

Unfortuntely not. All the custom components are based on this one as a base. And making your own is practically impossible.

Yoni

Hi, just updated MidiQ script to v.0.6 and uploaded to patchstorage.

MidiQ v.0.6

Any feedback appreciated

Edit: fixed link

echoopera

I just want to thank all of you for the great effort and support you’re putting into Mozaic. I find myself using it a lot for my little audio journeys and am truly inspired by the great work you are all doing with this plugin environment.

Many thanks over @brambos for releasing this into our world. You’ve unlocked the box to a world of new expression of substance 🙏🏼💕

Synthi

@brambos said:

What exactly was the “something special” you were hoping for?

@_ki said:
So if @brambos wants to have a go first, it‘s also okay for me But then i probably won‘t convert my version... and implement something else

brambos

@Synthi said:

@brambos said:

What exactly was the “something special” you were hoping for?

@_ki said:
So if @brambos wants to have a go first, it‘s also okay for me But then i probably won‘t convert my version... and implement something else

I think Ki was referring to another script altogether Anyway if there's anything you're missing functionally, let me know

By the way, the update is approved and should be available in the App Store any moment. I highly recommend updating!

Synthi

@brambos said:
I think Ki was referring to another script altogether Anyway if there's anything you're missing functionally, let me know

By the way, the update is approved and should be available in the App Store any moment. I highly recommend updating!

Thanks! would be great having the polyphonic voice stealing when reaching the selected number of voices, maybe knobs for selecting how much voices and the numkber for the first MIDI channel....
Also is great having all the options the @_ki script have, selecting a M number of voices for a specified MIDI channel.
And ideally would be absolutely great having different voice allocation algos,: rotate, reassign, random,...

brambos

Good news, it looks like I have found an elegant way around the memory hogging ways of the editor!

Now testing....

skrat

Thanks @brambos, already on the updated version!
Just now I stumbled upon a small possible improvement: Remembering the font size (at least per instance or project if possible). I always use the smallest size but after every opening of the project I see the biggest one.

wim

+1

brambos

+1

McD

@Peblin said:
On the workflow tips and tricks topic, the way I do it is using

• VSCode on the Mac (set to "Coffescript" which seems to be the syntactially closest match).
• Code lives on GitHub.
• "Deployment" uses simple Copy on Mac, Paste on iPad/iPhone using the handover features of MacOSX/iOS.

Makes for very easy editing/refactoring and still a reasonably fast round-trip to Mozaic.

Wouldn't it be nice if Mosaic was also ported to Mac's? I'm in the habit of coding/debugging on my Mac for MIDI scripting.
I find IOS to just be the wrong set of tradeoffs. I really should just connect a Bluetooth Keyboard to the iPad and re-test this
bias against IOS for coding.

This GitHub approach might work for me to get me started dropping scripts into Mosaic. But Mosaic in a Mac standalone or AU/VST package would ideal.

The "Coffeescript" clue is great too.

brambos

@McD said:

@Peblin said:
On the workflow tips and tricks topic, the way I do it is using

• VSCode on the Mac (set to "Coffescript" which seems to be the syntactially closest match).
• Code lives on GitHub.
• "Deployment" uses simple Copy on Mac, Paste on iPad/iPhone using the handover features of MacOSX/iOS.

Makes for very easy editing/refactoring and still a reasonably fast round-trip to Mozaic.

Wouldn't it be nice if Mosaic was also ported to Mac's? I'm in the habit of coding/debugging on my Mac for MIDI scripting.
I find IOS to just be the wrong set of tradeoffs. I really should just connect a Bluetooth Keyboard to the iPad and re-test this
bias against IOS for coding.

This GitHub approach might work for me to get me started dropping scripts into Mosaic. But Mosaic in a Mac standalone or AU/VST package would ideal.

The "Coffeescript" clue is great too.

I find the blutooth keyboard works really terrific. It Instantly feels natural to me.

Having said that, I intend to experiment with this new “run iPad apps on a Mac” thing. If it works nicely I may consider making it available on Mac too. Although I worry this may increase my support load exponentially.

mbncp

@MonkeyDrummer said:
Curious, as I have not taken the plunge yet...How difficult would it be to code up a utility so that a momentary hardware button (ie blueboard) can be converted into a toggle that can send configurable note or cc within AUM... AAAAND, be set up so that regardless of the state of the toggle, whenever you restart AUM/Mosaic, the toggle is in the off state. The second part is important...

I use this in my setup, may need some changes
? How is the code mark supposed to work ?

// CC-Switch  (Mozaic v1.03)

// Allows the use of a Controller to act like a switch 
// Usefull with controllers that return to their initial position once you release them
// The state is stored for each midi channel
// Off course you can also use the pads 

@OnLoad
  // Adjust to your needs
  TrigCC = 64         // Incoming CC to make it act like a switch
  OutCC = 64          // CC to send on switch change
  CCVal = [0,127]     // CC value on switch OFF, ON
  CCValRange = 15       // CC input value tolerance, for a knob use 64
  //    
  FillArray TrigState, 0,16 // keep state of all channels
  FillArray TrigReset, 1,16
  SetShortName {Switch}
  LabelPads {CC }, OutCC, { State for Chn 1-16}  
  ShowLayout 2
  for n = 0 to 15
    LabelPad n, n+1  
   endfor 
  Call @UpdateGUI
@End

@OnMidiInput
  If MIDICommand = 0xB0 And MIDIByte2 = TrigCC
    If MidiByte3 > (127 - CCValRange) And TrigReset[MIDIChannel]
      TrigState[MIDIChannel] = not TrigState[MIDIChannel]
      SendMIDICC MIDIChannel, OutCC, CCVal[TrigState[MIDIChannel]]
      TrigReset[MIDIChannel] = 0
      Call @UpdateGUI
    ElseIf MidiByte3 < CCValRange
      TrigReset[MIDIChannel] = 1
     EndIf  
  Else      
    SendMIDIThru    
  EndIf     
@End

@OnPadUp
  TrigState[LastPad] = not TrigState[LastPad]
  SendMIDICC LastPad, OutCC, CCVal[TrigState[LastPad]]
  TrigReset[LastPad] = 1
  Call @UpdateGUI
@End 

@UpdateGUI
  for n = 0 to 15
     LatchPad n, TrigState[n]
  endfor 
@End

wim

@mbncp said:
? How is the code mark supposed to work ?

Place a line with only ``` on it before and after the code. That character can be a little hard to find on some on-screen keyboard layouts. On my US-English keyboard it can be found by long-pressing the single-quote (apostrophe) key.

mbncp

@wim said:

@mbncp said:
? How is the code mark supposed to work ?

Place a line with only ``` on it before and after the code. That character can be a little hard to find on some on-screen keyboard layouts. On my US-English keyboard it can be found by long-pressing the single-quote (apostrophe) key.

Thanks

McD

@brambos said:
Having said that, I intend to experiment with this new “run iPad apps on a Mac” thing. If it works nicely I may consider making it available on Mac too. Although I worry this may increase my support load exponentially.

If you do I'll buy another App from you and I'm really low maintenance. There's a lot of innovation I'd like to have on the Mac too as well as having a lot of Mac plug-ins ported to the AUv3 system. I'm sure we'll see some of both at iPadOS adds more
OS X features like external storage. I looked hard for a way to just export my screen from the iPad and found something but
using the Mac for the keyboard for the IOS Apps doesn't work.

So, Bluetooth it is. If I do enough of it I'll start poking my MacBook screen again with my fingers or reach for a trackpad to move the never visible Cursor on the iPad. We need a "look and blink" user interface too. Much better hygiene and ergonomics.

mojozart

Regarding OSX version, I suggest thinking about a webapp (or possibly Wasm). Leveraging WebMIDI and WebBLE, you won't get an AU/VST but it would be extremely cross-platform.

xor

Hi Dr. Moz, long time listener, first time caller.

I was reading https://forum.audiob.us/discussion/28821/senogrid-demo-of-sonogrid-triggering-senod a while ago and one comment about Sonogrid not having host sync caught my attention and I thought, hey, Mozaic syncs to the host why couldn’t it generate pulses?

After a bit of work and some tweaks and changes I’m ready to share https://patchstorage.com/pulsesequence/. The highlights:

• 32 track rhythm sequencer
• Each track has its own tempo (in steps per host measure)
• Each track has its own length
• Each track can send a single midi note on a specified channel
• Velocity of each step is programmable
• Tracks can be auto-repeat or 1-shot
• Tracks have customizable midi triggers
• Interactive mode can be “played” with pads that mute/enable patterns
• Sequenced mode forces all patterns to be 1-shot
• Pads/triggers can be real-time or quantized to the start of the pattern
• Full state saving
• GUI can be bypassed and you could program it in Mozaic Script
• It defaults to a rather lame 5 against 7 pattern that controls Ruismaker

It’s quite cool to be able to get something like this up-and-running in a relatively short amount of time. In the end though it is kind’a shoe-horned into Mozaic’s UI and not all that “fun” to use.

Let me know if you find it useful (musically or just for the code), buggy, have suggestions...

gusgranite

@wim it’s weird. I cannot seem to save your MIDI CC patch. I download it, open in Mozaic, I see it load in the standalone instance, but when I save it, close the standalone, and open the an AU instance of Mozaic it is gone? I can see other patches I have downloaded OK. Strange.

wim

@gusgranite said:
@wim it’s weird. I cannot seem to save your MIDI CC patch. I download it, open in Mozaic, I see it load in the standalone instance, but when I save it, close the standalone, and open the an AU instance of Mozaic it is gone? I can see other patches I have downloaded OK. Strange.

No need to save it in the standalone app. Maybe that’s the current bug where saving when not viewing the code loses the code. Can you try not saving and see if that helps? I’ll try some things here too...

brambos

@gusgranite said:
@wim it’s weird. I cannot seem to save your MIDI CC patch. I download it, open in Mozaic, I see it load in the standalone instance, but when I save it, close the standalone, and open the an AU instance of Mozaic it is gone? I can see other patches I have downloaded OK. Strange.

When you open it in Mozaic it should already be stored in presets. No need to save it.

brambos

@wim said:

@gusgranite said:
@wim it’s weird. I cannot seem to save your MIDI CC patch. I download it, open in Mozaic, I see it load in the standalone instance, but when I save it, close the standalone, and open the an AU instance of Mozaic it is gone? I can see other patches I have downloaded OK. Strange.

No need to save it in the standalone app. Maybe that’s the current bug where saving when not viewing the code loses the code. Can you try not saving and see if that helps? I’ll try some things here too...

No, I just tried. Works as expected over here.

And the update with the bugfix is already live. There are no known bugs in the current version

wim

@wim said:

@gusgranite said:
@wim it’s weird. I cannot seem to save your MIDI CC patch. I download it, open in Mozaic, I see it load in the standalone instance, but when I save it, close the standalone, and open the an AU instance of Mozaic it is gone? I can see other patches I have downloaded OK. Strange.

No need to save it in the standalone app. Maybe that’s the current bug where saving when not viewing the code loses the code. Can you try not saving and see if that helps? I’ll try some things here too...

Nope. I’m having the same problem! There’s something wrong with that file. I tried re uploading and it’s the same. I’ll try renaming it or something.

brambos

@wim said:

@wim said:

@gusgranite said:
@wim it’s weird. I cannot seem to save your MIDI CC patch. I download it, open in Mozaic, I see it load in the standalone instance, but when I save it, close the standalone, and open the an AU instance of Mozaic it is gone? I can see other patches I have downloaded OK. Strange.

No need to save it in the standalone app. Maybe that’s the current bug where saving when not viewing the code loses the code. Can you try not saving and see if that helps? I’ll try some things here too...

Nope. I’m having the same problem! There’s something wrong with that file. I tried re uploading and it’s the same. I’ll try renaming it or something.

Is that the CC randomizer? I just downloaded and looked at it. I'm really puzzled.

wim

Yeh. That’s the one.
Trying a new upload...