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reaching out to developers regarding accessable midi seequencer app for blind musicians.
Hi everyone, hope you're doing well and staying safe. I’m trey I'm a totally blind electronic music producer from the Uk. Currently I make music with a combination of Reaper on Mac OS X and hardware. I am interested in using iOS for music production, I have no programming experience or knowledge. At the moment what is missing from the music production landscape on iOS is an accessible midi step sequencer that blind people can use. I would like to work with a developer to build a step sequencer that blind people can use on iOS. I'm thinking the best programming language for this maybe juce6.1 as it has just become completely accessible across iOS and macOS 10 and Windows. Here is a link where they describe the accessibility features:
https://juce.com/discover/stories/juce-6-1-released
Here is a talk by Ed Davies which explains how the accessibility features are implemented:
The reason why I am recommending juce6.1 it's because a developer would not have to do much work in terms of building accessibility in to the sequencer apart from making any custom controls accessible, I wouldn't mind if a developer working with me wanted to use another programming language but I know that juce6.1 is accessible.
If you're a developer and you think you could help with this project or know a developer that might be interested in helping with this project please feel free to private message me here or comment on this thread. I will go into specifics about what I would like the sequencer features to be when we private message. Thank you for reading everyone and hope to hear from you soon :-)
Comments
Great, thought provoking post! This does seem to be an important gap in the iOS ecosystem.
Since Juce is cross-platform, it seems to me like approaching the developer of one of these accessible apps that works well about porting what is already there to iOS might be a more direct approach than enlisting a developer to start from scratch.
[edit] oh ... I just re read your post and noticed Reaper is the only app mentioned. I guess asking for a port of that to iOS isn't a practical notion. Sorry.
Thank you for your comment currently I’ve no idea of any step sequence apps written in Juce6.1 for iOS. That’s why am asking here.
What I meant was, if there are any step sequencer apps written in Juce on other platforms, extending that to the iOS platform would be easier than starting from scratch on iOS. That wouldn't apply to a full DAW such as Reaper, but if there are VST step sequencer plugins, they might be candidates.
If nobody offers to port a VST, you could explain the needs of the project here. If I were to build something with Mozaic, the interface would have to be: two rows of 8 buttons, with VoiceOver-compatible labels. The track length, max polyphony, and/or minimum note division would be limited. If you're looking for specific accessibility features, some of them may not be possible with this solution. But I would enjoy exploring accessible design.
Hi @skyblazer thanks very much for this by the time you read this I would’ve private messaged you :-)
@soundwarrior20 Before talking about implementation details, yould you please elaborate on what would make a great sequencer for blind people?
Most of us aren't and we have no idea how your ideal sequencer could work.
I would like to start from scratch and hear about your thoughts.
Consider writing your ideas on this thread so as many people as possible can contribute with their answers and ideas.
By the way, If I was to set up a sequencer that I could operate without looking at a screen, it might be a combination of a MIDI keyboard with a custom or ASCII keyboard controlling various recording, editing and pattern operations in a sequencer.
Patterns are my personal favorite to work with but also a linear recording sequencer could work if you have a number of locators on a timeline that you can jump to by hitting the respective buttons.
I think that the Synclavier sequencer worked like that, with only buttons on the keyboard controller.
Basically the sequencer has to be compatible with the VoiceOver screen reader on iOS meaning all the controls and elements have to be visible to VoiceOver, VoiceOver must be able to recognise all the elements and controls in a meaningful way. Hardware midi controllers would be a good option. But in the first instance it must be accessible to VoiceOver. I love the step sequence of Paradyne and for it to have things like parameter locks and some kind of generative capability would be good to.
Do you want this to be a cross platform application? Standalone or plugin? What DAW's or other music applications do you want it to work with? Do you want it to be able to interact with and be usable with external gear? So, Bluetooth, USB, WIFI type connectivity?
The accessibility features they are adding to JUCE sound good, but if you are doing an iOS specific application then using the native UI elements are going to make for an easier and deeper path to accessibility support with better ties into system level configurations.
From the software dev perspective, it would be helpful to define the use cases and workflows before considering the tools and libraries. Who are all the people you want this to be usable for and with what external software and hardware?
Also, do you have a development/distribution model in mind? Would you want something that is for profit or free? Would you want it to be open source to enable development and support by a wider community?
With all due respect, slow down. The man is asking for help to make a tool. There will be things he hasn't thought of but your list feels a bit long. You have at least 20 different questions in there. By "all the people" do you mean apart from blind people?
@ashh
Agreed in regards to the list.
I've been the eyes for a blind musician and producer.
For the most part the hurdles happen when editing.
When he first became blind the immediate question
when it came to DAW's was voice control.
Obviously things like editing MPC 1000's has to be done using eyesight.
When the user is blind, things like menu driven apps/software
become pointless unless the app is designed for blind users
or the user has knowledgeable assistance which is the case for my friend.
If the OP would like additional input from my friend then
that could be arranged as he is a multi instrumentalist and
is currently doing a livestream from the South of France on a weekly basis.
His current topic is Mastering his album with anecdotal stories
of how his MPC 1000 crashed, did it's thing and still managed to save a loop.
Why slow down? These are all questions that are going to need to be thought about and thinking about them early will make everything easier. Also, the answers to some of them will help me know how useful I might be to the project.
By "all the people" I mean everyone that might be targeted as a user. But, sure, apart from blind people would be one of the possible categories. If I were writing an application that didn't have sighted users as a target audience, then I would probably choose to write it very differently and possibly much more usefully for blind people. On the other hand, if people with low or reduced vision were also part of the audience, then it would likely be different design again.
@ neaonsilicon Hi thanks for your comment in terms of a distribution model I’m not really sure. Though if a developer wanted to sell it on the App Store I’m guessing I wouldn’t complain. Would an open source approach be possible under iOS? I would want it to work with other apps on an iPad be able to sync to an external clock and be able to work with external hardware gear :-) standalone version would be good but also au v3 it would be aimed at totally blind users. @ gravitas brief departure from the main topic how good do you think an MPC 1000 would be for a totally blind person without help? @ashh i’m already involved with some software projects so I’m familiar with answering these kind of questions :-)
My point being is that my friend could
be of great assistance for your project.
I also know he would be interested
in such a project.
He became blind.
Before that he used to use everything
from MPC’s to DAW’s, has knowledge
of sequencers and music studios
and something like this would be of
interest to him.
Though he is now blind, he is still
a professional musician and performer.
I mentioned the MPC 1000 because
it is an obvious example whereby a blind
user would be unable to operate it without
assistance whereas an app that is tailored for the blind and the visually impaired
would be more than useful indeed,
also it was the last sampler he used
before he became blind so he can
mentally go through the menus etc.
A suggestion nothing more.
This is all good stuff :-) I’m going to message a few of you :-)
Why slow down? Well, how about a little empathy? Your question makes me feel really sad. How about trying to help? Asking stuff that, to a complete novice and person who has already said they would like to help a Dev so those questions aren't even targeted at the right person, seems to have an agenda attached rather than simply wishing to help.
@ashh The questions @NeonSilicon asked were perfectly valid questions and were targeted at the OP's initial comment regarding the Juce SDK which is purely aimed at developers.
He showed his empathy by asking for more details and showing interest in the subject but if you're the developer who can deliver a solution already then please do.
@neonsilicon i’ve dropped you a message mate :-)
I've always thought that the Novation Circuit (not having a screen) could be used blindfolded, I have the Circuit Tracks wich has 2 sequencer tracks, you might want to considere it.
Cheers!
It is definitely possible to do open source development and release on the App Store. Much of iOS itself is open source. But you do have to be careful about what open source license you use. I was asking that question for two reasons. The first is that doing it as open source might get more people involved with the development and make the tool available to a wider audience. The second reason is that, if I remember correctly, open source projects can use JUCE under a different license.
If it were sold on the App Store, I think it would be good if any profit went back into developing the application as opposed to one developer taking the profit. That would involve setting up the legal structures required by Apple. Maybe that could be handled under a sponsorship from a not-for-profit.
I'm sorry that my questions made you upset. But, I get asked to work on development projects all the time. Most of these are things that have absolutely no chance of working. Being empathetic in that situation means trying to direct the thinking into what's involved and what needs to be narrowed to make it possible for the person's idea to succeed. I don't think that's an issue here though. @soundwarrior20 has thought this through well enough already to be aware of the tools that could be used and the scope of the project. My questions were aimed at the why of those tools and my getting a better idea of the desired scope.
I did definitely have an agenda. I was trying to nudge the thinking towards an open source type project. If @soundwarrior20 is open to that idea I think it would be a good thing for making the development successful. If I'm going to be useful, then there's definitely going to need to be other people involved. I can probably help work on the infrastructure and MIDI aspects of the project, but the accessibility aspects of my current AU's on iOS suck. Their internationalization sucks even more. The need for internationalization for this project is going to be even more important for the accessibility to work. So, if I'm going to work on this, which I would like to do, then I'd like for there to be other people involved that are better than me at doing those things.
@NeonSilicon I agree with your suggestions. Keeping it open source is a good idea. I have some experience with sequencer design and assistive technology, but accessibility is a broad subject. If we can build something that works, then hopefully other people can refine it into something more professional.
I'm going to start by watching this course.
https://www.coursera.org/learn/accessibility
Great! This sounds really good to me. Thanks for the link to the course. I think I'll audit it too . It should be really useful for me.
@neonsilicon @skyblazer i’m completely hundred percent happy for the project to be open source.
I would love the project to be open source :-)
Didn’t we have a forum member way back who was using the Apple voiceover features due to being sight impaired? She would have valuable experience in this area?
Cool. I am always direct and honest aka brutal and annoying but I feel that what you say in this post is what I would prefer to see at first. Who cares what I prefer? V true and no one is going to be like whatever for me. I guess when I see something that strikes me as, maybe not dishonest but certainly doesn't ring true or makes my gut go "hmmmm..." then I ask questions. I am always very protective of vulnerable people. I get that blind people or whoever do not need my protection but there we are, I can only be who I am.
Anyway, s'all good.
@soundwarrior20
Curious if you have made any progress on this project. I'm interested to see how it was tackled.
Maybe @GeertBevin is interested in this Project?
I've started work on a little pet project porting the open source Orca sequencer to iOS. It's my first iOS (or MacOS) development, and I'm not a great programmer anyway, but it seems like a doable project to learn some iOS programming. Once I get far enough, I will post what I've got on github and it will definitely be an open source project.
I wonder how Orca on iOS would meet OP's needs. The interface is entirely ASCII text, so I assume not much of a problem with enabling accessibility (but really I have no idea). And Orca is a powerful tool, can be used many different ways. It was designed with live-performance in mind. But, I think the optimal interface, even on iOS will be a regular keyboard, so I'm not sure why running the already-existing Orca on MacOS or Windows might not be a superior solution. In other words, I'm wondering why the need to get these tools on iOS, what's drivimg the desire to use an iPad rather than a Mac/PC?
(Also, Orca already runs on Chromebook and Android tablets, inside Chrome -- or any other Web-MIDI browser. I don't know browser standards, possibly accessibility to read characters on screen is already built in, and this is an already-existing solution for a tablet based midi sequencer. Here's a link to a running version of Orca in the browser, along with a tutorial; it will run but I don't think it will work to send midi unless you're running it in a browser that supports Web-MIDI: https://metasyn.github.io/learn-orca/ Actually, I'm not even sure of that, because it makes music on my Firefox on MacOS and I don't think I've even installed Firefox's Web MIDI extension. I think this may be because the version running in the link is driving Orca's companion Pilot synth -- also open source and running in-browser -- so there's no need of sending midi out of the browser. . . Maybe someone can check if this runs on an iOS device.)