Text entry in Satin?

[rbreen]

Hi there - enjoying Satin as an AAX plug in Pro Tools, but can't seem to figure out how to enter values manually - surely there's a way. What am I missing?

TIA,
rich

[Urs]

Depending on host you can just type away values after you click a control. But I'm not sure if AAX/Pro Tools was one of those where this didn't work.

(and we've been sooo frustrated that many hosts don't adhere to operating system or plug-in API standards with respect to keyboard focus, undermining our extremely user friendly system, that we haven't found the strength to implement an alternative system which would open a small text field instead)

[tasmaniandevil]

Text input in Pro Tools should work the way Urs described.
Click a control, type the value, hit Enter.
Yet there is no way to enter negative values as the + and - keys are used to increment or decrement the parameter value.

[rbreen]

Sadly - this does not work well; yes, you can enter a value, but keystrokes are also passed to the host, so say you want to set the input gain to +1dB; you click on input gain, enter 1 (now zoom preset in Pro Tools goes to the "1" value), then hit the enter key; value is entered, but also Pro Tools sees the enter key as a "new marker" and pulls up the new marker dialog - awkward at best, but basically not usable.

FWIW, I've never seen another AAX plugin that did *not* support the standard text entry method: double click (or in some cases single-click) on the parameter, enter the value, hit enter/return - no issues; only Satin seems to be a problem.

[Urs]

As I said, it used to work and it worked well. Our plug-ins could be controlled from the keyboard alone, without touching the mouse.

It's unfortunate that we live in a world where the arguably better system has to surrender to the more primitive, less usable simply because it's the more widely adopted one. But I don't think the last sentence is spoken about this, there may be options we can adopt that bar hosts from accessing the keys when we handle them.

[rbreen]

...the more primitive, less usable...

OK, well clearly I'm not gonna get anywhere with this. At least I know I'm not missing something, and that it just doesn't work. Guess I'll get back to work in my own primitive way.

best,
rich

[EvilDragon]

Double-click to type in a value is perfectly acceptable, Urs. It's pretty much ingrained in people now so they expect every plugin to do it.

I would also really appreciate it very much, because your current system, while elegant in execution (when it's in a DAW where it can work in full), just isn't cross-compatible enough...

[noiseresearch]

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[rbreen]

Our plug-ins could be controlled from the keyboard alone, without touching the mouse.

Yes, and there are plugs that operate that way in Pro Tools (think Melodyne or even most Waves), though I'm not sure I prefer it, I can imagine some would like to work that way.

...more primitive, less usable simply because it's the more widely adopted one.

Not sure I understand the pushback / dismissive tone on this; there are many modern plugins with very innovative and advanced GUIs (think Fabfilter), that adhere to the text entry standards we're all used to without problems.

[Urs]

Not sure I understand the pushback / dismissive tone on this; there are many modern plugins with very innovative and advanced GUIs (think Fabfilter), that adhere to the text entry standards we're all used to without problems.

The common way of text input is "more primitive" because all you do is enter numbers into a text field. Our approach also lets you type words, increase/decrease in large or small amounts, navigate, control via MIDI CC in coarse or fine expression. There's nothing condescending about the wording, it is de facto more primitive.

Our approach is also more ergonomic because you don't need to switch between keyboard and mouse. Again, there's nothing condescending about that. It's a simple fact.

Anyhow, as I said, what you have from us is a very toned down, crippled version of our concept. Our actual concept worked very well, but too many hosts needed too many workarounds, so we crippled it to what's there now. Which, in theory is still less primitive and more usable than the common approach, if only the hosts would adhere to the standards their manufacturers have set for themselves and us plug-in developers. Because, if host developers would follow their own rules, we could put it back in all its functionality.

[Urs]

[...] Our plug-ins could be controlled from the keyboard alone, without touching the mouse

If so it would be great. I imagine using Zebra only via keyboard. Do you have some ideas gathered to do so? Could it be implemented at some point?

It was fully implemented, but never worked in Logic, Live and other major hosts.

[noiseresearch]

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