Alias / Linked / Shared / Pooled Clips - are you using them?

[Fornicras]

As a longtime user of FL Studio and just started using Studio One, I thought I was gonna use "Shared Events" more in Studio One because FL's default behavior for patterns is shared. But turns out I don't need to use that often because having them not shared makes me create little differences between each pattern more easily and as someone who usually makes repetitive patterns, I feel like it's really made my music better because I find myself creating variations more and more. Slightly different patterns every 4 bar. Awesome.

[antic604]

As a longtime user of FL Studio and just started using Studio One, I thought I was gonna use "Shared Events" more in Studio One because FL's default behavior for patterns is shared. But turns out I don't need to use that often because having them not shared makes me create little differences between each pattern more easily and as someone who usually makes repetitive patterns, I feel like it's really made my music better because I find myself creating variations more and more. Slightly different patterns every 4 bar. Awesome.

...which still isn't a valid reason to not have the feature implemented AS AN OPTION for those that want to use it

Also, you are aware in FL you can make patterns distinct, i.e. break the link?

[Dionysos]

...which still isn't a valid reason to not have the feature implemented AS AN OPTION for those that want to use it

Yup. It would also be nice if every DAW that offered the option allowed specifying the default behaviour, i.e. whether copied clips are copied as linked or unlinked copies by default.

Because I'm sure Fornicras knows that patterns can be made unique in FL Studio, but defaults matter, and it sounds like for him, "unique by default" clips are a better match. For me it'd be the other way around.

[antic604]

Yup. It would also be nice if every DAW that offered the option allowed specifying the default behaviour, i.e. whether copied clips are copied as linked or unlinked copies by default.

IMO 'linked' should never be a default, especially because in all DAWs where I used it, it's just a matter of holding additional modifier key when duplicating the clip to make it 'linked'. Users can comprehend the difference between moving & duplicating clips, so they'll wrap their head around one more feature too

[Fornicras]

...which still isn't a valid reason to not have the feature implemented AS AN OPTION for those that want to use it

Yup. It would also be nice if every DAW that offered the option allowed specifying the default behaviour, i.e. whether copied clips are copied as linked or unlinked copies by default.

Because I'm sure Fornicras knows that patterns can be made unique in FL Studio, but defaults matter, and it sounds like for him, "unique by default" clips are a better match. For me it'd be the other way around.

Exactly. I know they can be made unique but I guess I was being lazy about it, right-click on pattern, then make it unique, change the notes etc. Unique by default approach is much better suited for me. I didn't know that I needed this before starting using Studio One.

[Dionysos]

IMO 'linked' should never be a default

IMO it should be, but you know what opinions are like...

It's how FL Studio works, so at least there's some precedence for that behaviour.

I'd still be interested to see an implementation where there's no such thing as explicitly "linked" or "unlinked" clips, just two modes: "Edits apply to all identical clips" and "Edits apply only to the edited clip(s)". So in the first mode, clips would be implictly treated as "linked" if their contents are identical. This way you wouldn't have to decide up front what you want a clip to be, but could opt in to or out of making broad-stroke changes whenever you want. There might be all sorts of details and complications that would make such an implementation unfeasible, but at least on paper (ok, in my head ) it seems elegant to me.

[Abiah]

Back when I used to do 3D modeling, I constantly used object instancing. If you want to duplicate and distribute a bunch of street lights down the avenue, of course you still want to be able to edit one of them and have all of them update. Especially cause clients often decide to change such things after the fact or even last minute!

And in human spaces there are so many duplicate objects... light switches, door handles, wine glasses, fluorescent lights in a commercial space, etc., etc., etc.

Yes, same in game engines like Unity, also in visual design tools like Figma, and of course code with objects, classes. components etc. Repeating instances of a primary pattern.

It's a fundamental of pattern-based creation across all mediums. Change all child instances of the parent pattern. Whether you prefer it to be disabled in your own practice, it's still an intuitive & first principle factor in patternlooped-pattern music making. Dance music in particular is built from this. Live & Bitwig are sold as the dance music tools. It's a gaping hole in their design.

[antic604]

IMO it should be, but you know what opinions are like...

True

But I'm really against separate "modes". User should decide - by holding additional modfier key - that when they duplicate something a link is created (and it should be clear during performing the action, e.g. by dedicated mouse cursor) and then it should also be very clear that when you click a clip that's part of linked group, all other clips should briefly "blink" or something to let you know you're editing all of them. And the clips within linked group should have a common visual cue (e.g. a small icon + a number or name of the group).

I don't think there's a DAW that does this correctly right now. Both S1 and Cubase for example will display a small icon on the clip to show that it's linked, but if you have several groups of linked clips on single tracks there's no way to tell them apart (unless you color them separately, which I don't do - one track = one color).

Perhaps there's so much confusion & controversy about it becuase no one's doing it right?

[xbitz]

As a longtime user of FL Studio and just started using Studio One, I thought I was gonna use "Shared Events" more in Studio One because FL's default behavior for patterns is shared. But turns out I don't need to use that often because having them not shared makes me create little differences between each pattern more easily and as someone who usually makes repetitive patterns, I feel like it's really made my music better because I find myself creating variations more and more. Slightly different patterns every 4 bar. Awesome.

fyi , S1 has a dedicated pattern feature with variations and standard events can be converted back and forth into them
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVT-icSrnGI
pretty cool, so shared events seems a bit outdated legacy feature for me (patterns has been introduced around S1 4.5 AFAIK)

[Fornicras]

As a longtime user of FL Studio and just started using Studio One, I thought I was gonna use "Shared Events" more in Studio One because FL's default behavior for patterns is shared. But turns out I don't need to use that often because having them not shared makes me create little differences between each pattern more easily and as someone who usually makes repetitive patterns, I feel like it's really made my music better because I find myself creating variations more and more. Slightly different patterns every 4 bar. Awesome.

fyi , S1 has a dedicated pattern feature with variations and standard events can be converted back and forth into them

pretty cool, so shared events seems a bit outdated legacy feature for me (patterns has been introduced around S1 4.5 AFAIK)

Yes, I use patterns a lot with my drums. They have their problems but still better than putting everything on different tracks. I don't use them with melodic instruments though.

[Dionysos]

But I'm really against separate "modes". User should decide - by holding additional modfier key - that when they duplicate something a link is created (and it should be clear during performing the action, e.g. by dedicated mouse cursor) and then it should also be very clear that when you click a clip that's part of linked group, all other clips should briefly "blink" or something to let you know you're editing all of them. And the clips within linked group should have a common visual cue (e.g. a small icon + a number or name of the group).

You're against separate modes and then you list all the issues that occur with the currently common approach, or what would be needed to improve on it. That's exactly why I think editing modes might work. Less micro-management of clips – they are linked when they're identical, that's it. In FL Studio I've often made a clip unique to try out a change, only to find out that I didn't like it, so I had to manually replace it with the original pattern again. With my suggestion, simply undoing the changes would also re-establish the link.

But it's a bit of a pointless discussion about a hypothetical implementation, I'd be happy about any way to create linked clips in Bitwig, I can live with the slight downsides of current implementations.

Perhaps there's so much confusion & controversy about it becuase no one's doing it right?

I don't think there really is that much "confusion & controversy" around it outside of these forums.

[pdxindy]

Whether you prefer it to be disabled in your own practice, it's still an intuitive & first principle factor in patternlooped-pattern music making. Dance music in particular is built from this.

Perhaps so... But I'm not convinced about the feature.

One thing about aliased clips, it's too easy to edit a clip and accidentally edit something one didn't intend to. It is a feature that forces me to spend mental energy keeping track of what is linked to what. Were I a developer I would look for other ways to implement the basic concept of editing multiple clips at once that didn't put that burden on the user and was more fluid.

[antic604]

One thing about aliased clips, it's too easy to edit a clip and accidentally edit something one didn't intend to. It is a feature that forces me to spend mental energy keeping track of what is linked to what.

That's why I said no DAW implemented it really well, but it can be done if someone decided that it's a marquee feature of a point release, rather than an afterthought.

[apoclypse]

Whether you prefer it to be disabled in your own practice, it's still an intuitive & first principle factor in patternlooped-pattern music making. Dance music in particular is built from this.

Perhaps so... But I'm not convinced about the feature.

One thing about aliased clips, it's too easy to edit a clip and accidentally edit something one didn't intend to. It is a feature that forces me to spend mental energy keeping track of what is linked to what. Were I a developer I would look for other ways to implement the basic concept of editing multiple clips at once that didn't put that burden on the user and was more fluid.

Pretty much this. I do it all the time in S1's pattern mode and used to do it all the time in Maschine. I would have to undo all the stuff I did so I don't mess up the patterns that are already sitting on my timeline. I have to remember to duplicate the pattern before making the changes.

Maschine used to have this split function that I used to use all the time where if I made changes to a pattern and hit split it would split out the changes to its own pattern. In typical NI they removed that function and told us we can just undo and copy the original pattern which wasn't remotely the same.

[Dionysos]

All these people using FL Studio without any of those issues must be super-human. Maybe the difference is that in FL, the list of patterns is quite front-and-center and you actually learn to keep it tidy. Both Bitwig and Live have a clip launcher that could just as easily serve as a clip manager.

Anyway, I should drop out of this topic, reading about people "not being convinced" about a fundamental bread-and-butter DAW feature doesn't really feel like time well spent.