PatchWork 2.65 - issues / strange behavior

[luckyred]

Hello fellow musicians

First I will say the update 2.61 to 2.65 is great: upsampling support and a working VST3 PatchWork Synth in Ableton Live are much needed additions. Also I like the colouring options. Thank you very much, Blue Cat Audio!

But I encountered a strange behavior of the PatchWork Synth. I was creating some plugin-slots presets for my favourite plugins. First I open the PatchWork Synth, click in the first PRE-Slot and select "load VST3" and load a synth plugin. Now if I click again on the same slot the context menu won't open, the menu in which you can load a VST plugin, change colour, adjust oversampling settings and the like. Not every time but eventually after four or six clicks it stops opening. Then after repeatedly clicking in the occupied slot, the context menu appears again but with fewer options. For instance the options to colour the slot or the adjust oversampling are missing form the context menu as are options for MIDI and Audio routing. After a few more clicks the context menu only displays the first few items like the slot was empty and I first would have to load a plugin into that slot. But of course the slot is still loaded with a plugin.

Happens to me with PatchWork Synth VST2 und VST3 v2.65 in Ableton Live 11.2.10 on Windows 10 21H2. Do I miss something or is that a bug with PatchWork? Is there a workaround?

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Feature request: Maybe I missed it in the manual, but I can't find an option that would prevent plugin windows ("editors") to open upon loading the plugin into a slot. So if I load multiple plugins I have to close every single plugin window after loading. Is there a way to tell PatchWork to stop opening the plugin windows after loading it into a slot?

[Blue Cat Audio]

Hi,

Thanks for the heads up. That's really odd as this issue has never shown up so far. If the menu is showing different item. it is probably the menu for a slot that has nothing loaded inside. So this looks like a problem with mouse coordinates. Are you maybe using some specific software for your mouse (something like Synergy or any other tool)? Or maybe do you have a particular configuration with multiple screens?

There is indeed no option not to open the plug-in's user interface when loaded. Maybe that's something we could add in the future.

[luckyred]

Hi,

Thanks for the heads up. That's really odd as this issue has never shown up so far. If the menu is showing different item. it is probably the menu for a slot that has nothing loaded inside. So this looks like a problem with mouse coordinates. Are you maybe using some specific software for your mouse (something like Synergy or any other tool)? Or maybe do you have a particular configuration with multiple screens?

Kind of. You know, I'm a lazy fellow. After work, when I sit down, lean back and play with my softsynths, I use the Windows build-in magnifying tool to compensate for the distance to my 27 inch display when I don't sit straight up at my desk.

I was suspecting a correlation between that weird PatchWork behavior and the magnifying tool as well. So I left the screen scaling at 100% (no magnification) but still PatchWork started again to act weirdly. At that time the magnifiying tool ran in the background. I will try to not even open the magnifying tool in the first place. Then again, if only running the tool without scaling the image would cause PatchWork already to behave weirdly ... Let's put it this way: no other app I know of does that. I'll report back.

There is indeed no option not to open the plug-in's user interface when loaded. Maybe that's something we could add in the future.

That's great to hear. I feel like spending money on a Blue Cat product was well invested. The short amount of time I own one of your licenses already show me that you really care. That is much appreciated. Thank you.

May I ask for another two little features?

(1) Would you please consider giving the parameter value readout under the PatchWork preset name a bit more contrast? At the moment the font color is middle to darkish grey on black. Sometimes I have a hard time reading it. Or maybe make the font color user selectable, if possible.

(2) Ableton Live has a keyboard shotscut ([CTRL] + [ALT] + [P]) which hides all plugin GUI windows instantly and brings them back with another press. In case of PatchWork, [CTRL] + [ALT] + [P] hides the PatchWork interface but leaves all the plugin windows of the loaded plugins inside of PatchWork on screen. Is it possible to implement a hotkey into PatchWork that would allow to hide or even fully close all open plugin windows inside of PatchWork at once? And then with another press would open the previously closed windows again? That would be super handy for people that work on a single screen like me.

[luckyred]

On the topic of not opening context menu / missing context menu items in occupied plugin slots:

I rebooted my system, gone straight into Ableton Live 11 not launching the Windows magnifying tool and start playing around in PatchWork. Sure enough after a short period of time the context menu of occupied slots was no more showing up -- in this case the first PRE-slot loaded with Rob Papens Punch 2 Multi Out device. Continuing clicking on it and other parts of PatchWork it finally opened but a few menu items were already missing. Like for instance the oversampling, colouring and routing options for that slot.
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BC_PW_2-65_2.png

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So I guess the Windows magnifying tool has nothing to do with this behavior.

Another strange thing I noticed: I was not able to open my Windows explorer (native Windows file manager), neither with starting the explorer.exe nor with the native Windows keyboard shortcut [Windowskey] + [E]. I had to close Ableton Live and with it PatchWork and then I was able to open the Windows file manager again with [Windowskey] + [E].

In laymans terms I imagine there is some sophisticated window managing mechanic at work under the hood of PatchWork that might need some improvement. Can some reproduce this behavior?

[Blue Cat Audio]

It's as if the menu got truncated right after the params map. Which makes me think: how many parameters does this plug-in have? Maybe there is something wrong going on in the parameters list, which could cause all sorts of issues in Windows in case something has gone wrong with the menu. Can you check what's inside the Params Map menu?

[luckyred]

[...] Can you check what's inside the Params Map menu?

As far as I can tell there must be hundreds upon handreds of parameters with Rob Papen Punch 2. Punch 2 is a drum machine / drum sequencer / drum synthesizer / sampler. Every one of the 24 pads act as a seperate synthesizer or sampler. In turn, every pad that is configured as a synthesizer has different synthesizer engines. A few are for hihats, a few engines are for kicks, a few for snares, etc. It seems like every single parameter of each synthesizer / sampler module of every single pad and every synthesizer engine is mapable. On top of that come the global parameters of the instrument.
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BC_PW_2-65_3.png

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I have to ask the Rob Papen team to get to know the exact number. Looked into the manual, haven't seen it documented yet. ( No, I won't count )

Which makes me think: the other Instrument plugin I had the same issues with was Sample Tank 4 by IK Multimedia. An eight part multitimbral sampler / rompler. With lots of parameters as well. But nowhere near as many as Punch 2.

So .. could that be the issue?

[luckyred]

I got a reply from the developer of Punch 2. I think it is alright to quote that reply. No secrets shared I guess.

Hi there

Yes, as Rob says there are lots of parameters, 32768 in total.

So for most hosts this is a not a problem but some host go through all these for what ever reason and so that might take some time.

Cheers
Jon

I'm no developer, but 32768 seems a lot to me.

So .. what to do now?

[Blue Cat Audio]

Thanks for investigating!

I can confirm that when inserting a plug-in with more than 22380 parameters on Windows, the menu will start behaving strangely. Working on a fix right now... Will keep you posted.

[luckyred]

Thank you, sir, for fixing things. That's not always a given. I will take a look at the preview version of PatchWork from time to time.

[Blue Cat Audio]

A new preview of PatchWork has been uploaded today. It should fix this problem. Please report back when you have the opportunity to test it!

[luckyred]

A new preview of PatchWork has been uploaded today. It should fix this problem. Please report back when you have the opportunity to test it!

You keep surprising me. That was fast.

I'm cautiously optimistic. I played for about an hour with version 2.66 preview and the context menu appeared every single time and displayed all items as expected.
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BC_PW_2-66-P.png

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I came across one or two glitches that I had not seen before. Like on startup PatchWork 2.66 preview seemed to not load the user default preset and was showing what looked like the initial interface configuration. That is because of the untested nature of the preview version I guess.

So far, again, thanks for your excellent customer support. I wish other (software) companies would learn a lesson from you.

[Blue Cat Audio]

You keep surprising me. That was fast.

Your detailed report helped a lot. And when there is a simple demo version of the plug-in available with no iLok/user account etc. that's easier...

I came across one or two glitches that I had not seen before. Like on startup PatchWork 2.66 preview seemed to not load the user default preset and was showing what looked like the initial interface configuration. That is because of the untested nature of the preview version I guess.

That's odd, there should not be any difference here. Have you made sure the default preset was there?

[auote]
So far, again, thanks for your excellent customer support. I wish other (software) companies would learn a lesson from you.
[/quote]
Thanks. I wish all customers were as good at reporting bugs as you are

[luckyred]

[...] That's odd, there should not be any difference here. Have you made sure the default preset was there?

Haven't moved / deleted the default user preset. Actually I created a new one after updating to v2.66 preview. Just in case there would be an incompatibility with the preset between v2.65 release version and v2.66 preview. I have to admit though I simply installed v2.66 preview over the already installed v2.65 release version. Hope that didn't mess things up.
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BC_PW_2-66-P_23.png

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My user default layout of the interface looks like this:
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BC_PW_2-66-P_21.png

8 by 8 grid, plugin preset folder permanently visible, UI scaling at 130%, meters put on at the right side of the interface (not in frame)

When I drop PatchWork v2.66 preview into an instrument track of my DAW, the interface window pops up like this:
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BC_PW_2-66-P_22.png

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Then I have to click on the folder icon of PatchWork to make the preset list visible and manually click on the default preset to load up my custom PatchWork layout. I wonder though if the initial layout would show that many meters on the right edge of the interface. Is that the usual initial layout?

Thanks. I wish all customers were as good at reporting bugs as you are

Thanks. I have a vital interest in a smooth PatchWork experience. I like your work and can see myself using PatchWork whenever I sit down at my DAW.

[Blue Cat Audio]

Thanks for the heads up, there was indeed a glitch with the VST and VST3 versions. It has now been fixed in the new preview uploaded today!

[luckyred]

Thanks for the heads up, there was indeed a glitch with the VST and VST3 versions. It has now been fixed in the new preview uploaded today!

Thank you, sir. I can confirm that dropping the plugin onto a track opens up the user default layout. (v2.66 preview, VST3)