is growing the controller api a popular demand around here?

[Quack Quack]

I was a bit surprised to see minimal api commands for the arranger. Being able to create,move and edit clips around the arranger especially if the clips had IDs would make it possible to create entire songs from the API alone. Wondering if the devs were aware or requests for growing the API.

[Milkman]

So you want to use Bitwig, the DAW, but you dont want to use all its carefully, passionately developed features and instead you want to use a robust API to do production work from some other application? Huh. Maybe just develop your code until its more like a host and an arranger, and just generate music that way without BWS in the middle?

[monolithx]

I was a bit surprised to see minimal api commands for the arranger. Being able to create,move and edit clips around the arranger especially if the clips had IDs would make it possible to create entire songs from the API alone. Wondering if the devs were aware or requests for growing the API.

Regarding AI vibe coding usage and infinite whishlists on all audio gear forums, they should... or die.

[oluf]

Yeah, this would be very welcome. I had been working on a multi-modal (voice, cli, eventually gesture) control system that was initially targeting live, but would much rather work with Bitwig as I am on Linux.

[] Peter:H []

I think it's a legit request. Bitwig consists of an UI which is a window into Bitwig the playback engine. Following the MVC pattern (or derivatives) it would be cool to be able to create different views/controls ontop of the engine.
But I think it will not happen - because with a legit API Bitwig the company would undermine futur earning opportunities if all over sudden people would be able to build usefull stuff and offer it to others.
I remember that there was a user who hacked a native bitwig device back in the Version 2 days by changing the DSP Code which is based on Bitwigs Nitro Scripting language. Nitro is still there but afaik the possibility to access and tweak Nitro Source Code of a device has long ago been blocked ... Imagine people could write sth like the spectral plugins on their own... Therefore I think we are not going to see a fundamental extension of API capabilities into teritory the OP requested.

[apoclypse]

I think a better controller api for more access to the DAW from a controller would be nice. I don't really care for or about extension for generative purposes. I just want to finally be able to see the piano roll, waveforms etc in a controller like Push. I don't know if its possible now.

[chamania]

i actually think controller API and documentation are the most important thing of a DAW, since they all lack extremely in that area, we are stuck forever it feels like.
Bitwig is already pretty much leading, we are still stuck in the past tho.

[knob_monster]

peter is spot on about them protecting device sales. but look at how max for live carried ableton. restricting the api just hurts adoption long term bruh

[monolithx]

After 20 years of DAW to DAW (including years of Max) trying to build a Neuzeit Instrument Drop like controller, I finally implemented mine in a few months of spare time vibe coding (almost only architectural and documentation work) with features that Drop is not even to manage like hardware preset files management, devices specific behaviors and environment aggregation. All integrated to AI. Honestly, I don't see any future for a tool that you can't extend according to your needs (you still can do it as plugin, anyway). Next step is trying to generate the hardware plans from code

[Milkman]

Honestly there is no future for the idea of embedding "AI" trash in everything, as the tech itself is an unsustainable dead end. I could tell this wasnt about "extending the bitwig controller API" from the start, lol. On the bright side, the people who choose to degrade their own cognitive capabilities (if they had any to start) by using shallow cognitive crutches will have their space, and everyone else will have theirs, so I guess this is good? lol

[monolithx]

Each time "AI" is pronounced, the fun begin So why use a computer? During centuries composers had only a piece of paper... and even them were losers because they need performers... Anyway, what I'm most interested here, is building my own music tools. If I can ask an AI tool to connect and snapshot my set, I'm more than happy instead of loosing my time on maintenance.

[Milkman]

Why use a computer? Because it is my career and I understand much of it better than most people you will meet, including what you call "AI", lol. This isnt a funny joke about new technology vs old technology, but sadly for some ignorant yet passionate folks, its that simple. If someone says something bad about the new toy (MIT and Harvard, for example), just call them a Luddite and show off your great knowledge.

[monolithx]

Let's philosophy behind the mainstream pros&cons hype and AI assisted nude cats pics generation:

Some composers worry about the possibility of automatic music production while others, paradoxically, seek it! I think this is a red herring, either way. Today, there are already people who produce music by the mile, mainly sound illustration. AI can, or will soon be able to, do this and also produce music to accompany videos, following, for example, the dramatic arc suggested by the image. But I believe that AI is currently unable to produce truly experimental music. Simply because experimental music is less defined, since it is not governed by clearly established principles (like tonal harmony).

Moreover, this raises the crucial question of data: musical logic has, for a century, become more and more multiplied and individualized. Each composer develops his own, different from that of his neighbor. This means a lot of worlds to go through for the AI and less data from each of them. The AI will therefore have a hard time getting into the logic at work, and what it will produce will be close to random. In short, music can be produced in this way, but it will not necessarily be interesting and will only explore new territories by accident. For a composer, as for a listener, it doesn't matter if a machine composes music like Bach.

What do you think are the risks of such technologies?

The same as any technology: the standardizing effect. By making artists' lives easier, technologies tend to harmonize aesthetics; a tendency that is magnified by the very nature of deep learning. But is this normative danger stronger than that presented by the media machine, the public gaze, or globalization? Having access to all the music in the world does not help to produce new music.

On the contrary, it requires composers to follow a unique path, a form of experimentation, deviations that only make sense in the context of the history and the landscape in which they are embedded. Conversely, this can be an asset, and AI can be used to do just that: to give voice to an emerging norm. The machine brings both an exteriority (it is not a human who composed this) and a focus on our idiosyncrasies (learning captures what is recurrent in a corpus). In this, the machine will undoubtedly "move the lines": what are the questions and issues surrounding composition for a human when a machine can also compose?

So? Will it kill mainstream? Maybe, I hope so...

[pdxindy]

Please take the AI stuff to the AI forum.

[monolithx]

no prob, in my mind it's directly linked to api programming in this subject anyway...