Key Control

[Sir Hannes]

Issue:
LogicPro 10.8.1 internal keyboard won't react anymore on the single key "p" as it is used by Hive now. Playing a melody via the QWERT* keyboards will reproduce a e-flat only when the focus is set on the arrangement window of Logic and not the Hive plugin anymore.

[ChadArnold88]

Key Control is an awesome feature. In the long run it would be desirable to have the key codes customizable. At first it could be done in the config file without the need for a UI approach. I loathe having to use the mouse off and on for everything. Keyboard control makes everything easier and is also necessary from an accessibility point of view. I use to program back in the days when everything (on windows) was supposed to have at least two ways of accessing functions, one utilizing the mouse and the other the keyboard. These additional features are ANOTHER way to make the u-he software stand head and shoulders above the rest! THANK YOU!

[Urs]

Thank you. Yes, making things customisable is certainly something we'll go for at some point. There has been no preparation for this though, as we're currently evaluating the extent of how many keyboard shortcuts are required. Hence, atm it's all hard coded, and we're waiting for feedback to see how some things need to be handled differently (such as the "+" requiring a shift on some keyboard layouts).

[ChadArnold88]

The problem is there are so many keyboard layouts. There are keyboard layouts that correspond to different languages, then ones like Dvorak. So this is not a localization issue. In windows there are localization API's but these are keyboard agnostic. This is why my mind jumped to custom configurations first, because it avoids having to build some kind of keyboard layout DB. So customization avoids those pitfalls. Then it is back to dealing with some of the original constraints, such as the minus having to be after a number for negative numbers, since the keycode is already spoken for.

[the_eraser]

I would also ask for Key Control to be customisable – I wanted to try this new feature in Zebra today on my MacBook but I found out I cannot, due to my French AZERTY keyboard.

[alberto_balsalm]

Yep, it needs to be completely remappable, including the modifier keys. Shift seems to be hardcoded to fine control, and the "+" key, which you get by a combination of the keys "Shift" and "=", hard locks you into incrementing only by 0.01. It's effectively unusable.

I would also propose an option to drop modifier keys. Modifier keys make sense in text editing programs (and even then it's debatable) - you have to "escape" the input mode and you do this via modifier keys (as in, pressing the key 'S' inputs this letter in the editor, but Ctrl-S saves the file). But in a synth, what exactly are we escaping? Shouldn't I be able to map, say, WASD to selection (instead of arrow keys), Q and E to coarse control, 1 and 3 to medium control, and Z and C to fine control. Now all the keys are right next to one another, which might be way more convenient for some people. This will also allow you to manually resolve or tweak any kind of key conflict going on between the DAW and the plugin, or adjusting to any kind of keyboard layout.

I'd also love to see more extensive mouse controls implemented with multiple reassignable mouse modifier keys and user-controlled scaling for knobs. For some reason almost no plugins have this feature. I've no idea why everyone is hard coding this.

It's a common pitfall in plugins. One dev is coding on a Macbook with a touchpad, another uses a Magic Mouse, both of them use mouse acceleration, and none of them think twice about any of it. While a different dev uses a Windows machine with a 5 button mouse with a notched wheel, and mouse acceleration is turned off. Everyone uses different resolutions, different screens, different mouse sensitives, and they're all used to how their own setups operate and have their own expectations of how things should work.

We end up with absurd situations where in some scenarios the functional movement of controls can end up being so tiny that it competes with those miniature faders found in Roland Boutique mini-synths. You move the mouse half a centimeter, and the knob goes from 0% to 80% of the travel, making the synth next to unusable as a result because you need surgical precision to operate the controls.

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U-he synths and effects have "normedMouseTravel" and "mouseTravelInPercentageOfUISize" parameters in the scripts. "normedMouseTravel" is extremely useful and I've used it to tame Diva's cutoff mod knobs that have higher sensitivity than other knobs, for some reason. It also works in ACE which has way higher knob sensitivity than other u-he synths. It would be really helpful to see this option in the settings, ideally per-knob (for situations like in Diva where some knobs are more sensitive than others).

It would also be really helpful to have multiple key modifiers for variable fine control. Currently there's normal control via left mouse click dragging, and ultra fine control via the "Shift" key, which most of the time feels way too fine. You can't control the fineness of it, and it's only option available. It would be nice to combine modifier keys. Reaper, for example, makes extensive use of this, and it can be extremely handy and helpful for some functions. Shouldn't I be able to use "Ctrl" + "Alt" + "Left mouse click drag"?

Some other shortcomings: the middle mouse button duplicates the left mouse button; pressing the right mouse button on a knob opens a menu which often has just one option in it ("Lock"). Arturia has a convenient feature where right dragging a knob gives you finer sensitivity as opposed to left dragging (coarser sensitivity). Showing the menu via right click can still be kept, but upon releasing the button (currently it pops up upon pressing).

Mouse wheel could also use some options for tweaking. For those of us with regular (for PCs, at least) notched wheel mices, the wheel is an instantly accessible endless encoder operating in relative mode. U-he's plugins are pretty good, for me at least, in terms of stock sensitivity for the mouse wheel. So many other plugins get it completely wrong or don't even support mouse wheel, which is crazy. Still, it would be very helpful to be able to tweak it, and the mouse wheel should have the ability to respond to different key modifiers (i.e. shift + mousewheel = fine control, ctrl + mousewheel = medium control, ctrl + alt + mousewheel = control by semitones).

A lot of these features are, in some way, already implemented, but for MIDI control. Yet the most common type of control by far - via keyboard and mouse, is hardcoded, very simplistic, and not subject to any kind of fine tuning aside from manually figuring out and tweaking the skin scripts.

[Nug Wrangler]

This is a really good feature

[Geomystery]

I love Key Control function. It's right direction to improve workflow. Keep it up.

[a.cla.dio]

This is supposed to work on Linux? Tried with Renoise and Bitwig with Hive and Zebra. I can select controls with the arrow keys, but I can't change values in any way. Maybe a problem with the ITA layout? (but my keyboard have the numpad). I have to try with my Mac at home (US Keyboard without numpad)

[Urs]

This is supposed to work on Linux? Tried with Renoise and Bitwig with Hive and Zebra. I can select controls with the arrow keys, but I can't change values in any way. Maybe a problem with the ITA layout? (but my keyboard have the numpad). I have to try with my Mac at home (US Keyboard without numpad)

from the first post:

not on Linux... yet

[a.cla.dio]

Ah ok! Thank you Urs! I'll try at home with the Mac

[a.cla.dio]

I'm a bit late with this, but I've tried Key Control yesterday with the Mac. I really love the idea and it works really well. Fast and intuitive. But, as many already pointed out, it's not really usable... at least not with a US layout keyboard without the numpad. I started using US layout keyboards because I was tired that all the various softwares that I use heavily rely on keyboard shortcuts made for the US layout. The lack of tilde and backtick on the italian layout is annoying as well. Ironically, in this case, the italian layout would have been better because doesn't need shift for + and -.

Obviously, customizable keys for Key Control would be ideal, but in the case that it will be difficult to implement, why don't just use the arrow keys with a couple of modifier keys? For example:
- arrow keys for moving between controls
- alt+arrow up / down for increasing / decreasing values
- shift+alt+arrow up / down for fine control

[blindingSlow]

Hi! I'm visually impaired, not completely blind yet, but I see very little.

What a nice surprise it was when I opened he Zebra 2 manual and read about this feature, with a link to this forum!

So I'm stopping by to express my sincere gratitude to the noble developers at U-He for implementing Key Control, without which it would be absolutely impossible to use the software.

I hope they don't abandon the idea, and I eagerly await Key Control in Zebra 3 as well (;

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Here is a suggestion:
It would be useful to be able to jump from module to module and section to section.

For example:

Move between modules:
Holding shift + up/down arrows moves the cursor to the module in the selected direction.

Move between sections:
Holding shift + cm + up/down/left/right arrows moves to different sections, making it easier to move the cursor from OSC1 to the bottom panel, or central matrix, for example.

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Once again, I express my gratitude for the feature. It's no wonder that a company concerned with the best sound quality would also care about the best user experience.