F'em

[Wolfram Franke]

Set nr. of voices to one , now play two notes ..you will actually hear two voices .
What gives ?
Iam trying hard to replicate the envelope bug where the attack is suddenly disregarded ( obviously only noticeable when attack stage is fading in ) .
It's really hit and miss , I save the preset as an fxp file , upon loading it plays file ..after a while the bug appears ..really strange

Edit : just after typing this post ..the bug appeared again

Bug or design choice , when routing operator 8 to the output , double clicking the output sets it to full volume , on any other operator it sets to - inf ( zero volume )

Hi!

Voice count set to 1, but 2 voices can be played: will check.
Envelope attack bug: will check.
Operator 8 double click set to full volume: design choice. This is the default setting that's also used when you initialize a layer. If it bothers you too much, I might consider changing it to -inf, though.

Best wishes,

Wolfram

[Wolfram Franke]

UPDATE - sustain/sostenuto pedal bug described below only happens on operators using TX waves. Operators using the other waveforms behave as expected.

Hi!

Will check what's going on there.

Wolfram

[Peter Widdicombe]

Number of voices - is that TOTAL for the VST, or total per requested note ? Even set to 1, I would expect to be able to play a chord, for instance; just with one voice per note.

... unless MONO mode had been configured.

[dRowAudio]

Regarding Content install:

• There appears to be a permissions issue installing the content on some systems. At the moment I think this affects macOS systems
• We are looking to rectify this with the Download Manager and F.'em soon but you should be able to fix the permissions manually by doing the following:
• Open Finder and go to "/Library/Audio/Presets"
• If you don't have a "Tracktion" folder in there, create one, if there is one, skip to the next step
• Right click the "Tracktion" folder and select "Get Info"
• Check the permissions at the bottom of the window. If your username isn't listed as "Read & Write", either add it with "Read & Write" permissions or change the "everyone" user to "Read & Write"
• Now download the content with the Download Manager again*
• When complete, open F.'em in your DAW, go to the browser page and wait a few seconds, the content should be installing and after a few seconds the library should start appearing
• If nothing happens after a minute or so, check the "/Library/Audio/Presets" folder, does it contain an "F-em" folder? Does this contain an "Instruments" and "Samples" folder? If so, do these contain a bunch of "fminst" and "fmsample" files?

If not, let us know and we can go from there.

---

*- The content is downloaded to a temporary file in the "Downloads" folder but when it completes it should be copied to "~/Library/Application Support/Tracktion/Content/"
- When F'em is opened, it looks in that folder for content files to install
- It will try to copy the files contained in the content pack to the "Private" Instruments and Samples folders (which defaults to "/Library/Audio/Presets")
- That may take a minute or two depending on the speed of your machine. After it completes, the preset library will rescan and they should be visible in the synth
- When done, it will delete the original content folder to avoid installing it again and again
- If this doesn't complete fully, it's probably because one of the folders in this process has the wrong permissions
- F.'em should try and prompt you to modify the permissions for these Tracktion folders if required, so I'm not sure what's happening if these dialogs aren't being shown

[Wolfram Franke]

Number of voices - is that TOTAL for the VST, or total per requested note ? Even set to 1, I would expect to be able to play a chord, for instance; just with one voice per note.

... unless MONO mode had been configured.

That's for the total plugin, as can be guessed by the fact that it is located in the "Master" section. It is a maximum number of voices. Don't use it for sound design, use it for limiting F'.em's maximum CPU performance.

When you want to set how many voices are triggered per note, use "Unison" on the Layer page.

And I just checked it: it is off by one. Will be fixed in the next update.

Best wishes,

Wolfram

[Dacci Pucci]

Despite the manual fix above, I can not re-install the content now because the Download Manager is permanently queued. Sorry, but I can't be bothered to invest any more time into trialing this after unsuccessfully trying to install the plugin properly for two days. I think this is a good example why the content should *always* be included with the download. Make it one file that contains everything and get rid of any extra steps. And make sure beta testers actually try the final installation procedure before delivering it to paying customers.

[dRowAudio]

We used to install the content with the plugin but customers complained of large downloads every time we updated the plugin. In some countries, internet speeds aren't great so it makes a difference if you only download what has actually changed.

If the Download Manager is stuck it sounds like there might be an issue with curl. We're looking in to why this isn't installed in the same place on some machines.

You can always download the content via a browser here: https://marketplace.tracktion.com/downl ... hive?v=fem
Then install it using the button in the F'em UI.

We have had many people install F'em and the content successfully (including our beta testers), we're just trying to find out why there are problems on some machines.

We are also working on a new version that should fix the install process (so avoid the manual fix I posted earlier) which should be released very soon.

[DocAtlas]

Regarding Content install:

• There appears to be a permissions issue installing the content on some systems. At the moment I think this affects macOS systems
• We are looking to rectify this with the Download Manager and F.'em soon but you should be able to fix the permissions manually by doing the following:
• Open Finder and go to "/Library/Audio/Presets"
• If you don't have a "Tracktion" folder in there, create one, if there is one, skip to the next step
• Right click the "Tracktion" folder and select "Get Info"
• Check the permissions at the bottom of the window. If your username isn't listed as "Read & Write", either add it with "Read & Write" permissions or change the "everyone" user to "Read & Write"
• Now download the content with the Download Manager again*
• When complete, open F.'em in your DAW, go to the browser page and wait a few seconds, the content should be installing and after a few seconds the library should start appearing
• If nothing happens after a minute or so, check the "/Library/Audio/Presets" folder, does it contain an "F-em" folder? Does this contain an "Instruments" and "Samples" folder? If so, do these contain a bunch of "fminst" and "fmsample" files?

If not, let us know and we can go from there.

---

*- The content is downloaded to a temporary file in the "Downloads" folder but when it completes it should be copied to "~/Library/Application Support/Tracktion/Content/"
- When F'em is opened, it looks in that folder for content files to install
- It will try to copy the files contained in the content pack to the "Private" Instruments and Samples folders (which defaults to "/Library/Audio/Presets")
- That may take a minute or two depending on the speed of your machine. After it completes, the preset library will rescan and they should be visible in the synth
- When done, it will delete the original content folder to avoid installing it again and again
- If this doesn't complete fully, it's probably because one of the folders in this process has the wrong permissions
- F.'em should try and prompt you to modify the permissions for these Tracktion folders if required, so I'm not sure what's happening if these dialogs aren't being shown

I'm on Windows, and I'm having the same problem with the download manager.

[dRowAudio]

Is the Download Manager actually downloading the content file or is the progress getting stuck?

On Windows the process is the same but the .content file should be downloaded to "C:\Users\<USERNAME>\AppData\Roaming\Tracktion\Content".

Then, when you open F-em it should install it to "C:\ProgramData\Tracktion\F-em".
Do you have the "C:\ProgramData\Tracktion\F-em" or "C:\ProgramData\Tracktion\" folders on your hard disk?
If not if you create them and make sure they have user write permissions, F'em should install the content automatically.

As I mentioned, I'm finishing up a version which should have this problem fixed so you won't have to go through this manual process.

[dRowAudio]

Hello everyone who is having problems with the content. Can you please grab the F'em v1.0.2 installer from here: https://marketplace.tracktion.com/downl ... hive?v=fem

Once installed, open the F'em interface, after a few seconds, the content should install and the browser be populated with the content.
If this doesn't work. Download the content again with the Download Manager and when it completes go back to F'em and it should pick it up after a couple of seconds.

Let me know if you have any problems with this.

[Dacci Pucci]

We used to install the content with the plugin but customers complained of large downloads every time we updated the plugin. In some countries, internet speeds aren't great so it makes a difference if you only download what has actually changed.

Okay that's a good point indeed, did not think about people with slower connections. I will give it another try now with the new infos and links you provided.

[bhinton]

Why not just send people the download link when they buy the plugin, and include the file size and a "this may take a while" warning? And now that I've finally gotten it installed... what is with this bizarre thing of the content file disappearing copying itself to application support and THEN copying content to Audio/presets when the plug in is opened? It doesn't need to be this kind of Rube Goldberg-level complexity - just provide links, tell people to put the appropriate files in the presets/tracktion/F-em/(relevant folders) and all will be well and we can start exploring what looks to be a great new synth!

[bhinton]

Sustain/Sostenuto bug is still there in 1.0.2 but only on the even numbered TXWaves. Odd numbered waves seem to be OK.

[dRowAudio]

The way the presets are installed is part of a larger plan to offer more content more frequently. We want a system where you can simply download a content pack and whatever piece of software knows about that content can install in correctly.

This isn't as simple as it sounds however as the content locations can change. For example, in F'em you can set your factory content paths to be an external drive. If that happens, only F'em knows where those paths are so only it can install the content to those locations.

We use the Tracktion folder in Application Support as that contains other global settings and has to be there. It's a static location all the products can check if there's content they can handle.

You can always manually install the content packs. They are zip files, you just have to rename the .content extension to .zip and you can extract them and put the files in the correct place on your hard disk. This does however assume that you know where the correct place is. That might be the case for some people but lots of people are new to computer music and aren't used to hunting down file paths.

There is always the manual option of downloading the content pack from your tracktion.com Downloads folder and then installing it using the plugin. However it seems in a very small number of people system permissions aren't allowing that. This is what we're currently looking in to and should have fixed shortly.

[lalo]

Hi all, F'em is just great!
Instant buy for me.
I think i found a little bug/issue.
Automation is not working correctly when moving envelopes' nodes.
At least in Reaper with automation in "touch" mode.
All knobs work as expected as far as i can see tho...

ps...is there any bug/issue contact form on Tracktion web site? I can't find it...