Emu XL-7 & MP-7 User's Group

--- drK <drk@...> wrote:
> Aaron I was surprised by the statement about pattern chaining in an
> SMF, not because I know different (I don't) but because I was under
> the assumption that the whole reason Dave Oppenheim pushed for the
> Type-2 SMF format was to allow subsequences, which in my mind always
> included the simpler case of a bunch of chained sequences.  Are we
> both right because type-2 was not an option to use because it was
> not ever widely implemented (was it ever implemented outside of
> Opcode's Studio Vision?)?

Type 0 files are single-sequence, single-track files.
Type 1 files are single-sequence, MULTI -track files.
Type 2 files are MULTI -sequence, SINGLE-track files.

If there were a type 3 file (I'm envisioning mutli-seq, multi-track),
that would be almost perfect, but they don't exist.  Type 2 files don't
cut it primarily because they don't support multitrack (a requirement
for XL-7).

Also, there's the issue of data ownership.  Sometimes it's nice to have
all of the data bundled together (like multiple sequences in one file),
however, that leads to much duplication and editing issues.  On the
other hand, files using "links" to other separate files are pleasantly
small, but can break when the links fail.

The branching/looping working group (headed by Chris Grigg if I
remember correctly) was proposing a few additions to the SMF tags that
would allow some form of file link, some conditionals (like "if",
"else" "for", "while", etc), and anchor/jump points.  I kinda stopped
paying attention about a year ago when I ran out of time and it was
clear that the problem wouldn't be solved in time for XL-7.

> Sorry for the spurious interrupt.  The subject is probably not of
> much interest to anyone else.  Just my curiosity.

Nice use of "spurious interrupt".  =)  Trust me, file format issues
like this were the source of MUCH agony when designing the sequencer!

-Aaron


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