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At 12:15 PM 9/3/2001, Tom Ritchford wrote: >MIDI program changes tell a MIDI synthesizer to switch >to a new sound. (*) right. as the midi spec says "When a 'program' (i.e., sound, voice, tone, preset, or patch) is changed, the number corresponding to the newly selected program is transmitted." so a "program" is defined in midi as sound, voice, tone, preset, or patch. >(* - Actually some gizmos do other things with the program changes -- >for example, lighting units might move to a new scene -- but the >idea still holds...) To me that still fits with the idea of a preset. unfortunately, there are some gizmos now using program change to control things that are not programs at all, but actual functions. (like looper functions, for example.) This is breaking the midi spec, in my opinion. The reason manufacturers do this is because of the existence of simple-minded midi pedals out there that only send program change messages. Rather than tell users that they have to get a midi pedal with reasonable functionality to control a more sophisticated device than a multi-effect, the manufacturer contorts their midi implementation to do everything possible only using program change commands. Lexicon did this with the JamMan, and I was sad to see that Electrix is now doing it with Repeater. In the short term it is convenient for some users who already own a simple-minded controller. They will be happy that it is still useable. So it is understandable that some manufacturers make this choice. But in the long term it is harmful. For one thing it is watering down the midi spec, which makes it hard for other manufacturers to design similar devices since the standards become confused. It also reduces the demand for full-featured midi controller pedals, so those of us who wish that there were more good pedals on the market have to wait longer and continue to listen to the pedal manufacturers tell us that pedals are for guitar players, guitar players are dumb, and therefore cannot understand anything beyond a simple program change command. And it comes back to hurt the manufacturer as well, because now they have eliminated the possibility of supporting presets in their own device! So for example, you can never have a future Repeater upgrade that supports presets because program change commands have already been dedicated to execute the basic functions, instead of being left available for their intended purpose of changing presets.... Users with basic midi controllers would be really unhappy with a future upgrade that takes that away. So the manufacturer becomes stuck with this choice.... kim ______________________________________________________________________ Kim Flint | Looper's Delight kflint@loopers-delight.com | http://www.loopers-delight.com