Re: [timidity-talk] Re: [ANN] FreePats Project

[Eric A. W. <ew...@cc...>]

> > Some patches seem to have only their parameter (i.e. envelope, etc.)
> > modified, some patches seems to have been created newly or to have
> > been got from somewhere.  Would you please let us know the change
> > history of these patches.
> 
> Eric spent quite a bit of his limited spare time to put together
> this initial set of pats and only he knows exactly what he did
> during the process. Unfortunately I suspect we are lucky to have
> these pats in the state they are in and any extra documentation
> will probably not be readily forthcoming.

Actually, I did keep track of most of those changes:

acpiano		relooped
synpiano	relooped
clavinet	all new, samples from Thomas Korte
celeste		all new samples to replace Gravis samples
tubebell	new sample to replace Gravis samples
church		new low samples
timpani		redid the declipping
marcato		swapped out a Gravis sample (2nd sample) with a non-Gravis one
trumpet		all new samples
trombone	all new samples
tuba		all new samples
flute		swapped out a Gravis sample (highest) with a non-Gravis one
ocarina		relooped + retuned low samples, lessened LFO vibrato
sitar		new samples to replace Gravis samples
steeldrm	replaced a sample with an ancestral sample (same sample but
		higher quality), thanks to Rodrigo Nuno Bragan
highq		replaced Gravis sample with non-Gravis one

> He made a magnificent effort to "seed" this (I believe) much
> needed project but made it clear his time is limited and it would
> be up to "the rest of us" to add to and improve this initial
> set of free pats.

I don't know if I would call it a "magnificent effort".  This is the first
step in getting rid of all the non-free samples.  I would have released a
complete set if I had had time to replace all the Gravis samples, but I
don't right now, so I'm hoping that others can fill in some missing
instruments until I have time to look for more new replacements.  Mark
Constable has kindly volunteered to head up the new project to create a
set of free patches.  I thought the instruments I could identify as being
free of any known non-free samples would make for a good start at creating
such a set.  So I'm more of a contributor to this project than the person
running it.

> > I personally prefer the conventional short file name... :-(

> pros...
>  . naturally sorted in program change order
>  . more descriptive names
> 
> cons...
>  . takes up more room of a cfg file
>  . breaks from convention

I like seeing the patches in GM sorted order, and the more descriptive
filenames too.  I agree that typing the longer names is a pain, but I
think that it is better overall.  Making new .cfg files with the longer
names is time consuming (I know, I've started to do it), but it only needs
to be done once.  All the amp= values will need to be tweaked as
instruments are replaced anyways, so new .cfg files would need to be made
even if the instruents weren't renamed.  I can upload a crude.cfg file
that tries to map missing instruments to the nearest instrument that
exists if anyone wants it.  It could at least save some typing for those
creating new .cfg files with the new names.  I could upload a shell script
that can rename everything back to the original short names too.

-Eric