[midishare-devel] Input from MIDI device

[Ashley W. <as...@dc...>]

Hi...

I'm investigating adding MIDI capability to our research software, EDEN 
<http://go.warwick.ac.uk/EDEN/>.  Specifically, I'm thinking of writing 
bindings to some or all of the MidiShare API for our language Eden, 
which is written in C.

I've installed MidiShare on my Mac PowerBook (OS X 10.3.9) and compiled 
the 'samples' code.  Using msMidiPlayer, I can play a MIDI file: I 
assume the sound is generated by the OS QuickTime synth.  Good so far.  
But on the input side, I'm not having as much luck.

I've connected an Edirol PCR-30 
<http://www.edirol.com/products/info/pcr30.html> controller keyboard 
via USB.  I have installed the Mac OS X drivers.  I can control Apple's 
GarageBand application using the keyboard.

I was expecting msDisplay to show me the incoming event data from the 
controller keyboard.  Unfortunately it shows no events at all.  I 
cannot get MidiShare to respond to input from the keyboard.

I have tried various setups in msDrivers.  (I believe the correct setup 
should be for port 0 to take input from "EDIROL PCR 1" and "EDIROL PCR 
2", and output to "QuickTime GM Synth".)

My ~/Library/Preferences/MidiShare/midishare.ini file contains the 
following line (among others):
active= msQTDriver.so msMidiDriver.so

I was expecting to be able to play the QuickTime synth from the 
controller keyboard by setting an appropriate configuration in 
msDrivers.  I thought perhaps I'd also need to run msEcho to achieve 
this.  But nothing happens either way.

I have also connected a Tascam US-428 MIDI interface 
<http://www.tascam.com/Products/US-428.html> to my Mac and tried the 
same experiment, using a Roland SPD-6 MIDI drum pad 
<http://www.roland.com/products/en/SPD-6/> to generate MIDI input.  
Again, I have been successful with various other applications on my 
Mac, but not with MidiShare.

I have also tried connecting the controller keyboard to a Windows 
laptop (running Windows XP Pro).  I downloaded MidiShare and hoped to 
be able to play the Microsoft GS Wavetable synth using the controller 
keyboard by setting an appropriate configuration in msDrivers.  Again 
this was not successful.  I have not yet tried compiling the 'samples' 
code on Windows, but I suspect I'll have the same result.

Am I misunderstanding something?  How can I read input from a MIDI 
device?

Any help much appreciated.

Ashley.