#1697 Sounding Matrix Editor notes across different segments

[musewhirl]

In RG v18.12 there was a feature that has now been removed. I am not sure if that was intentional or when it occurred, but the feature was useful.

Steps to reproduce in v18.12:

1. Place one note from a chord at the same time location, but each in a different segment
2. Open the Matrix Editor on all of the segments...one segment will be active (enabled notes) while the others appear inactive
3. Prior to the notes, drag the mouse to form the usual selection rectangle
4. Move the right edge of the rectangle across the notes and the chord is heard

This feature gave the user a ability to hear a complex set of notes across segments all at the same location without actually hitting play i.e. isolate the full sound at that location. The accuracy would be right down to 1/64th if required, without invoking notes after that, which is bound to happen by trying to hit Play and Stop. In addition, the user could continue to move the right edge of the rectangle to selectively play notes further down the time line, and that right edge could be moved back and forth resulting in a controlled play not fixed to the tempo. It is equivalent to actually going to a keyboard and playing all those notes...not the Matrix Editor keyboard though, since only one note at a time can be played there.

As usual, there was a downside to this feature as implemented in v18.12. If the notes were actually selected across segments (releasing the mouse rectangle), when delete is hit or the notes are moved, notes in all segments were deleted or moved, even the notes in the inactive segments, which probably is not what the user wants.

• Question: Out of curiosity, was this feature removed because of this downside or was the removal unintentional?

The only way I've seen to duplicate that now is the following cumbersome and roundabout method:

1. CTRL-click all of the segments and copy them elsewhere (still across multiple tracks), so the original segments are not affected
2. Then Join all segments into one containing all notes (fortunately originally linked segments will be de-linked at this point)
3. Now all notes will sound in the Matrix Editor when the selection rectangle moves across them
4. Adjust the notes as required

The downside here is that any adjustments to the notes in the joined segment must be followed by tracking them back to the original segment to adjust it there too before finally deleting the joined segment.

Of course, another logical approach is to allow the cursor to be manually dragged to play notes as it goes i.e. not to tempo via Play, but instead following the user's movements to isolate sounds at a given location. However, in this case the user would still need the ability to only play selected segments.

This is reported as a bug and not a new feature because the feature existed previously although there is no way to be certain that it's existence was not itself a bug or unwanted side-effect at the time.

[Ted Felix]

This change was first seen in 22.06. I'll try bisecting further.

[Ted Felix]

This change in behavior was introduced by [cc0a41].

Need to dig a bit deeper to determine what exactly caused this change. Only about 237 lines worth of changes, so shouldn't be too hard to figure out.