Re: [crazy_music] Digest Number 49

Hi Mary

> I feel a little silly that because I usually have my keyboards hooked
> up through a Unitor into 2 Macs I hadn't really explored this
> capability of FTS, having been content to use the computer keys
> (which don't require matching midi channels and such). But I look
> forward to using it now that it has been pointed out :-)

Thanks. It is really easy to miss that kind of a thing, and I can
well understand.

I'm hoping to add a few neat things to the relaying from Jacky's
questions and suggestions.

> FTS is an awesome program. Everyone making microtonal music (on a
> PC) would make their lives easier using it.

> I still think it would be neat on a PalmPilot.

I do too.

It would be quite a fun challenge to write a program for such
a small (160 by 160 pixels) screen, and stylus input.

One is really talking about a new program from scratch - single
threaded to start with - FTS plays the tune by starting a
new thread, as is standard practice in writing for the low level
midi api in Windows.

(This means you can continue to interact with the program using
the ordinary interface, while the midi playing continues in
the high resolution timing mode of the midi api).

Also, a number of things to do with the way the code needs to
be written.

I've been browsing this site by palmpilot for developers to find
out more.
http://www.palmos.com/dev/
esp.
http://www.palmos.com/dev/intro.html

I know that when one uses a program the interface is (hopefully)
kind of transparent most of the time. Especially things like
exactly how the mouse / keyboard work and interact with the program
and the screen, and the details of how the program is able to receive
your input etc.

It's only really when one tries actually writing a program that one
becomes aware of these things (like only noticing
rough edges to paintwork if one has been doing
decorating oneself).

Would indeed be fun to write a tiny program with all
those limitations. I expect I'd learn a lot from
doing it, especially to do with learning to
make a gui for such a tiny screen. Who knows,
some day maybe,...

There's a fair amount of free palmpilot example
source code programs, palmpilot emulators
for the p.c., and development tools, so there is quite a
lot of support available, should I ever decide to
try something along these lines, so I gather from the
web reading I've been doing.

Robert