Ableton Forum

Okay, I'm still using 3 for Live performance, because I do live looping, and 4 and 5 have lost true "midi select on launch", which is crucial to be able to delete flubbed clips on the fly. So, from my live looping perspective, here are some feature wishes that will make me actualy buy and use 6, and will make it useful to other live loopers (kid Beyond uses 5, but without the safety net of deleting flubbed clips--I'm not that ballsy).

1. Bring back true "midi select on launch" ala Live 3. Lost it completely in 4, and in 5 the clip grid has to be "in focus" with the highlighted box around it--not useful for those of us performing with two handed instruments and not trying to mouse much. yeah, there are alt-arrow work-arounds but "midi select on launch" should just be "midi select on launch" without any "focus" malarkey.

2. Make a simple little button that is a midi-mappable "delete" key, just like hitting the "delete" key on your qwerty keyboard, but controlled by midi. Yes there is the bomes/ox workaround on pc, and whatever on macs, but it seems like a simple, easy request that would immensly help live loopers perfroming with Live, and bring live up to par with $250 loop pedals

3. Bring back bus view like in 3. For certain setups and soundcards, the ability to adjust gain on instruments coming into Live is very useful. bus view was great for this in Live 3--need to bump up a quiet keyboard module or tame a spiking loud guitar signal--use the bus view. I guess there are utility plug-in workarounds, but it was all so quick and easy with the bus view. why was it taken away, who did it ever hurt? One tiny little icon, one heck of a lot us instant usefulness, please bring it back.

4. Make Live 5 style scrubbing an option, and reinstate Live 3 style scrubbing (not 4, where you have to use two hands and the "ctrl" key to jump the playhead), allowing users to choose how to scrub. I just can't say how much this means to me, and how I feel I'll forever be stuck using 3 because of this. It is uber -frustrating to have one of the most fun and highly touted features be so drastically changed. Notice how most of the request are just to fix things they changed or removed from the application--I don't mind them adding things, but just taking them away is annoying.

5. As I said in another thread, zoom wheel support in the arrangerview ala Sony Vegas and other apps--click on (or hover over) a grid line, and zoom way in or out with the zoom wheel. This could save me days each year. With 14+ tracks in a set, zooming way in to do tedious timing edits slows way down at a certain point--ie the whole graphics and waveforms aren't responding instantaneously. Also, it is hard, even with lots of practice, to zoom way in and pull left or right to keep one particular drum hit on screen.

my 5 cents, anyway.

Ryan

just a friendly lil bump...

i totally agree with these, even though i havent gotten into much live looping yet a couple of these (playhead scrubbing, true select on launch) are essential and sorely missed.

- they did agree in principle that they should be changed back, but

- tried and couldnt do it

this is what happened.

.

I know you have been stuck with 3 for a long time due to a some of those removals, but my big wish for L6 is actually that they have re-assessed their market (s) and strategies to prevent Ableton making that mistake again.
Some of their core beliefs which worked so well for Live 1,2,3 need to be re-assessed as their functionality grows.

Live also has 3 equivalently large sectors of users:
* DAW type musicians/composers,
* 'live loopers' and performers
* DJs

(to simplify massivley).

Here we have 3 very different usertypes . It is not the case that a 'live looper' user can simply ignore features intended for the other users, because alterations to the codebase that fit one have impacted on other users.

It may have been the case in the simpler days of L3, but L5 and most likely L6 are much more complex beasts. Combine this complexity with Abletons love of a simplified interface and you actually have lessening of usability.

They need to re-examine the pre-conceptions about interface usability across the 3 userbases.

L6 will be a complex beast,
will it have 'main tempo nudge' buttons like DJs want?
will it have 'video sync playback' like composers want ?
will it have overdubbing and loop deletion like live loopers want?

how can ableton keep addressing those markets by providing more features to each while still keeping the interface fixed and 'simple'.

what affected Quandry is the re-write for the new warping methods and Live clips which replaced the old head jumping code. Ableton's strategy has always been "one GUI to rule them all" ... but now I think the the program requires more flexible interface , with user designed and storable GUIs and function sets to address the increased functionality.

There is understandable resistance to a "Live 6 DJ version" - so the alternative is to let the users define the available function and store it as a 'function set' complete with custom GUI.

not gonna happen of course !

Supster--word. I know I surely sound like a broken record, but it sucks to see some of the cool features in 4 and 5 (and to have paid for both of the upgrades) and to still be using 3 live to be able to loop properly. I think they should keep at these essential features that were lost in the 5 debauchel, and get them back in there for 6. Hopefully they take the time to get it right in 6 wheras they were timed-crunched for the release of 5 and weren't able to get it right...

I totally feel what you are saying Angstrom, and respect that they do need to cater to the very different user types to keep this thing going. I'm with you--one gui for all isn't the best overall approach. Drastically changing things from previous versions with no option for "the old way" is not cool 90% of the time (ie loss of true "midi select on launch" in 4 and 5, drastic change to the scrubbing in 5, loss of preset names on devices in 5 (wtf?!?), loss of arranger I/O in 4 (back in 5, duh!), loss of buss view in 4, etc.). Anyhow, some of these changes kindof make sense from a dj perspective (scrubbing I guess), but some are just omissions or broken functionality (midi select on launch).

I think decisions like this that are changes or omissions should be heavily weighed and considered. Like no arranger I/O in 4, loss of buss view in 4, no preset names on devices in 5--I really can't see that these helped ANYONE, and they all seem like drastic oversights of how people use their software. If aspects of Live are dramatically changed, they should offer an option in the preferences to have it the old way or the new way. I realize this is probably hard/impossible to code, but they should strive to add features, not take them away or drastically alter them beyond recognition, in essence screwing over the existing user-base.

Don't get me wrong, I love Live and am happy to have something as stable and fun as 3--there's nothing like it--but it would be great to take advantage of new effects, vsti, resizable session tracks and many other good things.

it's funny to think that software can be like guitars. that is, for some users, they largely got it right with L3, just like they did with the pre-CBS strats. i see the tension you're discussing in many posts, b/c complaints often seem to break down by user type (if you use live mainly as DAW, stability is nearly the issue it is for live performers, etc.). now i understand how DAWs like logic became so bloated and unwieldy (though all-powerful) as they tried to be everything to everyone (any excuse to quote everclear).

this issue (loss of the features quandry is talking about) opened up one of the core issues with this whole program ... which Angstrom summarized very well above:


theres no way you can keep this program fully functional for all its intended purposes, if you are not willing to make the interface more flexible and add more options

period

if they chose to ignore that this time around a lot of people are going to be unhappy

.

supster wrote:this issue (loss of the features quandry is talking about) opened up one of the core issues with this whole program ... which Angstrom summarized very well above:


theres no way you can keep this program fully functional for all its intended purposes, if you are not willing to make the interface more flexible and add more options

period

if they chose to ignore that this time around a lot of people are going to be unhappy

.

I am fairly new to Live. Been 3-4 months since I started using it with any seriousness.

The issues of complexity vs useability are being faced not just with Live. I think the pressures of financial need and user needs combine to make it very difficult. It is hard for a company to take the time to slowly develop something, adding features as creative and efficient ways to do so within the vision of the software are found.

I would be happy (though maybe many would not?) to pay for an upgrade that did not add too many features, but spent its effort and dev time on refinement.

I fall into a mix of the first 2 of the 3 types of Live users. It is fast becoming my main DAW and I do live looping/mixing/improvisational creation/performance.

I do a lot of video work and am one of the people who would like Live to have a video track. I would rather they stop there though. I am a big fan of useability, simplicity and creativity.

If they make things more customizable, where the individual user can decide more or less how their screen looks through choosing viewable "modules" that way a DAW user can use it like a DAW, a DJ can have their templates all set up for gigs, a composer can open a template and have his or her pallete exactly the way they want to see it when they are inspired and start recording with their guitar or a vsti. I think this is the only viable solution that would make the most people happy. Liberally saving modular assemblies as session templates would be fantastic! Live 6 could come with many preset templates, mainly to get people started and to use as a model for their own. Users can submit templates online to share... the children of the world would play peacefully forever....

glu wrote:If they make things more customizable, where the individual user can decide more or less how their screen looks through choosing viewable "modules" that way a DAW user can use it like a DAW, a DJ can have their templates all set up for gigs, a composer can open a template and have his or her pallete exactly the way they want to see it when they are inspired and start recording with their guitar or a vsti. I think this is the only viable solution that would make the most people happy. Liberally saving modular assemblies as session templates would be fantastic! Live 6 could come with many preset templates, mainly to get people started and to use as a model for their own. Users can submit templates online to share... the children of the world would play peacefully forever....

this is what some of us have been advocating for a while now

if it takes a couple of versions to get this fully implemented, fine .. in the meantime i think

- adding more options and configurablity in the menus and existing features and

- focusing on the details of workflow for each of the major intended uses (DJ, DAW, Live Looping/PA)



PS: and making it all work without sputtering, choking and gumming up/grinding to a halt :O) would be nice

.

2 is most certainly not going to make anyone mad. if you don't like it don't map it.

and 4 is much like what propellerheads did with the mixer. after making a fudamental change to how the eq in the mixer worked, they placed a little switch on the back of the mixer to toggle between the old and new algoithms.

edit,

i will second any and all requests for a midi mappable delete.

and i want to have the option to view all of the possible mappings in a list and see what is currently assigned

glu wrote:If they make things more customizable, where the individual user can decide more or less how their screen looks through choosing viewable "modules" that way a DAW user can use it like a DAW, a DJ can have their templates all set up for gigs, a composer can open a template and have his or her pallete exactly the way they want to see it when they are inspired and start recording with their guitar or a vsti. I think this is the only viable solution that would make the most people happy. Liberally saving modular assemblies as session templates would be fantastic! Live 6 could come with many preset templates, mainly to get people started and to use as a model for their own. Users can submit templates online to share... the children of the world would play peacefully forever....

I would be very pleased if they did this.

glu wrote:If they make things more customizable, where the individual user can decide more or less how their screen looks through choosing viewable "modules" that way a DAW user can use it like a DAW, a DJ can have their templates all set up for gigs, a composer can open a template and have his or her pallete exactly the way they want to see it when they are inspired and start recording with their guitar or a vsti. I think this is the only viable solution that would make the most people happy. Liberally saving modular assemblies as session templates would be fantastic! Live 6 could come with many preset templates, mainly to get people started and to use as a model for their own. Users can submit templates online to share... the children of the world would play peacefully forever....

I think this would be great as well, but I can't help wonder if the Abe's think this would alienate/scare the newbie from trying Live. Remember Burger King's whole "Have it your way" campaign failed miserably while McDonald's "my way or the highway" strategy paid spades.

people can be scared by choice, it's true - but there is a halfway house.

Simply lock the GUI down as a default when the app is installed ... for newbs. Then if anyone has the mental capacity to find the 'unlock GUI' checkbox in preferences then everyone is happy.

newbs get a basic interface, advanced users can knock themselves out changing things to suit their personal requirements.