WACOM support

Poster · Post by **Poster** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 7:38 pm

fiddling with 6 beta now for a while but still no wacom support..

please please please please...

in Live 6 alot of knobs are replaced by dragable value boxes and therefore it becomes even harder to adjust them...

[Galo] · Post by **[Galo]** » Sat Jul 29, 2006 10:38 am

I didn't even think of that, they mainly use it to model 3d objects and draw graphics, but of course, it could gain lot's of benefit an speed in workflow not even to think of the fact that you truly draw the envelopes @ more presision without having too zoom in a lot of the time...

not bad

Poster · Post by **Poster** » Sat Jul 29, 2006 11:38 am

[Galo] wrote:I didn't even think of that, they mainly use it to model 3d objects and draw graphics, but of course, it could gain lot's of benefit an speed in workflow not even to think of the fact that you truly draw the envelopes @ more presision without having too zoom in a lot of the time...

not bad

I don't mean the pressure support or any other exotic wacom features..

If you use a wacom with Live you know exactly what I mean.. HELL...

If you touch a parameter or gently adjust it,
the parameter 'runs' while you're not moving your pen/mouse..

I find this very very very uncomfortable and totally not understandable because Live is the ONLY app that I know of that acts like this....

And the most irritating part of it all is that Live is pretty inconsistent at it as well cause not all parameters act like this (i.e. Operators envelopes)..

But I give up..
Live will never support wacom I guess..
Or maybe in Live v.9 or v.57 when the do a complete recoding..

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrgggghhhhhhhh...

Poster · Post by **Poster** » Sat Jul 29, 2006 11:39 am

edit; double post

jackmazzotti · Post by **jackmazzotti** » Tue Sep 12, 2006 7:19 pm

yup its a big stupid pain in the rear

leinad · Post by **leinad** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 12:29 pm

I programmed a tool which allows you to use the wacom tablet with Live5. It's not perfect, it has a some issues with the midi editor and other controls, but at least the faders and knobs work right. When it works, it feels just perfect.

I managed to do this by looking at and modifying the mouse messages which the OS sends to Live and/or Live to itself.

I guess that if I could get in touch with the developers at Ableton we could establish a "protocol of WM_messages" which could be used to signal the control type which is about to be used and the mode required to use it. That way I could instantly simulate a normal mouse when Live requires it, and stop simulating it as soon as the control has stopped being used.

Poster · Post by **Poster** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 12:36 pm

leinad wrote:I programmed a tool which allows you to use the wacom tablet with Live5. It's not perfect, it has a some issues with the midi editor and other controls, but at least the faders and knobs work right. When it works, it feels just perfect.

I managed to do this by looking at and modifying the mouse messages which the OS sends to Live and/or Live to itself.

I guess that if I could get in touch with the developers at Ableton we could establish a "protocol of WM_messages" which could be used to signal the control type which is about to be used and the mode required to use it. That way I could instantly simulate a normal mouse when Live requires it, and stop simulating it as soon as the control has stopped being used.

oooohhh... yes.. finally..
that sounds very promising..
please contribute your progress to this thread..
it will make alot of people very happy!
if you need some 'betatesting' done let me know..

does it only work with L5 or L6 also?
and will it be PC/Mac?

thanks..

leinad · Post by **leinad** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 2:09 pm

It works only on pc.

The the current development targets Live 5. I won't continue developing it nor do I plan to release it, since it's pretty buggy and there is no way to remove those bugs without the help from Ableton's developers (which would probably mean releasing a new minor update for them).

But I will develop it for Live 6, which I will be ordering this week. And if Ableton collaborates, we might come up with a solution so that 6.0.1 could include support for this tool.

I'm hoping that this will work, since the lack of wacom's tablets is the only problem I see in Live, an I use my tablet exclusively (I'm no mouse user anymore).

Regards,
Daniel

Poster · Post by **Poster** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 2:20 pm

ok..
keep us informed..
i'am a strictly Wacom user and very, very interested..
cheers..

leinad · Post by **leinad** » Sat Oct 14, 2006 1:21 pm

I bought Live 6 , Sampler and Operator yesterday. I have adapted the tool to work with Live 6 and it does work like it used to with Live 5.

This means that knobs and faders work, but more complex ui like midi editor and other don't work reliably.

I will be analyzing the problem these days and probably be contacting Ableton next week to see what can be done.

leinad · Post by **leinad** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 1:38 pm

I've boiled it down to just one variable.

If that variable is 0, then the behaviour is just like it is without the tool.

If it is 1, meaning that mouse emulation mode is turned on, then it's the exact opposite: knobs, sliders, zoom, and all what used to accelerate into uselessness works just perfect, but what used to work nicely before, doesn't work anymore.

Ideally, that variable gets set when the user touches the surface with the pen.

If the pen get's down one of those special controls (knob, slider, etc.) then the variable should get set to 1, else it should stay at 0;

I cannot find out when the pen get's down on a special controller, I need Ableton's help for this.

All I need from Ableton is that they insert a line of code to their mouse handler when they know that the pen (mouse) went down on a special control:

if (mouseWentDownOnSpecialControl) {
::SendMessage(HWND_OF_LIVE, WM_APP + 0, 0, 0);
}

Hopefully we get this working soon.

Regards,
Daniel

Poster · Post by **Poster** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 1:48 pm

thanks for the progression report..
I really hope that the Abe's are willing to look into this..

franknputer · Post by **franknputer** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 5:06 pm

I, too, am interested in this!

leinad · Post by **leinad** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 8:08 pm

EDITED 28.Feb.2009

For Windows users there is a tool which partially (>90%) solves the WACOM issue with Live,
see the following post:

http://forum.ableton.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=50555

Nevertheless keep the discussion on this thread so that it always bumps up (and to clean the forum a bit, there are so many threads about this topic)

--------------------------------------------------------
OLD POST CONTENT:

Ok, it's going to take a couple of days until I can fix this together with Ableton.

In the meantime, you can try this:

Broken Link:
http://rapidshare.de/files/37126867/Pen2Live.zip

If you press the Win key (between Ctrl and Alt) you enable the mouse emulation mode, if you release it you disable the emulation.

Please let me know if it's working or if it crashes due to a missing dll (the Visual Studio 8 runtime).

Have a good day,
Daniel

Poster · Post by **Poster** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 8:14 pm

love to try it but I'am on Mac..

I rather see you team up with Ableton to get it integrated in Live..