Ableton Forum

EDIT: Control was accepted today! You can download it here: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/control- ... ?mt=8&ls=1

I probably shouldn't post this yet because it hasn't been accepted by Apple yet, but I submitted a new app today and wanted to share. It's an interface application (a la TouchOSC and Mrmr) with some important advantages (and disadvantages).

The advantages are:
--JavaScript scripting of widgets, similar to what is possible on a Lemur. As one example there's an included interface that plays the game of life (cellular automata, not hasbro). But it is also useful to say, move the crossfader after hitting a toggle button. Or to base note velocities off of accelerometer readings. etc. etc.

--Accelerometer, gyro and compass readings on a per interface basis with adjustable update frequencies

--Wireless MIDI and OSC. Interfaces can be configured for both protocols; if users select a MIDI destination MIDI will be used otherwise OSC will be transmitted.

--You can "push" interfaces to the app via OSC. The app itself is discoverable via Bonjour.

-- Free!

Website: http://www.charlie-roberts.com/Control

Here's a sample DJ interface with a crossfader, a couple of sliders etc.

looks great, charlie! can't wait to try it. had much use out of your softs before. thanks again for another freebie. much appreciated.

You can "push" interfaces to the app via OSC. The app itself is discoverable via Bonjour.

could you elaborate on this?

Looks awesome! Let us know when Apple approves it, cause I'd really like to give it a try.

Really beautifull interface man! Looks profecional.
Minimalism is an artform in it self.

Would love to read an FAQ, or a manual, or spec list..

garyboozy wrote:looks great, charlie! can't wait to try it. had much use out of your softs before. thanks again for another freebie. much appreciated.

You can "push" interfaces to the app via OSC. The app itself is discoverable via Bonjour.

could you elaborate on this?

Hi Gary,
When Control is started other Bonjour enabled applications will immediately become aware of it and know the ip address of the device running the software. You can then send an interface to that instance of Control.

An example of using this would be an audience participation piece. Users can download the software, start it, and then you can immediately push an interface to them that interacts with a performance. Another use case would be for interactive art installations. People could walk by an installation, read instructions for downloading the software and begin interacting. A third would be virtual reality environments; I work in one ( http://www.allosphere.ucsb.edu ) where we need the ability to give users contextual interfaces based on their location in a virtual space.

Once you know the ip address of the device (via Bonjour) you just send a string of JSON to "/pushInterface" and the interface should immediately appear on the users device.

ze2be wrote:Really beautifull interface man! Looks profecional.
Minimalism is an artform in it self.

Would love to read an FAQ, or a manual, or spec list..

Thanks! I'm (pleasantly) constrained by using WebKit for rendering... I did this to get around Apple's unfortunate prohibition against the use of scripting languages; JavaScript interpreted by WebKit is the only language that users (as opposed to app developers) can use when writing their own scripts. Anyways, that puts some limits on my already minimalist design tendencies.

Did you miss the website in my post? http://charlie-roberts.com/Control

I'll be flushing out info there this week as the approval process ensues... an FAQ is a good idea.

bigbadotis wrote:Did you miss the website in my post? http://charlie-roberts.com/Control

I'll be flushing out info there this week as the approval process ensues... an FAQ is a good idea.

Yeah, I saw it. And I actually love the gui screens.

If you post here when you have news, I get a note in my mailbox.

any news on the submission? keen to try it out.

searching for 'control' on the app store search lists 180 apps
there's also an app called Control already on the store. might that hold things up? dunno how the apple bouncers work...

No news on the submission. In the app store I had to call it Control (OSC + MIDI) in order to get around the name problem. I remember searching to make sure nobody was using the name when I first started the project... somehow that app didn't come up even though it's been out for a while. Hmmmmm.

hmm. how about moCTRL ?


cheers for the update

rejected... not sure why. They asked for a video demo of it running which I just posted. It's not exciting (really) but I thought I'd post it here anyways:

http://charlie-roberts.com/Control/images/Control3.mov

I'm hoping it was rejected because they weren't confident reviewing the MIDI / OSC aspects of it, and that this is why they asked for the video. - Charlie

OK, it's up in the store!

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/control- ... ?mt=8&ls=1

I've been trying to update the documentation on the website... let me know what needs work. - Charlie

A really kind review in Create Digital Music:

http://createdigitalmusic.com/2011/01/m ... verywhere/

Nice templates! Really shows how much development TouchOSC still needs. Maybe you guys should team up.

I found a little bug in the Multibutton template.
If you press the contact button repeatedly, about 1 in 20 times the grid wont be cleared.

Cheers

- Bjorn

Hah! I'm pretty sure that's the smallest of the bugs that are still in there... :)

Thanks for the props! I've submitted an update to Apple that includes a pretty nice step sequencer template, as well as bi-directional MIDI / OSC communication (works like the Lemur... if a slider outputs to /volume you send Control a message to /volume to set the slider's value). And -many- bugfixes. Once they accept that update, I've got another to submit with an interface that functions as a monome emulator... in order to create that I added the ability for interfaces to register for a javascript callback allowing you to process OSC messages. Which is cool... every interface can then process arbitrary OSC messages in addition to the ones that set the values of widgets.

I also went open-source tonight and have started working on an Android version.

https://github.com/charlieroberts/Control

If anyone has JavaScript chops and is interested in helping out with some of these goals let me know. - Charlie