[fluid-dev] Re: fluidsynth on mac OS X

[Josh Green]

On Tue, 2004-03-16 at 05:37, Ebrahim Mayat wrote:
> 
> The reason for this is that even though there is no problem for 
> fluidsynth to become a client in Jack, there is no MIDI driver for 
> fluidsynth (previously known as msSynthDriver) in the present version 
> of MidiShare (1.87). So, fluidsynth cannot act as a MIDI source.  
> (MidiShare did have this capability for iiwusynth.)
> 

Well generally you don't use FluidSynth as a source of MIDI events, but
rather as a destination synthesis engine. So it would be more useful to
look at how to get MIDI events routed to FluidSynth.

> Ideally, I would like to use fluidsynth in a live or quasi-live setting 
> using a laptop.
> 

I've used it in this manner before. I have a USB MIDI controller
keyboard that I connect to my laptop (it has lots of knobs for
connecting to FluidSynth via modulators, which I use Swami to create, I
hacked a "global modulators" feature that works nicely so you don't have
to create modulators for every instrument). I enjoy playing this way,
but I think there is still some work that needs to be done with the
synthesis. Its really good at the moment, but there are likely some
areas of improvement. I think FluidSynth could use some validation and
waveform verification. This could be done by looking at the actual
waveform using very specific sample data (square wave, sine wave, saw,
etc) and then modulating the various effects to make sure its responding
within SF2 specs.

> I could send you my configure script and Makefile. I'd also be glad to 
> help you out in other ways; just let me know. In the meantime, you 
> could checkout
> 
> <http://fink.sourceforge.net/doc/porting/index.php>
> 

Yeah I was reading over that. One of these days I'll sit down and give a
crack at it, if someone doesn't do it before hand.

> I am also looking into how I could use fluidsynth as a pure sound 
> source as opposed to a source of MIDI data. Perhaps, you could save me 
> some time and give me a few pointers on this.
> 
> This is what I get:
> > ebrahimm% fluidsynth 
> > /Users/ebrahimm/Desktop/sf2demos/VintageDreamsWaves-v2.sf2
> > fluidsynth: warning: Ignoring sample SineWave: can't use ROM samples
> > fluidsynth: debug: Using 'coreaudio' audio driver


Notice: Its using the coreaudio driver, not Jack. You probably need to
run FluidSynth with "-a jack", note that the jack audio server needs to
be running. It would be interesting though to get your input about what
it sounds like with the coreaudio driver. Last I tried it, it sounded
very bad (lots of static, even after turning the FluidSynth gain way
down).


> >
> > JAS: DeviceGetPropertyInfo unkown request:'bbvs'
> > fluidsynth: debug: sampleRate 44100
> > fluidsynth: debug: mFormatFlags 0000002B
> > fluidsynth: debug: mBytesPerPacket 4
> > fluidsynth: debug: mFramesPerPacket 1
> > fluidsynth: debug: mChannelsPerFrame 1
> > fluidsynth: debug: mBytesPerFrame 4
> > fluidsynth: debug: mBitsPerChannel 32
> > fluidsynth: debug: Using 'midishare' midi driver
> >
> > *** malloc_zone_calloc[1369]: arguments too large: 4,2423534936
> > *** malloc[1369]: Deallocation of a pointer not malloced: 0x66f000; 
> > This could be a double free(), or free() called with the middle of an 
> > allocated block; Try setting environment variable MallocHelp to see 
> > tools to help debug
> > *** malloc[1369]: Deallocation of a pointer not malloced: 0x73c000; 
> > This could be a double free(), or free() called with the middle of an 
> > allocated block; Try setting environment variable MallocHelp to see 
> > tools to help debug
> > *** malloc[1369]: Deallocation of a pointer not malloced: 0x74d000; 
> > This could be a double free(), or free() called with the middle of an 
> > allocated block; Try setting environment variable MallocHelp to see 
> > tools to help debug
> > *** malloc[1369]: Deallocation of a pointer not malloced: 0x7e9000; 
> > This could be a double free(), or free() called with the middle of an 
> > allocated block; Try setting environment variable MallocHelp to see 
> > tools to help debug
> > fluidsynth version 1.0.3
> > Copyright (C) 2000-2002 Peter Hanappe and others.
> > FLUID Synth comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY.
> > This is free software, and you are welcome to redistribute it
> > under certain conditions; see the COPYING file for details.
> > SoundFont(R) is a registered trademark of E-mu Systems, Inc.
> >
> > Type 'help' to get information on the shell commands.
> >
> > Segmentation fault
> 


Looks like some bugs.


> Alternatively, if I try
> 
> > % fluidsynth
> > (snip)
> > > load /path/to/VintageDreamsWaves-v2.sf2
> > fluidsynth: warning: Ignoring sample SineWave: can't use ROM samples
> > loaded SoundFont has ID 0
> > >
> 
> This seems to work. Now, what commands can I use to produce some sound?
> 

noteon 0 60 127
noteoff 0 60

Do a "help help" for help topics. You can then do "help event" to see
the MIDI related event stuff. The help system is fairly extensive.


> All the best.
> Ebrahim

Regards,
        Josh Green