iLKke
Offline
Psydney, Australia

I don't want to come across as an asshole but I am completely lost by some of the basic premises here.

1. How are pixitracker or nanoloop trackers?

2. Why do you think that trackers are good for touchscreens? They are based on text input and if you try any of the existing mobile trackers you will see that they can't compare with desktop or even gamepad trackers in terms of workflow.

3. Not sure how the likes of LGPT would work on touchscreen unless some serious UI changes are made. Even games with virtual gamepads mostly play like shit. Why not use LSDJ under a GB emu on your device to see how it fits? I find it quite troublesome when I need to hold 2 virtual buttons and press the third one.

Milkytracker is pretty much just a curiosity. I don't think it's usable at all, it's more like a player.

Sunvox is the only serious attempt at mobile tracker that I tried and it is usable, but lacks the ease of use that makes trackers stand out from pianolol-type apps in the first place. Otherwise it's very well implemented and feature rich.

Also there is sinusoid for iOS but I don't have an iOS device anymore so haven't tried. Anyone used it? Seems to be geared towards chipmusic specifically.
http://www.humbletune.com/sinusoid/

Also this thing is coming up but I'm not exactly holding my breath it will be usable at all:
http://www.vividtracker.com/

mk
Offline

I'd love to get a discussion going about what would be a good workflow on touch. Particularly on a small-tablet.. I don't think iphone is the best size for this kind of thing but nexus 7-style android tablets are getting to be very reasonable these days.

I like nanoloop but I find the one screen one melody aspect of it tends to limit how long I spend with it.

I'm definitely thinking sample based is a cool way to go too. . . hmm.

Last edited by mk (Jan 31, 2014 6:47 am)

SgtCrispy
Offline
South Dakota
XyNo wrote:

On Sunvox Android version, you can use a bluetooth keyboard or get OTG micro usb to female usb cable and plug a usb keyboard ! Don't know for iOS but I'm pretty sure it is something similar !

For ios you can use the camera connection kit via the usb dongle and hook up an keyboard.

sandneil
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iLKke wrote:

1. How are pixitracker or nanoloop trackers?

how are they not trackers? they are the same as all other trackers basically... maybe you are thrown off by the fact that 1) they go sideways instead of downwards  2) you dont enter notes with a qwerty keyboard. beyond this there are no differences between these and other trackers.

iLKke wrote:

2. Why do you think that trackers are good for touchscreens? They are based on text input

see above, i dont think "based on text input" is part of what makes a tracker a tracker. obviously if trackers are based on text input then a keyboard is the only good way to use a tracker

iLKke wrote:

and if you try any of the existing mobile trackers you will see that they can't compare with desktop or even gamepad trackers in terms of workflow.

right because they are ports of trackers that arent designed for touch screens rather than being bespoke for this interface

iLKke wrote:

Not sure how the likes of LGPT would work on touchscreen unless some serious UI changes are made.

no disagreement here. serious UI changes are not impossible though

iLKke wrote:

Even games with virtual gamepads mostly play like shit. Why not use LSDJ under a GB emu on your device to see how it fits? I find it quite troublesome when I need to hold 2 virtual buttons and press the third one.

again i dont disagree that trackers designed for non-touchscreen devices work better on non-touchscreen devices than on touch screens

iLKke wrote:

Milkytracker is pretty much just a curiosity. I don't think it's usable at all, it's more like a player.

again i dont disagree that trackers designed for non-touchscreen devices work better on non-touchscreen devices than on touch screens

iLKke wrote:

Sunvox is the only serious attempt at mobile tracker that I tried and it is usable, but lacks the ease of use that makes trackers stand out from pianolol-type apps in the first place. Otherwise it's very well implemented and feature rich.

right. it also lacks that ease of use on the desktop so i dont think this is a touch screen issue

think youre being a bit closed minded about what a tracker is. if a tracker is "a piece of software where you press the Z key on your qwerty keyboard to enter the note C", then trackers suck on touch screen, everyone will agree. actually probably the two most popular trackers on this forum dont use a qwerty keyboard, already, tho, so its perfectly possible to tailor the tracker concept to non-qwerty input devices as was already demonstrated by lsdj/lgpt/ntrq and so on. without it losing tracker status.

9H05T
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I'm apparently in the minority but I think sunvox is great ui wise. You just have to have something with directional buttons for navigating the menus and tracks. Then you have a touchscreen for the onscreen keyboard, drawing waveforms, and arranging modules.

sandneil
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edit : im dumb

Last edited by sandneil (Jan 31, 2014 10:12 am)

breakphase
Offline
Earth
iLKke wrote:

2. Why do you think that trackers are good for touchscreens? They are based on text input and if you try any of the existing mobile trackers you will see that they can't compare with desktop or even gamepad trackers in terms of workflow.

3. Not sure how the likes of LGPT would work on touchscreen unless some serious UI changes are made. Even games with virtual gamepads mostly play like shit. Why not use LSDJ under a GB emu on your device to see how it fits? I find it quite troublesome when I need to hold 2 virtual buttons and press the third one.

I've tried many different approaches to composing on ios. Piano rolls - way too cumbersome. You have to drag all over, pinch and zoom. I hate it. 16 step sequencers (like nanoloop) - I just find it too hard to think about the whole song in terms of little loops. That's a personal thing, as many people are good with nanoloop. So the problem with those approaches seems to be that they are not condensing enough song information on the screen.

Trackers on the other hand are super succinct. A tracker can basically be seen as a text-based musical score, scrolling vertically. The problem, as you mention, is the text part. Sunvox deals with this in a pretty intuitive way - just use a virtual piano for notes, and little keypads for the parameters.

I think something like LGPT could be made, you just have to get creative. It does require a rethink for sure.

GB emulators are no good (I've tried), for the same reason street fighter on ios/android is no good, there aren't buttons.

I actually think sunvox is great, it's mostly the navigation I don't care for.

sandneil wrote:

if a tracker is "a piece of software where you press the Z key on your qwerty keyboard to enter the note C", then trackers suck on touch screen, everyone will agree. actually probably the two most popular trackers on this forum dont use a qwerty keyboard, already, tho, so its perfectly possible to tailor the tracker concept to non-qwerty input devices as was already demonstrated by lsdj/lgpt/ntrq and so on. without it losing tracker status.

Yeah that's a good point. At one time it seemed crazy to have a tracker on a 5 button device.

Last edited by breakphase (Jan 31, 2014 3:12 pm)

SketchMan3
Offline
NC in the US of America

I've had some ideas on how a touchscreen "tracker" could work. I'll try and organize them and post them here later. The main thing I'd like is for it to actually make s3xmodit modules :\

iLKke
Offline
Psydney, Australia
sandneil wrote:

think youre being a bit closed minded about what a tracker is.

I think you are just assuming tracker = step sequencer. Nanoloop and pixitracker (despite the wishful name) operate very similar to standard groovebox-type step sequencers which have been around for ages.

Trackers are a very specific thing that started on the Amiga in 1987 (hm, so also around for ages now) and were revolutionary because of the way music data is organised, presented and edited. This comes with specific workflow limitations and advantages, for example: http://nashnet.co.uk/files/ICMC2011-Nas … ckwell.pdf
LSDJ stretched the paradigm quite a bit (in an ingenious way) but is clearly still a tracker.

If you relativise this, then a piano roll can be called a "tracker" with the added pitch dimension.

Anyhoo I see that this is not the central point of the thread, so I apologise for pressing it. It's just that I am quite passionate about the prospect of a touchscreen tracker, but sadly have yet to see one that I find a joy to use. Or even imagine how it would work.

All this said I am very open to any ideas!

bryface
Offline
vancouver, canada

i've played with sunvox and i overall like the interface, but anyone who thinks that you could track with the speed approaching that of a conventional PC tracker is lying to himself or is AMAZING at working touchscreens.

i have a couple of ideas of how i think touch device trackers could work better. 

1) a large single row view that's basically a heavily zoomed-in version of a selected channel's row. imagine seeing "C#4 01 01 X0000" taking the bottom 15% of your screen's real estate.  you could dial in the note / instrument / volume / effect data as a cursor advances from left to right, so that you don't have to hunt and peck at a small grid of alphanumeric values to enter data.

2) perhaps keeping 1 or more of these single-row views as an easily-accessible palette of buffers, and "painting" a channel's note data with the selected buffer.  i'm sure some logic could be written to adjust what data gets written to the pattern from the buffer, so that for instance you'd only write out the buffer's note column instead of the inst/volume/effect columns as well.

3) soft-key shortcuts that jump the pattern cursor to the selected channel's instrument/volume/effect column.  i don't like the idea of "swiping" the cursor to the effect column like you have to do in sunvox, as that's "time-consuming" and still somewhat imprecise.  instead, on the left hand side of the screen i could hit a button that'll take me to the effect column, where i then enter the effect command of my choosing.

4) an easily accessible palette of the most-used effect commands.  or, this palette could be customized depending on which effects you use the most.

anyway the overall point i'm trying to make is that maybe touchscreen trackers should focus more on providing a contextual interface that presents the user with the most likely actions that he would take, and then translate those actions into pattern data.  that's what i feel most fits with the spirit of a tracker: the ability to inputting note data quickly and unambiguously.

Last edited by bryface (Jan 31, 2014 10:32 pm)

Peng
Offline
Sweden

Sinusoid on ipad is the only one i tried so far. Might be worth checking out pixitracker and sunvox.

PROTODOME
Offline
UK
sandneil wrote:

!!! death to piano roll !!!

we are forever mortal enemies.

JaffaCakeMexica
Offline
Lake Titicaca

Sunvox is the best tracker for touch screen devices.

Sunvox interface is awesome, fast and convenient.
It is perfect for touch screen. Everything about it is designed really well.
It is better on tablets rather than small phones.

These sunvox tutorials by solarlune are great:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P … E7722DB7CC

sunvox is not only a sample based tracker but also has synths and effects.

It is possible to control 16 or more parameters per line in the pattern editor.

Milkytracker for PDA works nice with a D-pad and stylus and is good for small screens but its all sample based and much more limited than sunvox. The android version of milkytracker doesnt work very well.

There will be more trackers for touch screen devices in future such as this one:

http://www.vividtracker.com/

Last edited by JaffaCakeMexica (Feb 1, 2014 8:42 am)

mk
Offline

I've tried and tried with sunvox on ios but it does vibe with the way I use trackers. I'm forever cutting, pasting, editing and replaying.. and having to go in and out of "unlock mode" just to play a bar drives me batty

defPREMIUM
Offline
sandneil wrote:

imagine SWIPE-ing around the different screens in piggy, oh boy

i think the main thing is to make sure its touch -> tracker rather than touch -> virtual querty keyboard -> tracker

if you can get the virtual querty keyboard out of the equation, touch might be even more suitable for trackers than regular keyboards,

im pretty hyped up for the future of tracking, moreso than i have been before; hopefully theres enough people who are interested in the interface to keep it going. but otoh i think its a pretty natural interface that will be discovered over and over again independently by developers

!!! death to piano roll !!!

when i imagine all this it is very satisfying : )

gotoandplay
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I've tried a few and pixitracker allows you to create stuff the easiest for a phone sized screen, but there are limitations. Touch related stuff does tend to suffer the fate of needing to work on all manner sized screens and one not being terribly perfect for just a small screen. I'm definitely up for new ones appearing, specifically made for phones, and giving them a try. It's easier to dip in and out working on a track if it is around with you pretty much at all times.

I even tried LSDJ on a emulator on a phone, but that was a painful experience..