All of these FAQ entries have been migrated to the Q&A site, found here.

Advanced: Pedalboards and Supercontrols

What is a supercontrol?

A supercontrol can control other controls (called “subcontrols”). This means that when the value of the supercontrol changes, the subcontrol’s value also changes. However, the subcontrol respects its rules (min, max, ticks, inverted) to get its value.

See the Supercontrols Reference for more on supercontrols.

How do I access pedalboards?

The pedalboards are pages that are beneath your normal pages.
In Design Mode, drag the normal page upwards with one finger. In Performance Mode, drag a page upwards with two fingers.

How can I have one control send multiple MIDI messages?

Update 2013-01-12
This has been moved to this Q&A question on the same topic.

Also see this example for Bank Change and Program Change and this other example for something more complex.

Each control only sends and responds to one MIDI message. To send more than one message from a control, we’ll use supercontrols.

For this example, I set up three buttons: “Superman,” “Message 1” and “Message 2.”

In Design Mode, double tap on Superman to bring up the properties. Switch to the “relationships” tab.

Now toggle “supercontrol” to be on (blue). Note that the subcontrols button nods invitingly.

Click on “Subcontrols,” which brings up the Subcontrols pane.

Now drag the “Drag to Subcontrol” button to each of the two subcontrols (one at a time). The final result looks like this:

Then get out of Design Mode.

Now Superman sends out Message 1 and Message 2. That’s it!

You can even hide the subcontrols behind the supercontrol if you like.

Note

  • The supercontrol does not send out a MIDI message (though it will respond to them).
  • With buttons, the supercontrol’s subtype takes precedence over the subcontrol’s subtype. So if the super is momentary, the subcontrols will act like momentaries.
  • For knobs, sliders, crossfaders and XY pads, you can invert the subcontrol to reverse its direction.
  • Of course you can chain supercontrols and subcontrols in many different interesting and creative ways. MIDI Designer will keep you from creating endless loops.
  • Supercontrols are also the basis of how MIDI Designer handles button groups and steppers (seen in video). Also, the MIDI Designer Pedalboards feature is built entirely on the supercontrol infrastructure.



How can I send a bank-select then program-change with one button press?

Follow the instructions found here to send multiple MIDI messages with these particular instructions:

Your first subcontrol (called “Message 1” in the FAQ above) must be a:

  • Button of type Momentary
  • MIDI Message type Bank Select

Your second subcontrol (called “Message 2” in the FAQ) must be a:

  • Button of type Momentary
  • MIDI Message type Program Change

With this, MIDI Designer will produce a bank-select and program-change in one button press of the supercontrol.

How do channel changers work?

I’ve noticed that there’s a type called “channel changer” for knobs, sliders and crossfaders. What’s it about?

Check the article about channel changers here.