SysEx strings is designed to store patch names in a picker for display and recall.
A little bit of hacking can give us two other use cases:
Display a single string, such as current patch name
In this case we want to show just the current patch name from a fixed memory location. But we can only load SysEx strings into a variable or continuous control. No problem.
Example - in the RD 2000, we find current Program name at memory location 10 00 00 00, 16 bytes
The SysEx message is: F0 41 10 00 00 75 12 10 00 00 00 (16 bytes of Name Data) cs F7
We choose one of the fixed numbers as a pseudo V, making our MIDI SysEx settings:
41 10 00 00 75 12 10 00 00 V S, Roland three byte checksum, V = 1, S = 16
V = 00 is the valid report, but need at least two named ticks - set the MIDI value of the second to 127, (There is no SysEx string to arrive from location 10 00 00 7F, so no confusion).
Build a picker, two Named Ticks, with the settings above. Select Hide n Play Mode - this is only an intermediate control, and you do not want interaction with this control sending data to the hardware, overwriting the program name.
Now make a label with the Label Value Source set to the picker.
There is a side benefit from this - at initialize you can set the picker to the second value, blanking the program name. When a valid name string is received, it will flip to the correct value.
Edit program name
Most hardware has painful ways to enter patch names, such as scrolling letter by letter. With SysEx strings, we can use our computer keyboard instead.
Build a momentary control, No MIDI Send Receive, supercontrol, "Send Patch Name"
Build a second instance of the picker above, call it your Namer. Under Relationship tab, Enable/Disable Button, select "Send Patch Name" control.
Back to "Send Patch Name", select Namer as a subcontrol, in Options as SuperControl, select Send Current Value, and Force Not Stepper.
Use:
To enter a name, go to design mode, edit the 00* named tick value to your desired patch name. MD will let you enter any character here, you need to stick to valid ASCII data.
Exit design mode. Ensure the 00* tick is selected, press the "Send Patch Name."
A couple extra steps going to design mode, but still much easier than scrolling character by character, especially for a 32 byte Scene name.
* or the correct value selected for the valid pseudo V tick
Some notes and thoughts
SysEx strings is the most advanced concept in MIDI Designer, but also very capable. This is not the third control you want to build. I recommend some prerequisites for tacking SysEx strings are proficiency in supercontrols, scaling supercontrol values, and managing SysEx controls, including loading individual patch name characters. Once you are ready, we are here to help.
SysEx strings depends on the hardware capability. Roland and Yamaha hardware typically include SysEx capability to transmit patch names, etc. The hardware has to have the ability to transmit the data on request for MIDI Designer to display the data. Start by looking at the MIDI Implementation guide for your hardware.
