Maschine+ and Maschine JAM MIDI mode

Trevor Meier

Anyone with both a + and JAM: is the JAM usable in MIDI mode when connected through the Maschine+? Either by switching the + to MIDI mode, or the JAM (or both)

D-One

In MIDI Mode it will be just a dumb (for lack of a better term) generic controller and without Controller Editor to customize what it does I really don't see how it could be useful... Maybe to use the strips for Macros that you would need to set up in the computer version first but can't really think of anything else.

If both are in MIDI Mode then what would you be controlling? A DAW? If that's the case it depends if your DAW has an advanced script for the Jam... Or is it to control the Maschine App/Plugin? It really depends on what you're expecting to be able to do.

Trevor Meier

I'm building a standalone (DAWless) setup and considering the Maschine+ and the Jam. Currently I have the Jam and mk3. I use the Jam in MIDI mode to control patching and parameters on a piSound (standalone synth box based on a Raspberry Pi4).

So I'm wondering, if I were running the Jam attached to the Maschine+ (no computer involved) can I switch the Jam to MIDI mode and have its MIDI still be able to control the piSound synth?

Flexi

The guy who develops M+ originally started out by making an open source brain for Mk 1/2, you might want to look there, there is also another project that uses Pi with Maschine, but i forget its name right now.

D-One

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/45967#Comment_45967

Interesting.

1st thing you need to confirm is IF the Jam even has a MIDI Mode when connected to an M+ in standalone mode, I doubt it, my Mikro Mk3 and KK M32 for example do not. A Jam user will have to confirm this.

Even if it does have MIDI Mode the question is: Do you currently rely on Jam using a custom Controller Editor template to talk to the piSound? If you do then it's a no go, since M+ has no controller editor (CE templates are stored in the computer, not on the HW itself)... So all the messages Jam sends would be just the default ones.

If that's the case your better off with any MIDI Controller that is able to store it's MIDI Settings internally.

D-One

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/46136#Comment_46136

Vincenzo Pacella? That project is long dead. http://www.shaduzlabs.com/blog/18/what-happened-to-maschinio.html

The only current one I am aware of is Rebellion, afaik one of its goals is to be able to use a tiny microcontroller in between an NI controller and whatever doesn't support it, acting as the computer so people can use MIDI Mode with anything. It's still at alpha stage tho.... Not usable for anyone other than devs.

Flexi

Yeah I think that was the one I forgot the name of, somebody ported a build of it to Pi, or there is another project underway too.

Yeah MaschineIO is dead because he went to work for NI on the embedded system in the M+. https://github.com/shaduzlabs/cabl that was the open source one.

D-One

AFAIK Vincenzo is with NI since 2012 so prob worked on many things way before M+ was in the picture, so hard to say if M+ was the exact cause. MaschineIO was just a quick prof of concept, it died in 2015 and was superseded by Cabl like you mentioned which died in 2016. It doesn't seem like he ever had the intention of taking this all the way, seems like it was just a fun project at the time.

The exact reason his controller related hobby projects died IDK but If I had to take a guess I'd say that as his responsibilities and work complexity as a dev for NI increased working on a hobby project in his free time related to your 9-5 became much less fun... He is a team lead dev now. I'm curious about how companies look at an internal dev making hacky ways to use their HW with things that it's not supposed to, could be a little awkward... Especially when you have access to the source code which obviously is the company's intellectual property.