Weird editor behaviour (linux)

Morningstar Software
1

I encountered a strange behaviour from the online editor that can be reproduced systematically. Since I use linux, I can’t speak for Mac and Windows.

I usually use the editor in google-chrome and happily hack into my preset configs. But recently, due to some specific needs related to controlling Bitwig Studio (I have other discussion threads about that), I had to introduce virtual MIDI devices (for linux folks, this is brought by the ALSA module snd-virmidi) and midi message routing and conversion via the excellent midi-router-client s/w which allows me to basically have an “infinite” number of message conversions and routes as opposed to 16 given by the MC8 Pro.

Now here is the weird behaviour: anytime I load the kernel module snd-virmidi to create virtual MIDI devices, the editor disconnects from the MC8 Pro and the h/w MIDI ports are completely gone from the editor’s list of ports. But in reality these MIDI ports are still completely fine as I can still use them in Bitwig or the midi routing s/w. And as soon as I unload the virtual MIDI kernel module and reload the online editor page, the editor can see the MC8 Pro MIDI ports again and connect. Not sure why this is happening but I suspect a problem with google-chrome rather than the editor. If some linux folks lurking in here could try that and report, we could try to figure what causes this together because at the moment, I am rather clueless. There is no kernel messages (dmesg command) that could provide a hint. Maybe some google-chrome logs could show something but I had not had the time to dig this.

2

Sounds like maybe you go over the maximum number of midi channels when loading the virtual ones. Can you limit the amount of virtual chanels, just to check?

3

@Aiceman That’s correct, if I limit the number of virtual devices to 1 (default is 4), it works. I think I need 2 virtual devices but maybe I can cheat and use sub-devices instead (there are 16 sub-devs per virtual device, I believe they correspond to 16 MIDI channels - maybe I can hack my way with the MIDI-router app that sits in-between the MC8 Pro and Bitwig).

EDIT: Actually, I managed to just use one virtual device and midi channel. So all is good.

With all that said, what determines the maximum of midi channels the editor can support ? or is it the browser’s MIDI access implementation that sets a limitation ? Very curious to understand this better.

4

I remember i ran into the limit once, thats what sparked my analyses of your case. I believe I found something on max midi channels but cant find it now. I believe the browser was the limiting factor.

But good to know you got it working now by reducing the number of virtual channels.