Virus TI "Favoriting" Site, New and Improved

Sneezing's Greetings to all. Some of you have been kind enough to check out my Virus patch "favoriting" site, which has been significantly changed and - I hope - improved since its unveiling. Here are some of the new features:

• I've abandoned the form/post paradigm in favor of an edit-in-place one. If you're viewing your own edits, there are selects (aka drop-downs) for changing categories and ratings. Double-clicking on the Name and Description/Comments cells allows you to edit patch names and descriptions. Pressing Enter saves the changes and Esc cancels them. (They'll also be saved if you tab away or click outside of the cell.)
• I've implemented exporting to tab-delimited files and printing. The former are (hopefully) suitable for import into a spreadsheet program and the latter might be used to keep by your synth and scribble notes on, or for protecting your nice hardwood floor from your new puppy.
• Per a suggestion from I-forget-whom (thank you!), the Patches/Pg options are now 32, 64, and 128 to better correspond to the number of patches per bank in the Virus. At 128, you can view an entire bank at a time. (I also moved the categories in front of the descriptions per that user's suggestion.)
• You don't need to create an "account" in order to view the patch list and see what other users have "favorited." Instructions on the Login page, or just click here.
• I added a Help page that I hope will help explain how to use the site as well as for what it might be used.

I won't be offended if you don't check it out or if you do and tell me it is worthless, just try to include some constructive criticism in your diatribe. Cheers!

Thanks for the suggestions. I was thinking about that background image and whether it might cause contrast problems. I've been looking at it so much I can hardly see it any more.

Yes, I went through every non-INIT- patch to get the categories. It was not fun. At all. I searched and searched for patch files in the forums and could only find references to them. If you could point me to them, I would be grateful. It is very possible that I made some mistakes in the two weeks it took me to set the categories and that the previous owner wiped the RAM-D bank.

Thanks Again and Cheers,

Daniel

Could you point to those .mid files you mentioned? I'd really like to see what I can glean from them.

Thanks, noct, et al. This is what happens when you have no friends and nothing better to do and are living in a limbo state; homeless, basically, but my son's mother has graciously allowed me to live here while I wait on my disability application. I have severe depression, bi-polar disorder, etc., and I'm pretty sure I smell bad. Thankfully, one gets used to one's own smell. That's too much info, isn't it? Well, anyway, once I figure out what I'm going to do about a sequencer and a computer and resolve my small claim against my former business partners (not kidding, my life is a total mess), I might start putting my energy into music and gather information on my favorite patches in the meantime. One advantage is that I have a better feel for how the TI is laid out.

Thanks again for the info, noct.

Cheers.

Thank you. Sorry for the whining. Could explain why no one ever calls me. Oops, there I go again. I'm also very self-deprecating and a total smart-ass, which I'm trying to change. I even made up a joke about it:

Sometimes I wish I weren't such a self-deprecating smart-ass. But then I think to myself: "Well, at least one part of you is smart."

Hey @suzzymackenzie, I fixed the problem with the backslash appearing in the description. And thanks for your comment!

Cheers,

Daniel

Hey noct, any idea what the offset of the category information is in the .mid files? I've found the patch names at 274 bytes in and every subsequent 527 bytes, but have been unable to decipher where the category information is. I've been assuming it's an ordinal value from 0 to 22, but I figured it might be the two categories bit-wise OR'd or some other schema. I'll probably end up dumping a bank, changing a patch's categories, and then looking at what changed, but if you or anyone else happens to know where/how the categories are stored, I would be grateful.
Cheers,
Daniel

Interesting, THANKS! I would be very happy with just the category information. I'll fiddle with that and see what I come up with. If that gets me the categories, I definitely owe you a latte! (Don't know how I'd get it to you, though. hehe) Sorry I didn't read the other thread. I find it very hard to find stuff on this forum. For that matter, I'm also directionally-challenged in 3d and the hardest time finding anything. Thanks again!
Daniel

OK, I owe you a latte, my friend! I found the categories right where you said they'd be. All I had to do was build a lookup table for them. I've been able to decipher all of them except for Favorites 2 and 3. Favorites 1 appears to be 14, so my guess is that 2 and 3 are 15 and 16, respectively, since those slots are empty in my lookup table. I've posted my findings below. (I assigned random numbers to Favorites 2 and 3 since none of the patches in my Virus are assigned to them.) One note: The first patch offset and patch length are different in the .mid files and in the .vtibackup file I generated from Virus Control Center. They follow the category data. Thanks again!!!!
idcategory category_name
0 Off
6 Acid
8 Arpeggiator
22 Atomizer
2 Bass
7 Classic
4 Decay
21 Digital
10 Drums
9 EFX
20 FM
12 Input
1 Lead
17 Organ
3 Pad
11 Percussion
18 Piano
5 Pluck
19 String
13 Vocoder
14 "Favorites 1"
126 "Favorites 2"
127 "Favorites 3"

For .mid files:
define('START_OFFSET', 274);
define('PATCH_SIZE', 527);

and .vtibackup files:
define('START_OFFSET', 272);
define('PATCH_SIZE', 512);
(from my PHP code)

Ah, the software development process. Gotta love it. I'm going back to the drawing board again. I've finally realized that there really isn't a reference configuration of a TI2 other than for ROM-A through ROM-Z, and that only if someone hasn't loaded third-party patches. I did a factory restore expecting RAM-A through RAM-D to be restored, but they were untouched. The only way to offer every user a way to rate and comment on the patches in their particular machine is to provide a way to upload a .vtibackup file made using the Virus Control Center from their machine and rip the patch names and categories from that. Good thing I enjoy doing this stuff so much.
I'll post a notice once I've implemented this, just in case anyone is interested. [sound of crickets is heard in the background]
In the meantime, does anyone know of a way to load .mid files into the Virus? Apparently, Sounddiver isn't available anywhere, to which references are made frequently.

Thanks for all of your help, folks!! I'll see what I can do with your advice. Meanwhile, group hug? {crickets chirping} Anyway...
Speaking of advice, more improvements to my little site, in case anyone's interested...

I've given up on trying to maintain a standard set of patches for a TI2 keyboard. I thought I could use at least my ROM banks as a reference, but even those appear to have been mucked with by the previous user. SO, on the advice given here in this forum from I-forget-whom-and-I-don't-really-feel-like-checking ( noct? flabberbob? Marc?),..

• I've made it so that it works by uploading a .vtibackup file from a Virus Control Center backup and the patch names, locations, and categories will be scraped from it. (The file is automatically discarded at the conclusion of the upload script, but I'm considering providing a backup for backups feature.) I changed the database schema so that each user will have their own shiny new 3840 patch records to muck with after uploading a .vtibackup file. I got rid of the ability to browse other users' data.
• I added a Print feature so you can print something out to scribble on, and...
• What was especially fun for me, inline editing. No more form/post paradigm except for filtering/searching. You can double-click on patch names and descriptions and edit them in place. I rolled my own popup menu for changing categories, of which I am especially proud. (jQuery? Who needs it?!) OK, technically, there are some form/post features left, but just for paging, changing the patches-per-page, or viewing only the patches you've rated or commented on.

So, I'm not doing anything fancy like editing patches or talking to the Virus, but I think/hope I'm going to find it useful to help me remember where the patches I really like are located. Since I'm not really in a good position to be making and recording music, this has been a fun and diverting project. Oh, and one other note: The site doesn't work very well if at all with Internet Exploder. That POS has been the bane of web developers for years and since I'm not getting paid, screw that sorry excuse for a browser!
Cheers.

Zitat von suzzymackenzie

Stay with it, Daniel. It's true that moaning tends not to be very attractive - at least you've realised it! Consider making a personal cult of showering and self-care, seek out opportunities to interact with people however humdrum, and love your virus!

Thank you! I really appreciate that. I'll try to spread some of that Virus love.
Incidentally, I've changed the schema for my little site a bit and since you're the only one who's rated or commented on a patch, I created records in the patch table for you using a backup from my TI2 keyboard. If you go back to the site and have any trouble, please let me know. My guess is that at least some of the patches are going to be different from what's in your keyboard, so you may just want to upload a .vtibackup file to fix it. If that patch you rated is in the same place, then your comment and rating should still be there. Congratulations! You're my new (and only) beta tester!
Cheers, Daniel