A set of C++ classes that provide a common API for realtime MIDI input/output across Linux (ALSA & JACK), Macintosh OS X (CoreMIDI & JACK) and Windows (Multimedia).
By Gary P. Scavone, 2003-2017. Forked by Tobias Schlemmer, 2014-2018.
This fork has been started because the original RtMidi did not work for Mutabor and ALSA. Mutabor has a two-step activation scheme. The MIDI configuration is set up while no connections are active. After compiling the tuning logic all MIDI interfaces are activated at once. Each MIDI connection that RtMidi makes is reported as MIDI device again by RtMidi. This leads to a renumbering of all MIDI endpoints which have a higher ALSA device ID than the current RtMidi instance. The result is unexpected behaviour.
As a side effect this library uses a different namespace and is more C++-ish than the original RtMidi.
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The old API has been deprecated as there is no way to rely on consecutive port numbers. It is always the responsibility of the end user not to change the MIDI configuration between certain points in the execution path of the library. Obviously they usually lack the necessary information for that Currently, it is still available, but a compiler warning is generated if applicable
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MACOSX_CORE
has been renamed toMACOSX_COREMIDI` -
The classes of RtMidi now reside in the namespace rtmidi.
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The beginning letters “Rt” are dropped from the names
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For easy adoption of the new interface wrappers for the old API are provided.
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The library uses backend provided port descriptors, now. This provides a more reliable port handling for changing environments (See below).
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The way MIDI devices are enumerated has changed. The old way, using the ordinal number of MIDI devices works only in cases where MIDI devices are not added or removed during the program session. When a virtual MIDI port or USB MIDI device is added or removed the ordinal number of each of the other devices may change.
Suppose your computer has the following list of MIDI devices. 1. MIDI loopback device 2. Removable USB MIDI device 3. Another MIDI device 4. Software MIDI Synth 5. A virtual MIDI port
After the software obtained this list, your friend remembers that he must catch the next bus and unplugs his removable USB MIDI device. The software does not recognize this removal and keeps the above list, while the system has a new one: 1. MIDI loopback device 2. Another MIDI device 3. Software MIDI Synth 4. A virtual MIDI port
Somehow you told the software to use the Software MIDI Synth. The program stores the number 4 as it obtained during enumeration of the MIDI devices. Instead of playing the music using your sound card it sends the music to a different port.
While this behaviour is only annoying in interactive environments it results in unpredictable behaviour if several ports are opened at once. E.g. in the ALSA backend every opened port results in an aditional newly created virtual port.
In order to avoid such problems, most backends identify ports (except WinMM) by different data structures.
The current version introduces a new class \ref rtmidi::PortDescriptor in order to hide this implementation detail from the user code. In order to avoid the above problems these are retrieved at once using \ref rtmidi::Midi::getPortList. This new feature also allows to retreive the port descriptor of an open device using \ref rtmidi::Midi::getDescriptor. The latter can be used to obtain
This distribution of RtMidi contains the following:
doc: RtMidi documentation (also online at https://www.music.mcgill.ca/~gary/rtmidi/)tests: example RtMidi programs
On Unix systems, type ./configure in the top level directory, then make in the tests/ directory to compile the test programs. In Windows, open the Visual C++ workspace file located in the tests/ directory.
If you checked out the code from git, please run ./autogen.sh before ./configure.
RtMidi is a set of C++ classes (rtmidi::MidiIn, rtmidi::MidiOut, and API specific classes) that provide a common API (Application Programming Interface) for realtime MIDI input/output across Linux (ALSA, JACK), Macintosh OS X (CoreMIDI, JACK), and Windows (Multimedia Library) operating systems. RtMidi significantly simplifies the process of interacting with computer MIDI hardware and software. It was designed with the following goals:
- object oriented C++ design
- simple, common API across all supported platforms
- only one header and one source file for easy inclusion in programming projects
- MIDI device enumeration
MIDI input and output functionality are separated into two classes, RtMidiIn and RtMidiOut. Each class instance supports only a single MIDI connection. RtMidi does not provide timing functionality (i.e., output messages are sent immediately). Input messages are timestamped with delta times in seconds (via a double floating point type). MIDI data is passed to the user as raw bytes using an std::vector<unsigned char>.
In some cases, for example to use RtMidi with GS Synth, it may be necessary for your program to call CoInitializeEx and CoUninitialize on entry to and exit from the thread that uses RtMidi.
For complete documentation on the original RtMidi, see the doc directory of the distribution or surf to https://www.music.mcgill.ca/~gary/rtmidi/.
The RtMidi license is similar to the MIT License, with the added feature that modifications be sent to the developer.
RtMidi: realtime MIDI i/o C++ classes
Copyright (c) 2003-2017 Gary P. Scavone
Forked by Tobias Schlemmer, 2014-2018.
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