Firmware is a kind of operating system software that runs
on microcontrollers (tiny computers) such as used in the miniDig.
It handles the capture of analog signals, their translation into MIDI
data and communication with the I-CubeX editor. It adds intelligence to
the miniDig hardware in the form of the features described below.
Stand alone mode
Stand alone mode gives you the freedom to go anywhere with
your I-CubeX setup ! Configure the miniDig to process and map sensor data to MIDI messages with the MacOS editor or the Windows editor and it will remember
the settings after power down.
Stand alone mode features:
-
Mapping of sensor values to any MIDI channel voice type
message ie. note-on/off, key-pressure, control-change, program-change,
after-touch (all 7 bit resolution) or pitch-bend (10 bit resolution).
MIDI running status can be turned on or off.
-
Sensor data processing: inversion (increasing sensor values
result in decreasing MIDI data values), thresholds (the sensor values
within the specified range are offset and scaled to the MIDI data
output range), zooming (set the sensitivity of an input to a specific
voltage range), time averaging (reduce noise by averaging over up to 16
sensor values), differentiation (output only the difference between
two successive sensor values), peak/dip detection (detect the largest/smallest
value of up to 16 sensor values and output that or a preset value),
noise gate (output only when the sensor value changes more than a
user-set difference from its current value).
-
Gesture recognition: gesture onset detection (through
peak or dip detection mapped to e.g. note-on event with velocity value
corresponding to peak or dip value), post-onset processing (continuous
averaging and/or differentiation, mapped to e.g. after-touch or pitch-bend
messages), gesture end detection (sensor value above/below threshold,
mapped to e.g. note-off event).
-
Factory reset option: allows you to return all miniDig
settings to its original settings when it was first shipped to you.
Host mode
For more sensor mapping complexity, use the miniDig with
host mode plugins such as the objects for MacOS
Max and Windows Max or the
externals for jMax running on Linux or
Unix, and apply almost any signal processing algorithm you like. Other
operating systems can be used as long as you run software that can deal
with the I-CubeX system exclusive messages.
Reference documentation
The miniDig MIDI communication as implemented by the firmware is described in the MIDI implementation v4.4.
Known bugs
We are not aware of any bugs at this time. Please
notify us if you think you may have encountered one. |