BiD

Unofficial Linux control panel for the Audient iD series interfaces based on libusb, glfw and imgui.

BiD is a fork of MixiD by @TheOnlyJoey, which did the original reverse engineering and protocol work this builds on.

Description

Since there is no official support by Audient for the iD interfaces on Linux, this exists as an alternative to enable the functionality not available in the default class compliant USB driver.

Unlike the original, BiD talks to the interface over its spare DFU interface rather than claiming the audio control interface, so the kernel keeps the sound card and playback carries on while the mixer is open. It also stays resident in the system tray, and the interface follows the window when you resize it.

Notes and To Do

• Devices are detected by USB id; the iD24 is the one verified on hardware, the rest are inherited from the original project's support list
  • If a new device gets released, please open an Issue with your USB id and input/output counts
• The protocol is mostly figured out, just needs verification/testing
  • Reading state back from the interfaces is still missing, so the controls start at zero rather than at what the hardware is doing
  • Things like VU meters and some switches/modes have yet to be implemented
• Linux is the target; the tray and desktop integration are Linux only

Compilation

Dependencies

• CMake
• libglew-dev
• GCC or Clang
• libsystemd-dev, or basu on distributions without systemd (optional, enables the system tray icon)

Compile

• git clone the repository
• mkdir Release
• cd Release
• cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release ..
• make

Usage

• Either run through sudo, or setup appropriate udev rules for your interface
• Run the BiD executable

Optionally, make install also places a desktop entry and icon, so BiD can be started from your application menu.

Installing under a prefix inside your home directory, rather than into /usr, can leave the icon missing from the menu and the task bar: an icon theme directory is only searched when it has an index.theme, and a fresh ~/.local/share/icons/hicolor has none. If that happens:

cp /usr/share/icons/hicolor/index.theme ~/.local/share/icons/hicolor/
gtk-update-icon-cache -f -t ~/.local/share/icons/hicolor

System tray

When the desktop provides a system tray, closing the window hides BiD there instead of quitting, so the interface stays connected and reachable. Clicking the icon shows and hides the window again, and right clicking it opens a menu with the monitor toggles (Dim, Alt, Talk, Phase, Mono) and Quit.

This needs a StatusNotifier tray, which KDE Plasma, Cinnamon, Budgie, XFCE and LXQt provide out of the box. GNOME needs an appindicator extension for it, and compositors such as Sway or Hyprland need a panel that implements a tray, for example Waybar. Without one, or when built without libsystemd/basu, BiD simply quits on close.

udev rules

By default the audio interface is grabbed by the kernel module, so we need to setup udev rules to avoid needing root permissions when opening BiD. All we have to do is add the Audient vendor id to the udev rules. The specific group might be different for your distro, but "plugdev" and "audio" seem to be the most commonly used.

Either:

echo 'SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="2708", MODE="0660", GROUP="audio"' >> /etc/udev/rules.d/84-audient.rules

or

echo 'SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTR{idVendor}=="2708", MODE="0660", GROUP="plugdev"' >> /etc/udev/rules.d/84-audient.rules

depending on your distro's permission group.

Then either reboot or use the following command to reload the udev rules for the running system.

udevadm control --reload-rules && udevadm trigger --attr-match=idVendor=2708

All done!

Authors

• @baakhoff — BiD
• @TheOnlyJoey — MixiD, which BiD is forked from

Version History

BiD

• 0.2.1
  • Routing rewritten with the iD24's real source codes (decoded by Monix from the official app). The old table predated this device and could leave outputs stuck at full level on a source no fader controls
  • The routing window now works per output pair, starts from sane defaults, explains what the sources mean, and can reset to defaults
  • Routing is pushed to the device on connect like the rest of the state, which also recovers a device left mis-routed by older builds
  • The faders edit any of the hardware's three mixes — Main, Cue A, Cue B — switched with tabs above the strips. Each mix keeps its own levels and pans, all pushed on connect
  • Phones default to Cue A. The main-mix source turned out to be the monitor section's own feed, so Dim and Cut used to land in the headphones as well; on a cue the phones answer only to the Phones dial
  • The DAW return pair sits pinned on the left as L Out / R Out, and no longer scrolls away with the input strips
• 0.2.0
  • Control goes through the spare DFU interface, so audio keeps playing while connected
  • System tray icon with close-to-tray and a menu carrying the monitor toggles
  • Desktop entry and icon, installed by make install
  • The interface now follows the window size instead of the size it started at
  • Per channel pan, so a channel can be placed in the stereo image instead of being summed to the centre. Digital inputs start panned apart as pairs
  • Digital input faders now address their own matrix cells; they were writing over the mic channels
  • Headphone volume goes to the right entity
  • Protocol notes in docs/PROTOCOL.md

MixiD, before the fork

• 0.1.6
  • All known iD usb-id's are now known and implemented
• 0.1.4
  • Now probes usb devices based on the supported id list and selects if possible
  • Auto disconnects and re-attach to kernel when quitting the application
  • Now should properly set all faders depending on the individual device inputs
  • Small UI Fixes
• 0.1
  • Initial Release based around the iD14 and iD14 MKII with most essential features implemented.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE.md file for details

Acknowledgments

• MixiD, the project this is forked from
• mymixer, prior attempt to reverse engineer the original iD14 with some minimal functionality.
• imgui, a modern lightweight gui