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PocketTracker v0.9.8

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@github-actions github-actions released this 07 Sep 16:59
· 203 commits to main since this release
v0.9.8
cb13208

PocketTracker 0.9.8

Scales, nine new effect commands, a metronome, and a SoundFont that costs only
the sound you are playing.

Scales

  • A SCALE screen — sixteen scale slots and a project key. Step the name row through 38 built-in scales, or switch notes on and off by hand and save your own preset. Every note is pulled onto the scale its track is in as it plays, so putting a scale on a phrase you wrote chromatically re-tunes it.
  • SCA and SCG set the scale from a phrase step or a table row.
  • An instrument can opt out. A new TSP cell on INSTRUMENT takes that instrument out of every note transposition — the scale, the chain TSP column and the project transpose.

Nine new effect commands

SCA and SCG are two of them. The other seven put things that could only be set on the INSTRUMENT screen into a phrase step or a table row, per note:

  • LPF, HPF and BPF switch a low-, high- or band-pass filter on at the cutoff you name.
  • DRV and CRU write the instrument's dirt per note — overdrive, and bit crush plus downsample together in one cell.
  • FIN tunes a note by cents, a semitone either way, and re-tunes one that is already sounding, so a slide of it is a glide.
  • TSX scales how far the chain and project transposes move a note: as usual, further, not at all, or the opposite way. (GitHub Issue #30)
  • The filter three, DRV and FIN can be faded with AUS/AUF.
  • The effect picker is grouped now. Holding A on an FX type opens the commands in groups — SEQUENCE, INSTRUMENT and GLOBAL — instead of one long grid. One group is open at a time, and moving past its last row opens the next.

A metronome, and a tempo you can tap in

  • METRONOME is a new row on SETTINGS, off by default. Turned on, it clicks on every beat while the song plays, and VOL beside it sets how loud. It is never part of the song — no mix, stem or resample carries it. (GitHub Issue #35)
  • TAP sits beside the tempo on PROJECT. Press RIGHT from the number, then press A in time with the tempo you want. (GitHub Issue #34)

Help on SELECT

  • A new HELPER feature is here — press SELECT and read a brief explanation of the cell the cursor is on.
  • The file browser has no help panel, since there is no room for one, but most of its button combos are already explained on screen.

SoundFonts

  • SoundFont memory use is optimized now. Using one preset out of a huge SoundFont costs you the size of that preset, not the size of the whole file.
  • The list of sounds inside a file opens straight away, whatever the file's size — which is what lets you browse a bank far too large to load.

Loading

  • A load that takes more than about half a second says what it is doing — the file's name, how far along it is, and a bar — and B stops it. Stopping a load leaves the slot exactly as it was.
  • A file too big for the machine says FILE TOO BIG and leaves the app running. Files that used to kill the app now load.
  • Buttons pressed during a load are discarded rather than replayed afterwards, and the app still answers the system while it waits: closing the window mid-load exits, and a Home press still saves.

Sound

  • OTT is voiced like the original now, and turning it up no longer makes the song quieter. The three bands carry the settings of the preset it replicates — the outer two lifted harder than the middle one, which is the scooped OTT tone — and full depth comes out level with the dry signal.
  • Restarting playback with OTT on no longer clicks and drops the volume.
  • A render ends when the music does, instead of ringing on for up to half a minute and being cut off mid-waveform. The reverb and delay tails after the last step are unchanged, and a one-shot with no release still plays out.
  • A groove no longer plays fast. A grooved track used to drift ahead of an ungrooved one in the same song — at 140 BPM they separated by a whole step inside 33 bars.

Fixes

  • Editing a value while the song plays no longer breaks the loop. A change during playback could leave the song near-silent for a bar or two before the loop came back late and out of step.
  • The EQ analyzer's outline is drawn with its fill, not on top of the grid. (GitHub Issue #31)
  • Tapping a direction in the file browser steps once. The hold-to-accelerate was speeding up on fast taps as well, which made single steps hard to land. The same fix reaches the qwerty text cursor. (GitHub Issue #32)
  • Status messages clear themselves after three seconds — SAVED used to stay on screen until you pressed something.
  • Changing an instrument's type clears a name that came from a file. The leftover name was read as one you had typed, so no later load could correct it. A name you did type still survives.
  • A cell that holds a short list now steps on both axes. Theme presets, scales and the key, SLICE, SOURCE, RATE, DURATION, SNAP, the filter type, the on/off flags, the settings lists and a name character all ignored A+UP / A+DOWN.
  • The EQ spectrum's frequency numbers sit clear of the side bar — 20K is no longer hidden under it.
  • A on an empty GROOVE row lays down a step at the standard 12 ticks.

Worth knowing before you open an old project

  • Anything already made with OTT on will sound different — louder and more crushed.
  • A grooved track keeps time now. A song written against the old drift will sit differently against an ungrooved track beside it.

Nothing else in an existing project sounds different.

Reported and fixed

  • benjaminguerrer filed four of them: #31 and #32, both fixed here, and #34 and #35 — tap tempo and the metronome — which are built.
  • #30, the per-note transpose multiplier, is TSX. Its negative half mirrors rather than divides, so FF is the transpose the other way round rather than halved.

Requires Android 8.0+, 64-bit · Windows 10+ (x86-64) · Linux with SDL2 (x86-64) · PortMaster handhelds (aarch64).

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