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TidBITS#177/17-May-93
=====================

 This week brings the second of our three part look at MIDI, so
   watch for the exciting conclusion in two weeks. What? Two
   weeks? A season cliffhanger? That's right, we're moving and not
   having a phone line next Monday will prevent us from publishing
   an issue. We also have bits on having a Performa repaired at an
   Apple dealer and Easy View 2.32's hiding spots. Finally, Mark
   Millard reviews Tex-Edit, a free text editor with some nice
   features.

 Copyright 1990-1993 Adam & Tonya Engst. Non-profit, non-commercial
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Topics:
    MailBITS/17-May-93
    The Yellow Rose of Tex-Edit
    MIDI and the Macintosh - Part II
    Reviews/17-May-93

[Archived as /info-mac/digest/tb/tidbits-177.etx; 29K]


MailBITS/17-May-93
------------------
  TidBITS is moving! Not far, about 25 miles south to near the
  shores of Lake Washington (well, OK, we can't see the lake from
  inside our house, but we can from the yard). Nothing will change
  for my email correspondents (well, OK, I might be a bit less
  responsive for the next few weeks). However, this note is directed
  at those of you who work for companies that like to swamp my
  snailbox with press releases and other goodies. It's not that I
  don't trust the United States Postal Service to forward my mail
  (well, OK, I intend to bribe the mail carrier with some apricot
  jam I made last summer), but it's always best if everyone updates
  their databases as soon as possible. Thanks for your patience! Our
  new address will be 1106 North 31st Street, Renton, WA 98055 USA.


**Easy View habitats** -- It turned out that Easy View ended up on
  CompuServe in MACDVEN #5 as EV232.SIT rather than the MACAPP
  library that I mentioned last week. It's also available on the
  Internet at <mac.archive.umich.edu> as:

    /mac/util/editor/easyview2.32.cpt.hqx


**Performa Service** -- Apple recently reminded dealers that
  Performa owners are welcome to bring their computers to "regular"
  Macintosh dealers should they need repair, in or out of warranty.
  This option could be handy for people who live or work near an
  Apple dealer but who can't wait at home all day for an in-home
  service technician to arrive. Machines brought in for warranty
  repair will need to be accompanied by proof-of-purchase date.


The Yellow Rose of Tex-Edit
---------------------------
  by Mark R. Millard -- [e-mail]

  High-end word processors like Word, WordPerfect, MacWrite Pro, and
  Nisus can produce anything from a letter to a professional
  publication. But many Macintosh users lack the money, drive space,
  RAM, or inclination to run them. Even lower-end word processors
  like WriteNow, Nisus Compact, and LetterPerfect can cost upwards
  of $100. Apple's TeachText is free, but extremely limited.
  Consider instead Tex-Edit, a freeware text editor written by Tom
  Bender of San Angelo, Texas. It's free, requires only 256K RAM,
  occupies only 98K disk space, and is loaded with features.


Text Editing vs. Word Processing
  Other than price, what's the difference between a text editor and
  a word processor? Word processors support features beyond entering
  and editing text, such as headers and footers, mail merge,
  glossaries, spelling and grammar checkers, footnotes, sectioned
  pagination, multiple columns, indexing, graphics, style sheets,
  and equation editors. The practically endless list grows as the
  features war rages on.

  Text editors, in contrast, concentrate on plain text manipulation.
  Fancy word processing features are super if you're sharing files
  among Macs with similar software, but try reading the same files
  with generic software or on a different platform, and you may find
  the fancy formatting converted to a mess of strange-looking
  control characters, peppering what was once readable text with
  garbage. By focusing on the manipulation of compatible text, text
  editors provide tools for porting text between different
  computers.


Tex-Edit
  Tex-Edit supports basic features shared by many text editors. You
  can open any file of type TEXT, as well as drag & drop any file to
  read text in that file's data fork. You can add or strip carriage
  return and line feed characters as desired. Smart (curly) quote
  conversion is also available. Like some text editors (but not
  TeachText), you can open multiple documents, up to the limit of
  the RAM you have allocated.

  So what does Tex-Edit offer that some do not? In my opinion, the
  biggest feature is text styling (multiple fonts, sizes, and
  character styles within a document) supported by adding a "styl"
  resource to each document (Nisus uses a similar approach, but a
  different resource type). Unlike conventional word processors that
  use special invisible characters within the file's text to control
  formatting, styling kept in a file's resource fork won't trash up
  screens of text readers (like email software) that don't support
  that particular resource.

  Simply put, if you open a formatted Tex-Edit file with an
  application like Word that doesn't read "styl" info, you simply
  get clean, plain text - no garbage formatting characters. The
  file's resource fork is ignored and usually removed if you save
  the file with the other application. America Online and (according
  to the author) JoliWrite and Stylus all use the "styl" resource,
  so Tex-Edit can freely exchange text with these applications,
  formatting intact. To send formatted text to other applications,
  the author recommends you copy and paste from the clipboard - this
  technique worked for me in FileMaker Pro and HyperCard, but
  formatting was lost when pasting into applications that don't read
  styl from the clipboard, including PageMaker, Personal Press,
  QuarkXPress, and Word.

  Tex-Edit has several other interesting features. "Smart Cut &
  Paste" is an option that will add a trailing space to words copied
  to the clipboard. Window text wrap can be turned off to ease
  reading lines of programming code. Triple-clicking on a sentence
  selects the entire sentence. A Change Case command gives you
  selections of upper, lower, title, or sentence case. You can
  convert the "fi" and "fl" ligatures in either direction. Word,
  line, and character count is available. Tex-Edit also supports the
  extra keys on extended keyboards. If that's not enough, Tex-Edit
  supports Macintalk 1.5.1, and if it's installed, Tex-Edit can read
  part or all of a document out loud.

  Tex-Edit has a few limitations, but they provide some speed and
  size advantages. Although it supports multiple open documents, it
  can only open 32K of a given text file at a time. If you have a
  file larger than 32K, you can open multiple window "chunks" of 32K
  to see the whole document. Tex-Edit also does not support tabs
  (without converting them to spaces) or graphics, and doesn't know
  about zooming on multiple monitors.

  Tex-Edit is compatible with many of the Mac booby traps: it's
  32-bit clean, System 6 and 7 compatible, color compatible, big-
  screen compatible, 68040-cache compatible, and it adheres to all
  of Apple's interface guidelines. Most functions, although not
  Replace All, are supported by the Undo command. Tex-Edit is also
  stationery-aware. [We've had a comment from one reader saying that
  Tex-Edit isn't as stable under System 6 as System 7 in his
  experience, so be forewarned. -Adam]

  Tom has freely released the application and source code to the
  public domain, and he offers online support on America Online and
  GEnie. In upcoming versions of Tex-Edit, Tom plans to maintain
  System 6 compatibility while adding the capability to open files
  larger than 32K in one window and support for tabs and pictures.
  He says that speed and a small application size are priorities
  over adding features.

  Since programmers spend a lot of time using text editors, I took
  an informal survey of programmers, asking them which application
  they used for text editing. Tex-Edit rated highly, along with
  BBEdit and the integrated editors in THINK Pascal and THINK C.
  [BBEdit just split into two products, one commercial, one free,
  and the free version lost some features in the process. -Adam]

  It's hard to find fault in Tex-Edit. For a text editor, it's a
  gem: powerful, full of useful features, small, fast, flexible,
  and, best of all, free. If you work with text files smaller than
  32K on a daily basis, you should give it a test run. Tex-Edit has
  replaced TeachText on my desktop, and I only have to crank up my
  lumbering Alki MasterWord-enhanced copy of Word half as often as I
  used to.

  You can find Tex-Edit from your favorite source of free software,
  and it's on <sumex-aim.stanford.edu> as:

    /info-mac/app/tex-edit-181.hqx


Tex-Edit 1.8.1
    Tom Bender
    Trans Tex Software
    5313 Beverly Drive
    San Angelo, TX 76904
    [e-mail]
    GEnie: TBBENDER


MIDI and the Macintosh - Part II
--------------------------------
  by Shekhar Govind -- [e-mail]
  Technical editing by Craig O'Donnell -- [e-mail]
                   and Nick Rothwell -- [e-mail]

MIDI Software for the Mac: Application Software
  For simple purposes, MIDI application software can be considered
  to have two main elements - a recorder/player (sequencer) with
  tools for editing the MIDI performance data, and a music-notation
  editor to create printed scores, or "notation." (Other classes of
  MIDI software esoterica will be dealt with later.)

  Until a few years ago, the Amiga and the Atari ST, with their
  built-in MIDI capabilities, boasted some of the best MIDI
  software. However, highly acclaimed MIDI sequencers and notation
  editors are now available for the Mac, and it is the
  professional's computer of choice. As more MIDI software is ported
  to (or created for) Windows, the balance may change. But MIDI
  editing remains fundamentally a graphic process, a task at which
  Macs continue to edge out PCs.

  Sequencing packages are geared to "conventional" music making.
  They have several recording tracks, and let you display and edit
  notes, controllers, and so on. They often present a tape-recorder
  metaphor on the screen, with music being recorded and played
  sequentially. Notation editors provide seamless translation of
  standard music notation into MIDI files (and vice versa). A good
  analogy for a notation editor and a synthesizer keyboard would be
  a word processor and a QWERTY keyboard.

  A partial list of some Mac sequencers and notation editors
  follows. Usually, the list price is a fair reflection of the
  software's capabilities. The high-end has packages intended for
  the professional musician, while the mid- and low-range programs
  are aimed at the semi-pro or casual musician or composer. Each
  package claims its forte to be either sequencing [S] or notation
  [N], though sometimes both parts are present in some mix: [SN]
  [sN] or [Sn].

    Composer's Mosaic   $595 (Mark of the Unicorn) [N]
    ConcertWare+MIDI    $189 (Great Wave Software) [sN]
    Cubase              $495 (Steinberg/Jones) [S]
    D. M. C. S.         $130 (Electronic Arts) [N]
    Encore              $595 (Passport Designs) [N]
    EZ Vision           $149 (Opcode Systems) [S]
    Finale              $749 (Coda Music Software) [SN]
    Lime                $160 (CERL) [N]
    Master Tracks Pro   $495 (Passport Designs) [S]
    Metro*              $229 (OSC) [S]
    MIDIplay            $ 60 (Opcode Systems) [MIDI on HyperCard]
    MiniTrax            Public Domain (Altech Systems) [s]
    Music Writer 1/2/3  $119/295/595 (Pygraphics) [N]
    MusicProse          $249 (Coda Music Software) [SN]
    Performer           $495 (Mark of the Unicorn) [S]
    Trax                $ 99 (Passport Designs) [S]
    Upbeat              $129 (Dr. T's Music Software) [percussion]
    Vision              $495 (Opcode Systems) [S]

* Metro is a reincarnation of Beyond (previously Dr. T's) with an
  integration to DECK (a digital audio recording system also from
  OSC).

  Demo versions for most are available from the publisher or on the
  Internet. Those with FTP access should get a copy of

    info-mac/report/inexpensive-midi-resource.txt

  from <sumex-aim.stanford.edu>. This file, currently available as a
  draft FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) on the
  rec.music.makers.synth group on Usenet, lists demo, shareware, and
  public-domain programs available for the Mac and where to get
  them.

  Mail order firms sell most software for much less than list price.
  Besides the usual connections, places, zones, and warehouses,
  check out MacBeat (800/MAC-BEAT). They employ knowledgeable
  salespeople and always have good bargains on MIDI software,
  synths, and even Macs. Sweetwater Sound (219/432-8176) also has an
  excellent reputation among professionals (you can reach them via
  email through Chuck Surack at <[e-mail]>).

  Another flavor of MIDI software is the improvisation and "teach-
  yourself-music" category. The latter includes packages like the
  Miracle Piano Teaching System from Software Toolworks. This bundle
  lists at $500 and comes with software, MIDI interface, cables, and
  a 49-key MIDI keyboard. Software for improvisation and algorithmic
  accompaniment can provide a backing by different instruments in a
  wide range of rhythmic styles - all in real time. Software in this
  category includes:

    Band in a Box    $ 88 (PG Music) [algorithmic accompaniment]
    Cypher*          $ 39 (Robert Rowe) [algorithmic composition]
    Harmony Grid     $ 99 (VPL Research) [nontraditional
                           learning/composition]
    Jam Factory      $119 (Dr. T's Music Software) [algorithmic
                           accompaniment]
    Listen           $ 99 (Imaja) [ear training, theory]
    M                $119 (Dr. T's Music Software) [algorithmic
                           composition]
    MiBAC Jazz       $125 (MiBAC Music Software) [algorithmic
                           accompaniment]
    Music Mouse      $ 49 (Dr. T's Music Software) [graphic /
                           algorithmic player]
    Practica Musica  $125 (ARS Nova) [ear training and theory]

* Cypher is available on CD as a companion to the book
  "Interactive Music Systems" by Robert Rowe, published by MIT
  Press.

  Patch librarians/editors are applications which create archives to
  store synth-specific sound parameters (patches, remember?) and let
  you edit or create synth voices in a graphic mode instead of the
  "peer through an LCD mail slot mode" present on the front panel of
  synthesis equipment. Editors and librarians differ in function but
  tend to resemble each other: they let you put together sounds
  off-line which can be used in music composed with a sequencer. The
  $249 Galaxy (Opcode Systems) is a good commercial patch-librarian.

  Software tools that test hardware and connections, and send and
  receive system exclusive ("sysex") messages to and from the synth
  are essential for the serious MIDI-tinkerer. (Sysex messages don't
  play music; they change the attributes of the sound of the
  receiving MIDI system.) In addition, these tools can provide
  software-based access to the sound and music functions of the
  synth. A few such utilities available in the public-domain
  include: MIDI Mode and MIDI Program Select (both DAs by Austin
  Development), Bulk Sysex Utility and Interface Test (both from
  Altech Systems), and MIDIScope (thank the folks at Kurzweil for
  this one). Previously shareware, HyperMIDI, a decent MIDI
  construction toolkit in HyperCard by Nigel Redmond, has recently
  gone commercial ($125). Read the FAQ file referred to earlier for
  a list of other non-commercial Mac MIDI tools.

  MAX/OMS (Opcode MIDI System), an object-oriented MIDI control and
  interface programming toolkit, is a powerful environment for
  MIDI-hacking (more about OMS later). If you get bored with
  predefined tools and traditional ways of working, or come across
  problems or ideas which you cannot address with conventional
  applications, you should consider MAX. Designed by Miller Puckette
  at IRCAM in Paris and supported and sold by Opcode Systems, MAX is
  a toolbox for creating MIDI systems such as user interfaces,
  real-time processors, algorithmic composition components,
  performance surfaces, and anything else you can think of. It is a
  Macintosh application with a superb graphical interface. Control
  primitives can be laid out, connected, and edited in a MacDraw-
  like environment, and then used to process MIDI data in any way
  imaginable, with an interface designed to any scheme you wish. It
  can be considered an instrument, just like synthesizers; or even
  better, an instrument for building new instruments. Musicians use
  it on-stage as a performance system for their entire rig. MAX is
  one of the most significant MIDI products (hardware or software)
  ever, and much credit must go to Opcode for having the vision to
  bring it to market.

  MIDI applications can be written and compiled in almost any high-
  level programming environment. Books on MIDI programming and disks
  containing MIDI subroutine libraries and source codes (in C,
  MIDIBasic, MIDIPascal) are readily available. Some of the MIDI
  public-domain programs mentioned earlier are exhibits for these
  language packages.


Additional System Software
  Because of differences in architecture, the venerable Mac IIfx and
  the recent Quadras and the IIvx require a Serial Switch Control
  Panel for their serial ports. However, things get a little murky
  in the realm of System 7.1 and MIDI. Digidesign recommends Enabler
  001 for various Mac models including the IIvx and Performa 600.
  Apple says NOT to use Enabler 001 on a Performa. It's not clear
  what Enabler 001 does that the Hardware Update 1.0 doesn't do.

  Software with music notation capabilities come bundled with
  appropriate fonts (such as Sonata, an Adobe PostScript font. Most
  of the software packages include MIDI Manager, an essential MIDI
  system extension courtesy of (and that's putting it politely)
  Apple. The MIDI Manager extends the Mac operating system to
  correctly support the timing accuracy required by MIDI hardware
  and software under MultiFinder. While some programs do not require
  the MIDI Manager per se to function, using it can provide more
  flexibility (not to mention more system conflicts). MIDI Manager
  is available to developers from APDA or as licensed software with
  MIDI application packages.

  First, the good news about MIDI Manager - it can operate in the
  background; it allows the user to configure either the modem or
  the printer port for MIDI traffic; and it can take the output from
  one MIDI program and input it to another MIDI program. When loaded
  on a PowerBook, it automatically disables rest-mode (a state in
  which the PowerBooks are slow to the point of almost being non-
  functional as a MIDI platform). Oh yes, it is System 7 friendly;
  but then these days, what isn't?

  And now for the major discordant note. The Chooser is MIDI Manager
  hostile - if you bring up the Chooser while MIDI Manager is
  loaded, the modem port locks up.

  Nor can the MIDI Manager flawlessly direct incoming serial data on
  most PowerBooks. Although MIDI Manager does not cause the problem,
  an update could certainly solve it (more on the PowerBook-MIDI
  saga later). Using MIDI Manager with MultiFinder (or System 7.x)
  on a Mac with a slow processor (such as an 8 MHz 68000) can make
  the Mac choke, especially if the score contains multiple voices.
  Although the "sound" isn't affected, it might affect the timing as
  well as the screen refresh. (These are generic problems associated
  with the slower Macs - MIDI Manager just consumes another piece of
  the scarce CPU pie.) Finally, configuring the MIDI Manager
  requires an included stand-alone application called PatchBay - an
  example of interface design Apple would probably like to forget.


MIDI Manager & OMS History
  Originally invented to help MIDI software cope with System 6
  MultiFinder, MIDI Manager is showing its age and may not be around
  for long. Let's look briefly at where it came from and why it
  appeared.

  Part of the Mac's appeal is its high level interface to
  programmers (for things like QuickDraw), and this results in nice,
  consistent applications that work together (cut and paste,
  anyone?). Equally important, it means that applications will
  usually continue to work with new hardware. For example, you could
  use a six-year-old resource editor of Mac Plus vintage on a big-
  screen Mac or a PowerBook; you could also be reasonably confident
  that it would work on a graphics-accelerated Radius Rocket-
  equipped Quadra, a completely different beast from the Mac Plus!

  If you were given a Mac program which drew directly onto the
  screen (ignoring the window system), and which crashed on color
  machines, you'd consider it junk and throw it away, right? (Let's
  leave aside games for now.) Sadly, much original MIDI software did
  similar horrid things to the Mac like seizing serial ports
  regardless of other applications. This was not due to programming
  carelessness, but because there were no toolbox calls or
  programming conventions for MIDI, which is timing-dependent
  (unlike your generic pre-QuickTime Macintosh process).

  Then in early 1989, Apple released MIDI Manager. Like other
  Macintosh Managers, this Toolbox component offered high-level
  services to applications. In this case, it meant applications
  could use abstract MIDI communication and timing ports, regardless
  of the hardware they ran on. Several MIDI Manager applications
  could run at once, and could even send MIDI data to one another.
  And they would be independent of the hardware and could use new,
  high-speed MIDI interfaces, or SCSI, or synthesizers on NuBus
  sound cards, or whatever.

  And all was rosy. Well, actually, no. Due to a long-running legal
  wrangle with the Beatles' Apple Corps, Apple Computer was
  prevented from publicizing MIDI Manager properly and never rolled
  it into the (at that time) much-awaited System 7. Apple dealt with
  the legal problems, but by that time the MIDI Manager developers
  had left Apple, and MIDI Manager languished. It still works and is
  in constant use on most Mac-MIDI platforms. But it hasn't changed
  in years.

  Apple is reportedly working on an improved manager for audio
  events in general - taking care of both sound and MIDI on the Mac.
  Apple demonstrated early versions at the 1992 Developers'
  Conference, and the obvious place to see it unveiled will be on
  new Macs with DSP (digital signal processing) chips - but then no
  one can accuse Apple of being obvious.

  In 1991, Opcode developed their own system (OMS, the Opcode MIDI
  System) which provides system services similar to the MIDI
  Manager. Although OMS and MIDI Manager differ only slightly, there
  are good reasons for running both systems at once to access their
  respective features. Professionals often need extremely powerful
  MIDI interface boxes with more than 16 MIDI channels (64 is common
  and 128 is possible and surely we'll be up to 1,024 channels
  someday soon!) and must synchronize their Mac to SMPTE time code
  (a protocol defined by the Society of Motion Picture & Television
  Engineers for synchronizing various devices) on video or audio
  tape. Apple offers no solution and that's where OMS fills the
  bill.

  OMS is an exemplary piece of software; it works solidly on
  PowerBooks, and is considered a must for professional MIDI users.
  Mark of the Unicorn has announced a rival to OMS, the FreeMIDI
  System - think of it as OMS with a Free Software Foundation source
  license. Although a few beta testers have proclaimed it to be OK,
  it will have to prove itself to be at least as capable as OMS to
  achieve a loyal user base.

  Opcode fired the next few salvos in this MIDI battle. Since
  January 1993, Opcode has licensed OMS developer packs free to
  interested parties. In April, they announced an upgrade to version
  2.0 of OMS (currently, OMS 1.2.1 is shipping). The acronym OMS
  will change from "Opcode MIDI System" to "Open Music System" to
  reflect the fact that future versions of OMS will incorporate
  source code from other developers (a move designed to bolster its
  acceptance as an industry standard for professional musicians).
  Among other enhancements, OMS 2.0 will add IAC (Inter-Application
  Communication) and will include serial port independence that will
  allow the use of serial cards like Applied Engineering's
  QuadraLink four-port NuBus card. The OMS bandwagon already
  includes companies such as Passport, Steinberg, Emagic, PG Music,
  Roland, and Digidesign.

  The problem, of course, is that there is still a lot of MIDI
  software around that uses none of this stuff. MIDI Manager
  documentation is available from APDA, and it's easy to program
  MIDI Manager applications, so there is no excuse for applications
  not to use it. One might even venture that FreeMIDI was a
  TrueType-ish move to force developers to agree on a common system.
  With any luck, it will happen soon and the results will work well.
  In the meantime, if you have MIDI software that does not use OMS
  or MIDI Manager, you might wish to consign it to the trash. Of
  course, if you're just messing with MIDI, you may feel
  differently.


Gooey Crimes
  And now for something completely different - a short rant about
  user interface and reliability of MIDI applications

  The user interface of some of these packages is convoluted enough
  to make even the most hardened Microsoft programmer blush. One
  popular high-end sequencer insists on making the "close window"
  square at the top left of a Mac window appear as a triangle -
  truly the mark of a unicorn who doesn't believe in making simple
  ROM calls (or in using proper WDEFs, CDEFs, etc.). On one
  expensive notation editor, selecting a note does not darken the
  note - instead, it is grayed. These are the least of the
  collective sins committed against the standard Mac interface.
  Although these problems may seem cosmetic, in many cases
  functionality (not to mention immunity from conflicts and
  longevity across hardware and system upgrades) can be directly
  related to the cosmetics of the software.

  Reliability is crucial in any MIDI system and users have every
  right to expect dependability from applications that cost hundreds
  of dollars. If a word processor crashes while you are in the
  middle of composing a letter you might be moved to utter a few
  choice expletives; but few of us have the rich vocabulary required
  when a MIDI program crashes in the middle of a live performance.
  Unfortunately, there is a lot of unreliable software in the
  market. Generally it is the poor(er) user who discovers the
  expensive way about mutation problems in fourth-generation
  performers.

  As for Apple, we can only hope that by the time they let loose the
  next Manager, they will have read their own bleeping interface
  guidelines about how to configure a system extension from a
  Control Panel.

  Tune in next issue for a look at MIDI hardware, including
  interfaces, Macs, samplers, and synthesizers.


Reviews/17-May-93
-----------------

* MacWEEK -- 10-May-93, Vol. 7, #19
    Network Operating Systems -- pg. 32
      AppleShare 3.0.1
      AppleShare 3.0.1 & Internet Router 3.0
      EasyServer Python
      LAN Manager 2.2
      LAN Server 3.0
      NetWare 3.11
      Vines 5.5


..

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