Stage Traxx beta version 3.0.0

musicadi

peter Hi, yes, the connection is closed if ST3 goes in the background on the host iPad.

The problem with this for me, is that I have to reconnect every time after we take a break, since I play break music from the "Music" app, so I need to put ST3 in the background. In ST2 the connection was not interrupted, so when we came back from the break, nobody needed to touch anything, I just hat to bring ST2 to the foreground again and all was working.

peter

musicadi That's a side effect of the battery saving feature of Stage Traxx. When no audio is playing and you switch to the background, iOS might terminate the app (depending on how many other apps you have running). Once terminated, clients will loose the connection. The only way to prevent this is to keep audio running (even though nothing is playing). ST2 does this. But this leads to serious battery drain if you forget to force quit the app as ST3 would have no way of knowing whether it needs to keep the audio engine running or not.

So I guess having to reconnect after the break is the lesser of the two evils in this case. Especially as you don't have to acknowledge the conntection request as a host.

Another way around this for you would be to use iOS multitasking to open the music app in parallel to ST3. Or keep ST3 floating above the music app. To do this, slide the app out of the dock to the left or right side of your sceen.

EddieH

musicadi
In Stage Traxx v2, I create set of break music. That way I don't have to open another app.

musicadi

P.S. Oh, and the "Next in queue" info would be also cool, that's also there in ST2.

An idea about keeping playback history: instead of removing songs from the queue, after they have been played, how about moving them to the end of the list instead, or just use a coloured background to mark them played (just like in ST2).

An organising/sorting idea: in all windows where songs are listed, you could add different columns for Artist, Key (very important imo), Year, Genre, Last Played, Play Count and then, when tapping on a column header, the list would instantly be ordered by that column. Tap once, it is order A-Z, tap once again, it is ordered Z-A.

peter

musicadi An organising/sorting idea: in all windows where songs are listed, you could add different columns for Artist, Key (very important imo), Year, Genre, Last Played, Play Count and then, when tapping on a column header, the list would instantly be ordered by that column. Tap once, it is order A-Z, tap once again, it is ordered Z-A.

Library organisation will be a big topic for the 3.1 update. This is not something I will tackle in 3.0.

peter

Hm, I just have an idea regarding the background problem. I can detect in the app whether a network session is hosted. So I could keep the audio engine running while a session is hosted and that would keep the app from closing even if running in the background. Only thing you would need to remember is to disable the network session at the end of the evening or ST3 would keep on running indefinitely.

musicadi

peter I’m sure I would forget to turn it off... haha. How about closing the connection when the client goes in the background? Or just leave it as it is, or maybe add an option “Keep the network connection alive -Yes/No”

peter

musicadi I’m sure I would forget to turn it off... haha. How about closing the connection when the client goes in the background?

Well, I can also detect if a client is connected. So when the app is switched to the background and a network session is being hosted with at least 1 client connected, the audio engine will keep running to prevent iOS from killing the app. I guess that could work.

musicadi I have sony lyrice with lines like “Ah ah ah” 🙂 ST3 thinks these are A chords and colors them.

Well, in Germany many people use "H" instead of "B" that's why that line is detected as chords. Coloring only bracketed chords would leave everyone unsatisfied who uses the notation where chords are written above the lyrics. So that's not an option.

musicadi

BTW, stumbled across a bug regarding chord recognition.

I have sony lyrice with lines like “Ah ah ah” 🙂 ST3 thinks these are A chords and colors them.

Might be a good idea to only recognize text as chords if it’s in brackets?

musicadi

peter

peter Well, in Germany many people use "H" instead of "B" that's why that line is detected as chords. Coloring only bracketed chords would leave everyone unsatisfied who uses the notation where chords are written above the lyrics. So that's not an option.

Yes, I know, but maybe you can check if the given letter is actually intended to be a chord. The app might check whether there is a space before A, B (H), C aso. for example. Also, it could exclude letter combinations that couldn’t possibly represent a chord, or only interpret given combinations as chords, like A, Am, Adim, A#, Ab aso. (with space characters before and after)

Of course, it’s not a big deal, if someone thinks Ah is some kind of chord, they might not need the app in the first place 🙂

EddieH

Thank you for continuing development of Stage Traxx. I've downloaded the beta 3.0 and after preliminary testing, I can see that this is a wonderful replacement for v2. I use it mainly for backing tracks, lyrics, real-time midi and set lists. My main concern was real-time midi and I can report that it is working perfectly. I use Midifire to route midi and though I can't route Stage Traxx directly to Midifire, it is acceptable. Any chance of adding midi routing in the future?

BTW, I started looking for a replacement app when I read that you were going to stop development of v2. I'm really glad you decided to continue! Besides, there isn't an app like Stage Traxx to be found.
Thanks,
Eddie

peter

EddieH Thanks a lot for your comments. I really appreciate this kind of feedback 🙂

ST currently send midi commands to all ports it can find. I could restrict this via a settings dialog to only certain ports. I will add that to my todo list but not in 3.0. Might make it into 3.1.

EddieH In Stage Traxx v2, I create set of break music. That way I don't have to open another app.

In ST3 that would most likely be a waste of storage as ST3 copies all music into the app. You would then have the songs both in the iTunes library and in ST3.

EddieH

peter I can live with that, for me, storage space isn’t an issue. The features I need that are built into Stage Traxx is what counts most!

I can wait for v3.1 for midi routing. Thx for adding it to your list.

Thx again.

JDSMUSIC

I also have a set list of break music organized by genre. Depending on gig start playback wherever i want and have autoplay on for that list. While last song before break is playing I select Break Music playlist and position to start.

EddieH

I forgot to mention that I’m testing v3 on an iPhone 8 running v12.1

DickyDutch

Hi Peter there seems to be a small bug relating to adding songs to a playlist. Can you please see if you can duplicate this condition. Start with an empty Queue then select Playlists, then tap on a playlist to add it to the Queue (Lyrics view automatically opens). Now try to add additional songs to this playlist by closing the lyrics view and tapping the edit “I” symbol on right of screen. The + symbol needed to add songs to the playlist doesn’t pop up at the bottom of screen as expected nor does it appear when playlist edit function is selected. regards Richard
PS I’m testing on IPAD LATEST IOS.

EddieH

DickyDutch iPhone 8, iOS 12.1
Yes, it's the same on my iPhone as well. I was wondering if I add a song to the queue, can the queue be saved back to the playlist.
Thx,
Eddie

peter

EddieH Would you consider adding Audiobus or IAA into Stage Traxx in the future?

Audiobus is already supported.

DickyDutch Yes, I am aware about this problem but I did not find a way to make it work yet. The problem is that the mini player has a life of its own and it doesn't seem to accept the position changes I send to it. I tried to contact the developer of that component, but no progress so far on that front.

EddieH 1. If I manually add songs to a cleared queue and a placeholder is the first song in the queue, the lyrics will not display.

Can't reproduce this. Lyrics are shown fine for placeholders as first song in empty queue.

EddieH 2. The Song/Set volume icon is missing.

No room for them on the iPhone. You need an iPad for that.

EddieH 4. How do I get the song to remain in the queue after playing.

You can't that's how a queue works. The next version will have a history of played songs. So you will be able to see all songs played.

EddieH 16. Volume control: Works except that in device mode, the display doesn't update if the
iPhone buttons are used. If device volume is used for the set volume as in v2, the display would make more sense.

Don't know what you mean by v2 as there was no way to control device volume except in the settings dialog which is similar in ST3. But you are right that the slider should change when using the hardware buttons.

EddieH

iPhone 8, iOS 12.1
Here are more result from my testing. Be aware that I'm testing mainly for my workflow, and if I don't mention a setting, it means that it doesn't affecting how I use Stage Traxx.
1. If I manually add songs to a cleared queue and a placeholder is the first song in the queue, the lyrics will not display. Only after adding and playing a backing track, can I go back to the placeholder and the lyrics will then be visible.
2. The Song/Set volume icon is missing.
3. As DickyDutch mentioned, I cannot add to the playlist unless the queue is clear.
4. How do I get the song to remain in the queue after playing.
In Settings:
5. Master Eq works
6. Volume slider works
7. I don't use the Fade settings
8. I don't use the Network sessions (I perform mostly solo)
9. Dark mode works, I wouldn't use light mode.
10. Haven't tested the color settings yet, not a high priority.
11. Screen lock is not a high priority
12. Stop button mode works
13. Double tap to stop works
14. Show lyrics on play works
15. Default queue add position works
16. Volume control: Works except that in device mode, the display doesn't update if the
iPhone buttons are used. If device volume is used for the set volume as in v2, the display would make more sense.
17. Clock mode, I'm not sure how useful Timer and Queue End modes are.
18. Autoscroll lyrics work
19. Fixed font width works, but I wouldn't use it.
20. Centered text works.
21. Haven't tested remote control yet.
22. Backups: Create and Restore works

Current settings:
Master Eq: Off
Fader Settings (all): 0s
Buffer size: 512 (default)
Host session: Off
Dark Mode: On
Color settings: n/a
Disable Screen lock: On
Stop Button Mode: Rewind
Double tap to stop: On
Show lyrics on play: On
Volume control: Song
Clock Mode: Clock
Autoscroll lyrics: Off
Fixed font width: Off
Centered Text: On
Remote control: Not set up

I hope you'll find this helpful.
Thx,
Eddie

EddieH

Would you consider adding Audiobus or IAA into Stage Traxx in the future? If I wanted to use Bias Fx or other iOS apps, it would be more straight forward in the context of using a mixer such as AUM to send the different audio to my Behringer XR18.
Thx again for your work. Perhaps you should set up a PayPal account for me to donate to your project(s).

EddieH

iPhone 8, iOS 12.1
IPad Mini 4, iOS 11.1

peter Audiobus is already supported.

Thx, I will make no further assumptions because it is not available in ST2.

peter Can't reproduce this. Lyrics are shown fine for placeholders as first song in empty queue.

When I go into Queue, I found that I had to tap anywhere within the navigation block except for the Next button. Ok, this is moot if loading the queue from playlist.

peter Don't know what you mean by v2 as there was no way to control device volume ...

Sorry Peter, v2 is ST2. So in ST2, I can control the song volume and playlist volume within ST2, and device volume with the hardware buttons. The playlist volume is super convenient for my break music which is a different volume setting than backing tracks. But I do like the vol up/down buttons, it makes it much easier during a song.

peter No room for them on the iPhone. You need an iPad for that.

peter You can't that's how a queue works.

peter

EddieH The playlist volume is super convenient for my break music which is a different volume setting than backing tracks.

As ST3 adds everything to the queue when you want to play it, there is no longer a playlist volume. Instead you now have the device volume slider available on the player screen to quickly change the overall volume.

EddieH When I go into Queue, I found that I had to tap anywhere within the navigation block except for the Next button. Ok, this is moot if loading the queue from playlist.

Hm, still can't reproduce the problem on iPhone or iPad. Here are my steps:

Clear queue
Add placeholder song to queue
Open player view
=> lyrics are displayed

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