There is an inconsistency where instruments are changed when switching to another view.
Depending on what data is on the step, instrument is changed or not.
Scenario 1: A note is on the step and you switch to song view (or any other view like master, editor, etc.) and back, the instrument of the track is selected.
Scenario 2: You are on an empty step
and switch to song view (or any other view like master, editor, etc.) and back, the instrument you selected is still there.
That’s a weird behaviour, depending on where you are in the pattern, quick tempo changes (hold song+jog) or switching to another view to see the arrangement or edit samples, etc. forces you to always change your instrument to the desired one again.
EDIT: and to make a nice game out of it, create a pattern with notes and some empty steps and press play.
Now try to switch to song mode and back while not changing the instrument slot.
Steps to Reproduce
In pattern editor, make 2 tracks containing 2 different instruments and put in some notes
Being on track 1 switch to Song Page (or any other like master, editor, etc.) and back, instrument selected is the one that’s on track 1.
Goto track 2, cursor on a note and repeat step 2 while being on track 2. Instrument now is the one that’s on track 2.
Go back to track 1 on an EMPTY step and repeat step 2. Instrument is still the former one.
Hey Patrick. Sorry it took some time to reply to this. I get where the annoyance is on this, but can also see why it functions this way. Going through your reproduction steps, the consistency is that the Tracker remembers the last instrument on a step of a track. I’m pretty sure that’s how the Tracker has behaved since day one.
Is there something I’m overlooking? Perhaps some other scenarios where this is not consistant?
Can you explain how you are interpreting what is the desired instrument?
@Dann sorry for the delay, had some work to finish.
Yes this is a behaviour since day one and it is totally fine. But the bug topic is about when switching views
As long as you are in the pattern editor, an empty step is populated with your current selected instrument, a filled step with the instrument thats in there already. But when you switch to another window, lets say song view, and back, the instrument wich was under the cursor at that very moment is your permanently selected instrument for every step. Even when not in rec(red) mode.
That’s breaking the workflow because its very annoying and gets worse, when you press play.
Then the playbar becomes the selector and whatever is under this cursor when you switch to another window or change tempo etc. will be your instrument. This is a bug because the tracker does not remember your last selected instrument, it selects wherever you are in the song!
Apart from that, i get where this eventually comes from. Its meant like a shortcut to the sample editor. Cursor selects, press sample editor, voila. But this breaks instrument selection as a whole.
And…the whole grid play function is a bit of a mess.
I can play my selected instrument in the song view and master view where it doesnt make sense but not in the sample loader, where it would be very handy. But that’s another story
So hopefully this makes sense or i dont get it, then please tell me what i am doing wrong and where’s the sense behind this choice.
Simple, the desired instrument is what i selected last with the instrument selector (yellow button) whatever i’ll do, where i’ll be until i select another one. Protracker, Octamed, Buzz…it is all the same.
@Patrick Thanks for your report, I’m sorry that Tracker is causing issues. Sorry to disappoint, but this particular case is by current product design, and we are not planning on changing this workflow. Thanks for understanding.
