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Date:      Sun, 21 Dec 2008 21:01:28 +0100
From:      Tore Lund <tl32@next.online.no>
To:        freebsd-multimedia@freebsd.org
Subject:   MIDI input device
Message-ID:  <494EA098.20808@next.online.no>

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Asking about MIDI here may be somewhat like flogging an absent horse.
There seems to be little if any information on mailing lists and other
forums about MIDI, so I have to ask:  Does MIDI input work at all on
FreeBSD?  And if so, with what sort of MIDI interface?

I wanted to try out the software synths available on FreeBSD.  So I dug
out my old Roland A30 keyboard and my SoundBlaster PCI64 card, which is
based on Ensoniq 1370 and which has a game/MIDI port.  The sound card is
recognized all right by FreeBSD, but not the MIDI port - doing a "cat
/dev/midistat" gives me "No devices installed".

It occurred to me that I should try out the rest of the synthesizer
software before going any further.  Hence I installed jack-keyboard and
some of the necessary infrastructure.  Following the documentation, I
first ran "jackd -d oss", then "ghostess whysynth.so" and then
"jack-keyboard".  This setup works very well - makes me look forward to
trying out other synth stuff in /usr/ports/audio.

But I need a real keyboard in order to play music.  Am I missing some
command or configuration that will recognize my MIDI port as an input
device?  Or, if my old SoundBlaster cannot be used, will FreeBSD pick up
any of the new USB interfaces?  Thanks for any hints.
-- 
    Tore




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