Solaris as a controller

[minorguy]

One strength of the Solaris is the UI with all the knobs and displays. I was thinking it's a shame that the UI is a significant expense that only gets used for one sound source. Although the knobs could output MIDI values to control other synths, the displays don't get reused. So I thought it would be a good idea if it worked the other way around: if a device like the Solaris advertised its UI abilities for other rack modules, desktop modules, or even plug-ins to make use of.

Imagine that the Solaris can be switched into another mode where its controls and displays are advertised to other sound modules over some interface like MIDI. I hate to use the S-word, but let's say there is a standard for it. The Solaris would say, "I have this knob that is associated with a display near it. The display can show two rows of eight characters. The knob is an encoder type and has such-and-such resolution." Then the sound module would set up the controls for its own use, understanding its own most important parameters. It would receive the knob events and send back display information on what to show. The buttons could be used for whatever the sound module wants, such as switching pages like the Solaris does, but maybe not. Like knobs, buttons could be advertised to be associated with certain display regions.

True there are already many MIDI controller keyboards. But there are some disadvantages. At the low end some of them seem more like cheap toys. The more expensive ones can have some knobs and even displays, but are often limited to only eight. And you need to manually set up what the knobs control. Although there are some that have templates that do this for you in the case of popular synths. But why should I buy a whole other keyboard with knobs and displays when I already have a perfectly good quality one in a keyboard like the Solaris? That just costs more money and takes up more room.

If we want controllers and sound sources to be smart enough to query each other about their capabilities, I think it makes more sense that the sound source queries the controller. It would be much easier because sound sources vary so much more and have an infinite variety of parameters. There are synths that do subtractive, additive, granular, FM, spectral, etc. But controllers usually have only what are essentially knobs, displays, and switches. Much easier to standardize on. It's just more a matter of describing their arrangement or relationships. (Not forgetting there are always obstacles; the devil is in the details.)

Yes, it is dreaming, but it would be cool if the Solaris could spearhead such a movement by making its displays and controls available. Now back to the real world, lol …..

P.S. Sorry if this is better suited to the Off-Topic forum. Feel free to move it.

[dawman]

Zebra2 would be nice.......