Author Topic: Os/2 and Midi  (Read 7845 times)

Mike La Martina

  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Posts: 59
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile
Os/2 and Midi
« on: August 12, 2016, 08:42:36 pm »
Does anyone know why OS/2 does dot support playing Midi files?
I recall that OS/2 V2 could do this.  Can anyone explain when and why this no longer works?

Greggory Shaw

  • Sr. Member
  • ****
  • Posts: 442
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Os/2 and Midi
« Reply #1 on: August 12, 2016, 11:30:47 pm »

Mike La Martina

  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Posts: 59
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Os/2 and Midi
« Reply #2 on: August 13, 2016, 12:17:36 am »
Thanks.  I appreciate the link.  I want to do more than just play MIDI files.
I am an electonic musician and I use Digital Audio Workstations, (CuBase, FL Studio) under Windows.  I want to stop using Windows completely if possible.  I see that there are Linux (Open source) equivalents of such products.
These products contain software Music synthesizers and directly access MIDI capabilities of the sound hardware.
Perhaps if OS/2 had native MIDI support, myself or someone else could port the Linux products to OS/2, as has been done with many other opensource products.

Roderick Klein

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 653
  • Karma: +14/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Os/2 and Midi
« Reply #3 on: August 13, 2016, 02:10:54 am »
I remember some MIDI apps for OS/2 have been around. Including (I think it was called) MIDI station.
This page is " alive" but the download links are not working.
http://www.sainthelenapark.org/Subweb1/MidiLab.htm
It mentions all sources are released (link to ZIP does not work).

Here you can find some MIDI programs http://kimludvigsen.dk/os2/os2/sound/index.php
I just did a VERY VERY quick search on google. Try hobbes.nmsu.edu as well.

As to OS/2 playing MIDI files, support for reading the MIDI files has never gone away from OS/2. Its just that for many PCI chipsets, hardware synthesizer support was written.  Just about all PCI chipsets never supported MIDI play on OS/2, with the exception of 2 or 3 cards. . Thats why Timdity is now recommend as a software synthesizer.

If you want to use MIDI devices on OS/2 such as a MIDI keyboard. You have two options.

1. Use an old ISA soundcard.

2. See if you can do something with USBRESMG.DLL and/or LIBUSB to port something from Linux.
Since all MIDI adapters these days I think are USB to MIDI converters. It might work with USBLIB as MIDI does need that bandwith a driver might not even be needed.




Mike La Martina

  • Jr. Member
  • **
  • Posts: 59
  • Karma: +0/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Os/2 and Midi
« Reply #4 on: August 13, 2016, 06:01:00 am »
Thanks Roderick.

Since my computer has onboard sound chip and no ISA slot I may be out of luck.

Daniel

  • Guest
Re: Os/2 and Midi
« Reply #5 on: August 13, 2016, 06:06:04 am »
Hello Roderick,

As I sit here at my computer I have a Roland JV-2080 64 voice synthesizer in front of me. And there is no way to talk to it. Just the ability to record and play from the computer would be great. I have a few midi programs somewhere but I might have to get a floppy drive up and running to read them. Midi has been rather forgotten on OS/2 for a long time.

Daniel Carroll

Joop

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 633
  • Karma: +5/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Os/2 and Midi
« Reply #6 on: August 13, 2016, 02:50:21 pm »
I remember some MIDI apps for OS/2 have been around. Including (I think it was called) MIDI station.
This page is " alive" but the download links are not working.
http://www.sainthelenapark.org/Subweb1/MidiLab.htm
It mentions all sources are released (link to ZIP does not work).
Try this http://kimludvigsen.dk/os2/os2/sound/index.php. If you're going to search on Google you have to force Google to do the search you want, not what Google thinks you want with all unwanted add's. To do that you have to use "MidiLab/2".

Roderick Klein

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 653
  • Karma: +14/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Os/2 and Midi
« Reply #7 on: August 13, 2016, 03:50:35 pm »
I do not know what your coding skillset is Mike La Martina. But with LibUSB you might be able to get a Linux MIDI app working to communicate with your MIDI equipment.

Roderick

Lars

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1268
  • Karma: +65/-0
    • View Profile
Re: Os/2 and Midi
« Reply #8 on: August 14, 2016, 12:16:33 pm »
If you are not after playing MIDI files but rather after interfacing with a MIDI device I think this is what the MIDI.SYS driver is for.
However you will not get by without additional programming effort. MIDI.SYS offers a generic interface to client drivers (which have to be written) in order to read or write MIDI data. The client driver in turn interfaces with an application (usually via some freely definable IOCTL interface I would suppose).
You will find the MIDI.SYS driver interface (IDC) (badly and insufficiently) documented in the DDK in the "MMPM/2 Device Driver Reference" document under the chapter "Real-Time MIDI Subsystem" (the MIDI.SYS driver IS the RTMIDI support that chapter talks about).
The odd thing is that MIDI.SYS driver is not necessarily installed on your system and you might also need to add it to config.sys. You would find it in the \MMOS2\MMPLAYER subdirectory (at least on an eComStation installation).

Lars
« Last Edit: August 14, 2016, 12:19:00 pm by Lars »