Portable setup with an android phone

General
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Does anyone have any tips for controlling / using an android phone as a way of viewing settings on a ksoloti patch?

I wanted to create a hybrid setup with my phone running koala sampler / or a midi controller app to change patch settings. However, upon connecting it I was not able to get the ksoloti to run a patch (even with it loaded for startup), so I just wanted to check if there were some specifications i need to keep in mind - would it need a powered USB hub to work in this manner?

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Not sure if I understand you correctly - you send MIDI via an app on the phone to the Ksoloti Core and then display the values in the Patcher?

One thing to keep in mind, Axoloti/Ksoloti only recognizes “class compliant” MIDI devices or hosts. From a quick Google, I found

Yes, Android phones can be class compliant USB-MIDI devices when connected to a USB host, such as a computer. To do this, you can:

  1. Go to the USB settings on your Android device
  2. Change the USB mode to MIDI

This should technically make the Ksoloti recognize the phone. If yes you should get a bunch of blue messages in the Patcher console as soon as you connect it.

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Screenshot_20241108_133323_Settings
Screenshot_20241108_133323_Settings720Ă—1528 148 KB

Screenshot_20241108_133329_Settings
Screenshot_20241108_133329_Settings720Ă—1532 83.7 KB

There is a thing called developer settings which each phone has a specific combination to unlock (it is not a jailbreak or hack), and from there you can set the default mode the phone is entering when connected to USB. I’ll try it later on my phone, this sounds like fun!

EDIT: It looks like Ksoloti recognizes my phone now instantly. I have no MIDI app right now but it should work!

This is how it should look like:

2024-11-08 13_38_27-ksoloti-1.0.12
2024-11-08 13_38_27-ksoloti-1.0.12739Ă—817 67.7 KB

This might just be a great way to recycle old phones and tablets.

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Oh thanks for the swift response! So my goal is two-fold(or three-fold, depending on what’s possible), but largely to have a portable mini DAW-less setup:

  1. Upload a synth patch on the ksoloti, and use my android phone as a midi controller using a pre-configured mapping. This should be doable, I probably missed the default usb setting option.
  2. Route audio from ksoloti directly into Koala sampler via a usb hub, so I can loop/mangle parts that i play on the ksoloti.
  3. In addition to MIDI control, use my android phone as a display for patch settings, similar to how the OLED screen functions on the Gills. I doubt this can work without building something custom, perhaps mobmuplat or something similar could work for this?
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  • Axoloti/Ksoloti (currently?) does not support USB hubs.
  • USB audio (Ksoloti ↔ USB host, e.g. a DAW) is being worked on by user AndyCap but will need testing and polishing.
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This looks nice, creating a custom control surface should be possible with it! Or something like Touch Designer, Lemur MIDI app, Pure Data for Android? It really just needs to send some MIDI.

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TouchOSC works on most android/iphone/pc/mac/linux devices and allows you to set up custom midi controller surfaces. I believe you just need to use a usb OTG adapter when using it with a phone. I was using it on the Ksoloti for a while but kept having some connection issues, though I think they are more from my phones usb port being pretty worn out and loose

Not too difficult to create your own layout (options for buttons, faders, etc) and just set them to the correct midi message. Lots of tutorials on setting it up as well

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