Noel Borthwick [Cakewalk]
Indeed,  doing it analytically demystifies it. It was a revelation to me when I first did this.
Minor thirds are common. The harmonic minor and harmonic major both have this intervals.

My first idea was to use half/full intervals only. But then I put "any" there. I mean I could forget harmonic scales without that. In addition I have got a prove that major third (or more) is not possible ;)
 

Regarding the surface stuff, you did it the hard way :) Its much easier to start with the C++ ACT control surface and work from there for most people, I would think...

I am "old school" programmer, why use wrapper when you can work directly? In most cases (and sorry to say, this SDK is not an exception), to use a wrapper "right" you should understand underlying API in any case. I have tried to use free VS first, does not work (no MFC). GCC C++ lib is one more potential problem for distribution, so I used C. May be I am just not from "most people" category.
 

Regarding Mackie, not sure which issue you are referring to, but the surface is not act aware. So it would need to be modified to handle that.

If I understand people correctly, there was  possibility to control at least EQ (without ACT). And it was working (MCU, BCF, ...). With introduction of PC, it no longer works as before. The problem is a feature (but I think a bug or several of them) in SONAR that the filter ID is no longer "stable". When some strip is not in focus, only "old fashion" filters are exposed. And "EQ" has (as it was before) the id 0 (not sure that in all cases). As soon as the channel is focused (note that plug-in is not (always) informed when it is changed), filters get "natural" PC order, other PC modules are accessible and EQ is no longer "0" (till it is on the first place in PC).

OK got it. I understand the problem if you dont have the VS IDE. Feel free to contact me off list if you are interested and we can try and get a resolution to the eq issue. Send me a pm and we can correspond.

Noel Borthwick [Cakewalk]
The way modes are taught in most theory books is by rote which is silly. Modes are a simple mathematical concept that apply to any series of intervals and yet they are normally only referenced with respect to a few scales. They are best learned as interval series but most people don't teach them that way.
 
When I was initially studying music the lack of information in this area frustrated me, so when I started programming in the 80's, I wrote some code using simple cyclic permutation math, to iteratively generate all possibilities of scales and modes in 12 tone music - 7, 8 tone scales, pentatonics and hexatonics...
The code was written in COBOL btw, and it ran overnight to compute that stuff on a Z80 microprocessor and print out pages of scales! That was my first music software project :) The stuff I learned from that exercise changed the way I thought about scales forever. 

I toyed with BASIC and machine code as a kid but never really did anything much with it. Then in the early 90's I picked up a language called AMOS on the Amiga, read the reference manual from start to finish, and then set about writing a huge guitar/music utility from scratch. It basically self-taught me how to program (I didn't know anything about common practices, patterns or algorithms, I literally had to sit down and figure them out myself, albeit clumsily). One of the features I implemented in my program was to be able to give it any chord, scale or random sequence of notes and to get back every possible chord, inversion and scale that was either included within those notes, or which those notes were a part of. So you could give it the notes of a G major scale and it would tell you all the modes, as well as which exotic pentatonic and jazz scales were included in those notes. God knows what my algorithms would look like now if I looked at them again. I have a feeling they were not the "correct" way of doing it, but it worked perfectly and I remember spending hours with my guitar at the computer because the results it gave taught me a ton about chord substitution and what scales could be played with chords etc. I was incorporating all sorts of exotic scales and modes into my playing after that, and my understanding of chord substitution increased exponentially 

Noel Borthwick [Cakewalk]
OK got it. I understand the problem if you dont have the VS IDE. Feel free to contact me off list if you are interested and we can try and get a resolution to the eq issue. Send me a pm and we can correspond.

If you were referring to the full-blown Visual Studio IDE, couldn't they use the freely downloadable Visual Studio Express?
 
Bob Bone
 

I should have changed by answer to 2 since there are 2 whole tone scales. What are the other 4? I would like to learn them.

The output from my program, 0/1/2 - minor second/major second/minor third ;)
 
0110111
0101111
1010102
0110102
0101102
0101012
Number of scales: 6

The Write in C song

When I find my code in tons of trouble,
Friends and colleagues come to me,
Speaking words of wisdom:
"Write in C."

As the deadline fast approaches,
And bugs are all that I can see,
Somewhere, someone whispers:
"Write in C."

Write in C, Write in C,
Write in C, oh, Write in C.
BASIC's dead and buried,
Write in C.

I used to write a lot of FORTRAN,
For science it worked flawlessly.
Try using it for graphics!
Write in C.

If you've just spent nearly 30 hours,
Debugging some assembly,
Soon you will be glad to
Write in C.

Write in C, Write in C,
Write in C, yeah, Write in C.
LOGO's not the answer.
Write in C.

Write in C, Write in C
Write in C, oh, Write in C.
Pascal won't quite cut it.
Write in C.

Date posted: 28th March 2000

There ain't no cure, for the subroutine blues.....
 
Bob Bone
 

Nice. Here is a link to my 7 tone scale theory that might be a slightly more understandable :)
 

azslow3
The output from my program, 0/1/2 - minor second/major second/minor third ;)
 
0110111
0101111
1010102
0110102
0101102
0101012
Number of scales: 6

sharke
 
I toyed with BASIC and machine code as a kid but never really did anything much with it. Then in the early 90's I picked up a language called AMOS on the Amiga, read the reference manual from start to finish, and then set about writing a huge guitar/music utility from scratch. It basically self-taught me how to program (I didn't know anything about common practices, patterns or algorithms, I literally had to sit down and figure them out myself, albeit clumsily). One of the features I implemented in my program was to be able to give it any chord, scale or random sequence of notes and to get back every possible chord, inversion and scale that was either included within those notes, or which those notes were a part of. So you could give it the notes of a G major scale and it would tell you all the modes, as well as which exotic pentatonic and jazz scales were included in those notes. God knows what my algorithms would look like now if I looked at them again. I have a feeling they were not the "correct" way of doing it, but it worked perfectly and I remember spending hours with my guitar at the computer because the results it gave taught me a ton about chord substitution and what scales could be played with chords etc. I was incorporating all sorts of exotic scales and modes into my playing after that, and my understanding of chord substitution increased exponentially 

Very cool. There are lots of ideas you can unlock using a computer to help you visualize stuff this way.