Project manager for Octatrack

Hi @phading, thanks for clarifying :raised_hands:

I took some time to think about it :nerd_face:

To summarize, you would like:

  • Copy/paste of Banks across projects, with automatic Sample Slot copying and auto-merge.

It does seem possible to implement this, as @dijksterhuis confirmed :ok_hand:

However, it would require a lot of thinking, decisions, and work to make sure it fits not only your workflow and expectations, but also those of other users.

What I mean is that it’s one thing to implement a feature in an arbitrary or hard-coded way, and another to do it in a generic and configurable way that can adapt to the workflows of most users.

Another important consideration is that new features should leverage and complement existing ones rather than duplicate them. This is crucial not only for a coherent UI/UX, but also for long-term code maintainability and evolvability.

So before developing a large feature like this one, I think it’s preferable to first develop independently each feature it relies on, and then build on top of that.

In any case, I’ve added this to the backlog :white_check_mark:

I’m also happy to say that I plan to implement a “bulk operations” page soon, which would include features like:

  • Copy banks within and across projects
  • Copy patterns to banks within and across projects
  • Copy sample lists across projects
  • Copy parts to banks within and across projects
  • Copy tracks to banks within and across projects

Not everything is straightforward, and several questions still remain, for example:

  • Copy sample lists > How should related samples be handled? Does Bank only contains Slot# info or does bank contains also name or path of audio file samples used?
  • Copy tracks > How tightly coupled are Parts and Tracks? Does copying a Part include Track type and configuration? If not, can both be copied independently without breaking anything?

I’ll move in that direction anyway :ok_hand:

Also note that I plan to add many more features to the Sample Slots pages:

  • Ability to preview and assign samples from a Set’s Audio Pool to a project’s Sample Slots
  • Auto-fix any samples in the Audio Pool that use unsupported formats
  • Auto-fix missing samples from Sample Lists (similar to Ableton Live)

These will likely come after bulk operations, priority-wise.

Finally, I feel it would be useful to formalize and move the backlog somewhere online so everyone can see the current state, next planned features, and discuss priorities together:

  • GitHub Projects might be a good fit — I’ll look into it
  • Feel free to recommend any other tool that could serve this purpose
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