I was so intrigued with this Cakewalk MIDI effect that I wrote down my notes on its layout and usage. I hope its OK to post them here-maybe someone out there will find them useful for using this unscripted & essentially inaccessible plug-in.
To date, I've only described the arpeggiator in these notes, but I've successfully used a few of the other CakewalkFX plug-ins(most notably the Velocity plugin) and they all seem to be based on the same graphical faceplate type arrangement. If there is any interest, I can write up some of the other plug-ins.
My Notes follow: Cakewalk MIDI effects--Navigating their interfaces.These effects are not accessible via CakeTalking, but you can navigate them using the jaws cursor. The following sections describe these dialog boxes(actually, they're graphical depictions of a hardware faceplate), to give an orientation to the layout and position of the various parameter knobs and sliders. With this information, you can easily use the jaws cursor to move around the faceplate, choosing & setting parameters for the desired effect. The Sonar help system gives detailed information on these MIDI effects, their parameters & their usage. This text is only concerned with describing the faceplate layout-not the effects usage.
Elements common to all faceplates Using the Tab & Shift Tab keys, you can access the following: 1) The Preset combo box, and its associated Save and Delete buttons. 2) The buttons marked OK, Cancel, Audition and Help.3) there'll be a third control you'll land on that will say "TAB". This is where all the effect parameters are located, but you can't access them with the tab key while in PC cursor mode. You'll have to use the jaws cursor for them as described in each of the following sections.
MIDI effect--The arpeggiator. As though you were looking at the faceplate of a piece of audio hardware:On the left side, below the title bar is the preset combo box with its save & delete buttons to its right. Below the preset box, there are 3 controls stacked vertically. The first is the "Units" combo box. Below that is the "Path" combo box, and below that is the "Play Through" checkbox control.
On the far right of the faceplate are the OK, Cancel, Audition and Help buttons, stacked vertically in that order.
In the middle is the parameters section of the faceplate. There are five sliders and a display box. The display box has the title "recognized chord" above it, with the two words stacked above each other-not on the same line. The Sliders have an edit box atop the slider(two of these sliders-the output & chord sliders-have edit boxes at their bottom as well for specifying a lower limit). Above the upper edit box for each slider is the sliders(parameters) name. In addition, above two of these sliders, namely the Output & Chord slider, there is a button to select them--only one can be selected and each toggles on and off as you select the other.
From left to right, the faders are named: 1) Rate 2) Legato 3) Swing 4) Output 5) Chord Navigating the faceplate with the jaws cursorBy routing the jaws cursor to the PC cursor with insert numpad -, then pressing PageUp, then Home, you'll be at the upper left corner of the dialog atop the title bar. Now, cursoring down and reading the faceplate a line at a time with the jaws say line command you'll hear: 1) the preset combo box, then two unlabeled graphics(these are the preset save and delete buttons), then the OK button
2) the Cancel button3) Two unlabeled graphics(these are the select buttons for the Output & Chord sliders mentioned above)-Activated with single left mouse click. 4) The slider titles line. You'll hear "Units:Tab", "RateTab", "LegatoTab", "SwingTab", "OutputTab", "ChordTab", "Recognized", then the Audition button. Don't get confused by the "tab" after each title word-its just a control type and has no meaning here, its just part of the title word. Also, the word "recognized" is the first word of the "recognized Chord" title for the visual display area which is not an input parameter. Note that there are six input parameter titles, then the display area, then the audition button-it'll help to orient you to the faceplate. Note also that the "units" refers not to a slider, but rather to the "Units" combo box which is one of the three controls stacked on the left side of the faceplate as mentioned earlier. 5) on this line you'll hear the parameter fields themselves. These six fields correspond to the titles on the line above. By counting in from the left edge with the jaws cursor, you can access the desired parameter. The fields are opened for editting by a double left mouse click, and exited with the enter key. Note that the word "chord" after the six parameter fields is part of the title for the "recognized Chord" display area mentioned above. 6) on this line you'll hear "Path:Tab" and the help button. Path is the title for the "path" combo box. 7) First you'll hear an unlabeled graphic, then the path edit combo field-activated with left mouse click. I'm not sure yet about the unlabeled graphic-it looks like a power button. 8) this is the line that contains the "Play through" parameter. The unlabeled graphic before the words "play through" is the checkbox-click it to check and uncheck. The default state upon opening the arpeggiator is unchecked(at least I think so, you'll have to experiment for yourself). 9) Finally, on this last line of the faceplate, you'll hear two parameter fields with midi note information in them. These are the lower limit parameters for the "Output" & "Chord" parameters. Open them for editting with double left mouse click and exit with the enter key.
Some Operational notes1) The two unlabeled graphics mentioned in line 3 above seem to be Function, or "Mode" buttons. That is, the arpeggiator seems to work either in "output mode" or "Chord mode". Output mode actually creates the arpeggios and places them in the midi track replacing the origional data(or not replacing it depending on the Play through checkbox). Chord mode seems to be a visual thing with chords being displayed in the "recognized Chord" display area-so a sighted person can see what the chord they've played is actually called, for example C minor9 etc. In either case, checking one automatically unchecks the other--as to which is which, you'll have to experiment. Using the audition button, if you hear an arpeggio then you've got the "Output" button checked. If you don't hear an arpeggio, then you've probably got the "Chord" button checked.
2) in the edit fields for the Output & Chord sliders (they have two each one at the top and one at the bottom), type the number of the note and the field will automatically update the note name--for example type 48 and the field will say "48 C 4".
3) You can quickly get to the audition button by cursoring up or down til you hear "Units". Then press the end key and you'll be on the audition button where you can left mous click to start the audition. End the audition with the space bar.
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