Playback Audio Routing and EQ

[arlo]

Hi Arlo - AudioShare is a simple host app that can take a source audio and pass it through effects before it sending it out to headphones etc. It is pretty basic and has what appears to be a small footprint which is good. It would be an ideal host I think. Also the same company produces effects apps that work with AudioShare.

Okay, and the developer just confirmed to me that the EQ app is only a node, so a host app is indeed required.

In any case, just for completeness with regards to SLM - If I compare hosting SLM in AudioShare to other apps (such as SampleTank) you should be able to set them up without having to play the audio first: there is no problem loading SampleTank even when SampleTank is not loaded. I have also tested SLM Garageband (iOS version) and I get the same issue: difficulty in hosting SLM and once done, cannot get the audio to play through the host app. Might be the fact that I am using an old iPad mini (even though it is running the latest IOS).

If I force-quit Set List Maker, then try to select it as an instrument in GarageBand, the Set List Maker sources (4 of them) appear, but when I tap one, I see the message "The Inter-App Audio app you have selected is not available at this time." In contrast, when I select other apps that aren't running, they launch. I don't know why that is. But the solution is simple -- launch Set List Maker and play some audio before trying to select it as a source. After doing that, I don't see any problems. If you see a different problem, please describe it.

Maybe this is crazy but I love the technology as much as I love the music!

I don't think that is unusual. :-)

[Tomd100]

Hi Arlo - an update: I messed round with Garageband and AudioShare as hosts to SLM - it is not reliable enough in either case. In GB the audio worked fine for a while until I changed the recording to another and then it went into a single constant pitch and I could no longer hear the track . I think it is probably just a simple setup / initialisation / reset issue within SLM perhaps? Anyway I have decided not to pursue the IAA approach. In fact I will probably replace little the mixer I have with a better one or run the whole lot through MainStage on a Mac and use that as a mixer before feeding out to a PA. I was hoping to avoid the use of a laptop. One thought I had was to make SLM an IAA host rather than node. You could allow third-party effects and other IAA compatible apps to work within SLM. If you made it Audiobus compliant (not sure what is involved there) SLM could also act as the audio source when more a more complex setup is needed. Just an idea.

[arlo]

I'll test the GarageBand workflow you described.

The main use case for adding Inter-App Audio was feeding my app's sounds into a mixer app on the same device for processing or routing. In that case, my app only needs to be a node. I can see the benefit of making my app a host to use effects apps directly, but I think a better approach is to use an app whose main purpose is to be an audio host and has all the features you would want to have for that ... rather than going down the road of turning BandHelper into a mixer.

I considered AudioBus, but decided to use a native Inter-App Audio implementation when I found out about the level of control that AudioBus takes over apps that use it. It's bad enough dealing with Apple, without having another company get up in my business.

[arlo]

FYI, I checked feeding the Set List Maker recording to GarageBand, and switching to different recordings in Set List Maker, and it worked as expected. This is on iOS 9.2, so it's possible there was a problem in the previous iOS version that is fixed now.