Overview

send-sds provides utilities for sending SDS (MIDI Sample Dump Standard) files to samplers from Linux using the ALSA MIDI API.

Getting Started

Install dependencies

Debian/Ubuntu/Mint systems

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install libsndfile1-dev sndfile-tools libasound2-dev alsa-utils

Red Hat/CentOS/Fedora systems

sudo dnf install alsa-lib-devel libsndfile-devel

# For sndfile-convert on Fedora:
sudo dnf install libsndfile-utils

Build send-sds

make

Install send-sds

sudo install send-sds /usr/local/bin

If you just type send-sds at the command line now you should see a brief help message:

send-sds 2010.10.23
usage: send-sds <alsa-device> <channel-num> <sample-num> <sds-filename>

Sending SDS files

Create an SDS file from a wav file

You must have sndfile-tools and alsa-utils already installed, since we will be using sndfile-convert and amidi.

sndfile-convert foo.wav foo.sds

List MIDI devices

Connect your Elektron Machinedrum to your computer via a MIDI interface and run:

amidi -l

Take note of the Device column for the device you want to send an audio sample to.

For example, if your Elektron Machinedrum is connected to the computer via an Elektron TurboMIDI interface the output would look something like this:

Dir Device    Name
IO  hw:1,0,0  Elektron TM-1 MIDI 1

In this case, hw:1,0,0 is the device you will send data to.

Send a mono SDS file to sample slot 2

send-sds hw:1,0,0 0 2 foo.sds

Note there is a small SDS file checked into this repo that you can use for testing.

If you want to test with this file, try:

$ send-sds hw:1,0,0 0 2 layered_finger_snap_mono.sds