Does C6 accept .txt files for Device Manager patchscripts?

Cubase
#1

Reading TFM, I get the impression it only takes .xml.

I’ve got a very long .txt file that I’ve used since forever in XS3, for my Yamaha Motif. I can’t stomach the idea of retyping that into .xml format (and again and again, for the little " - " or " . " that didn’t get that extra space just after it…).

I think the folder Cubase 6 looks in for patchscripts is up in Documents and Settings … I put the .txt file in there as bait to see if Cubase 6 would bite and take it as an option to import in Device Manager, but no dice.

  1. Can someone confirm with certainty which file the Patchscript is meant to go in?
  2. “--------------------------------------------” that Cubase 6 will simply laugh at a .txt file, taking only .xml files for device patchscripts?
  3. Do I need some sort of “.txt-to-.xml” converter?

Thanks -

#2

Although it was only last night I posted this, it has dropped off the first page, and I am in a major world of hurt (OK, I do exaggerate a bit, but hardly at all :laughing: ) until I get this problem fixed.

Problem:
Accessing Yamaha Motif voices from MIDI is very very clunky - voices are assigned by “Pre-1, Pre-2, GM, …”, etc. For example, an acoustic piano might be next to a glockenspiel and “Weird Space Sounds” patch. So, if for example, I want to access a certain voice, I need to go to scroll through 128 x about a million banks to find it.

Pending Solution (Hopefully)
Import the nice, LONG, notepad patchscript I’ve been using for years with SX3. All the voices are arranged in a very useful fashion: Electric Pianos … Acoustic Pianos … Brass … Guitars/Plucked … etc.

Roadblock
Cubase 6 only accepts patches in .xml format - page 360 of the opns. manual: “There is no easy way to import a patch name script into an existing MIDI device. For a complex workaround basesd on XML editing, please see the separate PDF document, ‘MIDI Devices’”. So, I’ll have to transcribe the notepad .txt format into .xml??? I tried to set up a fake device, but it would not accept a notepad .txt file when pointed to it.

Solutions
Any help guys, thanks. It took me hours to be able to get to the point of even describing the program, like above. I’m brain dead on this one, I think -

Thanks!

#3

“Hello, walls …”

OK, so I got the problem fixed. I was reduced to such a drooling snivelling mass of subhumanity by the problem solving process that I’m not exactly sure how I did it. All I know is that now the Motif voices are arranged in the old familiar very user-friendly fashion for easy access.


I wish I could say for sure the following is what I did to get there, but I can’t, and I’m afraid to try to replicate it since it all works well now.

  1. Set up a fake device in MIDI Device Manager: “Alexis’ Motif with Nate’s Patchscript”. (Whatever happened to good old Nate?..).
  2. I clicked “Import Set Up”
  3. Somehow (???) it knew to offer me the option to import from SX3 the Motif setup, which uses Nate’s patchscript.

Then, in the Project Window, all is cool - I can choose my old familiar “Alexis’ Motif with Nate’s Patchscript” and away I go.

Like I said, I’m not sure if that’s how I got it to work or not. I’m not kidding, I was reduced to paranoid hallucinations while trying to do this, pushing buttons more randomly than a lesser primate on acid, in the end I could hear the voices inside the box saying – “Ha, Ha, Mein Herr - we could have told you HOURS ago THAT was certainly not going to work … but better to see you scream, yah!!!” :smiling_imp: :laughing:

#4

:laughing: :mrgreen: :stuck_out_tongue:

#5

here is the easy way to do it :
copy your text file to the following:
Documents and Settings/Your Name/Application Data/Steinberg/Cubase /scripts/patch name/
Put the file in the “Inactive” folder.

Then use the “Install Device”
button of the MIDI device manager in cubase

#6

Thanks, ffreak … if I ever have to do this again, I’ll look at that. To be honest, I actually may have DONE that to make it work … I know I was rooting around in those directories for a few feeding cycles … but to be honest it was such a haze I can’t be sure.

I intensely dislike messing with computers!! (I know, I should have gotten a Mac. Instead I blew the extra bucs on a Carillon AC that is oversized for my needs, just so that things would run smoothly).

Thanks again!