I think MIDI is the way to go, since you should be able to control Live with a MIDI controler. I have done so with FLStudio and that worked great.

I remember I used MidiYoke (Windows only) to route the MIDI signal out of Processing to FLStudio. I had to configure FLStudio to listen on a (virtual) MIDI device, and set up proMidi to send signals on this device.

Ya but would u mind sharing the processing code to me as I need help in that bcos there's no resources on how to use Promidi except for some examples which doesnt seems to work well..

The example u ( gllllll) does not work for me as there's an error in the program.

It says "The constructor Controller (int, int) is undefined in line 63 of the program.


Btw MidiYoke doesn't seems to be compatible to Vista and that's the reason why I didn't use it.

Ya I figured out that too.. (gllllll)

So is there anyone who can provide some help/ tips on using Processing programming to send midi to Ableton Live.

Thanks in advance..

I started with promidi too, but never got it to work. I then switched to the midibus and found it much easier and effective to use. I can recommend this to everyone. Here is a code example to send random midi notes from processing to, for example, ableton live using the midibus. As you can see it's pretty short (but it works). In Ableton go to Options-Preferences-Midi and make sure the input midiport from your virtual midi cable is set to ON for the Track column.

1. import themidibus.*;
2. MidiBus myBus;
3. 
   
4. int channel = 0;
5. int pitch = 40;
6. int velocity = 127;
7. 
   
8. void setup() {
9.   size(200,200);
10.   frameRate(6);
11. //  MidiBus.list(); // use the list to find your correct midi output port, for me it's 2, change it accordingly
    
12.   myBus = new MidiBus(this,-1,2);
13. }
14. 
    
15. void draw() {
16.   pitch = int(random(40,81));
17.   myBus.sendNoteOn(channel, pitch, velocity);
18. }

Hi, amnon.owed, thanks for supplying the Processing code using midibus but it doesn't seems to work well.

When I run it, it will show the available MIDI devices. And it shows some message (see below) and my Ableton

Preference setting is this (see below).

And how do I see if Ableton receives the midi message bcos I did remember that the Ableton supposed to blink the LED
in the " Midi Track In Indicator" (Upper right-hand corner of screen) when receiving Midi message or am I wrong?

Thanks in advance!

From your screenshots it seems the current problem is that your virtual midi cable (Maple) is listed as unavailable in midiBus. Normally it would show up in the input/output list as an available midi device. Since I am using midiYoke myself and I have not experienced this problem I can only give you some suggestions you might try to make it work:

1. Try limiting the number of open midiports created by Maple to just 1 (now it seems there are 4).
2. Restart your computer, run the processing sketch first (without starting ableton) and see if they are available then.
3. In Ableton, turn off ALL the buttons except "Input: Maple Midi in: Port 1" for just column Track.

If you receive a midi signal in ableton, you will indeed see the LED light up red. But until the most important part (the virtual midi cable) works properly you can't establish a connection between the two programs.

I've tried step 2 and there's no problem (all the inputs and outputs shown)

After that I run Ableton, and like what u said for step 3, this time only the input which I've turned on is shown as "unavailable".

So what causese that or is it Maple simply can't work? I wanna dl midiyoke but it seems to support till Windows XP while mine is Window Vista..

Could you clarify this. After step 3 is port 1 unavailable for input only or for both input and output?

If the former is the case, this is good. Use output 1 in processing which leads to input 1 in ableton.

Oh I've got it working already.

I changed the command in processing to myBus = new MidiBus(this,1,1); and the song can play now and there's no unavailable ports shown but I turned off all the buttons in Ableton Live.

If I were to turn on any of the button in Ableton Live, then it will show as unavailable in Processing but the song still plays.

So it seems that its independent of what I've turned on (buttons) in Ableton Live in order to play the song. So is that supposed to be this way or something is not right?

I also tried to change to myBus = new MidiBus(this,1,2);, no unavailable ports but the song doesn't play which means the song can only play at (this,#,1).

Though the example is workable but what I wanna know is how to send midi from Processing to Ableton Live to play some instruments via Promidi Processing library.

The Midi Track In Indicator supposed to blink when receive midi msg and play the instrument set in Ableton but it doesn't blink and the audio played doesnt seems to come from Ableton.

If it works with MidiBus, why don't you stick to MidiBus, then? You don't need ProMidi anymore!

The Midi Track In Indicator supposed to blink when receive midi msg and play the instrument set in Ableton but it doesn't blink and the audio played doesnt seems to come from Ableton.

Sounds like your Midi signals are sent on the wrong device. You need to change the arguments in the constructor call, just like you did for MidiBus.

 i had the same problem: