The Transport

Numerology's transport is always visible at the top of the project window. It has controls to control playback, tempo, navigation and status for sync and CPU load.

Playback controls: Reset, Stop, Play

These controls are always tied to the equivalent controls for the master clock module, which is the GrooveClock module in the Clock stack. This module is the master timing source for the entire project, thus it is always present in every new project, and cannot be removed.

"Reset" sets the location of the Clock to the beginning (bar 1, beat 1), "stop" stops the transport, and "play" tells it to proceed.

When the transport resets, it sends a "reset" messages to all sequencers, so they can reset themselves to match.

By default, the transport will auto-reset each time it stops. You can change this behavior in the Preferences dialog.

You can also use the spacebar to start and stop the transport.

This read-only display is also tied to the master clock. It displays musical time in bars (musical measures) and beats. To set the length of a bar, change it on the master clock module directly.

One more control tied to the master clock. You can modify it by clicking and dragging the mouse, or by clicking once to activate it, then entering a numeric value followed by the return key.

This is an on/off switch for the transport loop.

This sets the start point for the transport loop in bars.

This sets the end point for the transport loop in bars. When the transport reaches the given bar, it re-locates to the start bar for the loop. So to loop the first four bars, set the loop start to 1 and the loop end to 5.

This is a global on/off switch for the synchronization options available in the master clock. For more information, read the chapter on synchronization.

The blank area in the center of the transport is reserved for important messages Numerology may have for you.

The CPU load meter reports the amount of time it takes to render all modules in the project, as a percentage of overall CPU time. Keep in mind that OS X is a complex operating system that always has many important background processes running. One of these processes is the OS X MIDI server which is responsible for forwarding MIDI messages from any software program (including Numerology) to hardware drivers and other software. In order for this process, and all the others, to work correctly, you have to give them time to run. In general we recommend that you try to keep your CPU load below 75%.

Sometimes when working with MIDI synthesizers, no matter how careful you are, you may get a stuck note. This happens when the synthesizer gets a "Note On" message, but no "Note Off" message. When you click this button, Numerology will send special MIDI messages to "everyone" to tell them to stop all their notes. In this case, everyone means: All Synthesizer modules, and all MIDI outputs.

This button allows you to navigate between Numerology's three major UI panels: the Rack, the Timeline, and the Mixer. You can also use shift-tab on your keyboard to cycle between these three views.