An mt32-pi control program for DOS, Amiga, Atari ST, Linux, and Windows
MT32-PI.EXE/MT32-PI.TTP/mt32-pi-ctl is a control program for the mt32-pi MIDI synthesizer available for DOS PCs, Atari ST and Amiga computers as well as modern systems running Linux and Windows.
Features
- Supports sending mt32-pi's custom System Exclusive messages for temporary configuration of SoundFonts & Co.
- Can send standard MT-32, GM, and GS reset sequences
- Can send screen text in MT-32 mode and 16x16 1bpp bitmaps in SoundFont mode to the mt32-pi's display
- If that's not gimmicky enough for you, it can also send 8 characters of text as a 16x16 bitmap using the Miniwi 4x8 font
- Custom MIDI messages from the command line
- Can send SYX-files of any length containing any number of SysEx messages
- DOS version compiled for 8086 Real Mode, so should work on pretty much any system with an MPU401-compatible interface
- Amiga version is compiled for AmigaOS ≥1.3 and supports both
camd.libraryand direct serial port access, so it likewise should work on pretty much any system - Useful for making game/application-specific start-up scripts to correctly set up the synth
- NEW: Smart option autocompletion on Linux using the bash, fish, and zsh shells
Usage Summary
MT32-PI.EXE/MT32-PI.TTP/mt32-pi-ctl accept the following UNIX-style parameters:
Platform-specific options
DOS-specific options
USAGE: MT32-PI.EXE [OPTIONS]
OPTIONS:
-p [ADDR]: Set the port address of the MPU401 interface. Default: 330.
AmigaOS-specific options
USAGE: mt32-pi-ctl [OPTIONS]
OPTIONS:
-S: Use direct serial port access instead of camd.library.
-l: The camd output location to connect to. (Default: out.0)
Atari-ST-specific options
USAGE: MT32-PI.TTP [OPTIONS]
OPTIONS:
[No special options as the Atari ST has a built-in MIDI port which is automatically used]
This is a CLI/TTP-utility. If you launch it directly from TOS a graphical prompt will let you input the parameters. Though for more convenience I would recommend a text based shell like EmuCON or Okami.
Note that quoting in Atari ST shells seems to work a bit different than in other systems (or maybe I don't get it but the following works, in any case). Quoted parameters must use single-quotes, be located in front, and the parameter needs to be within the quotes.
Example: When on other systems you'd write mt32-pi-ctl -m -t "Hello, World!", on Atari ST
it should be MT32-PI.TTP '-t Hello, World!' -m.
Linux-specific options
USAGE: mt32-pi-ctl [OPTIONS]
OPTIONS:
-p "[CLIENT]:[PORT]" : The ALSA MIDI client and port address to output to (*MANDATORY*).
To find out which client/port to use, you can run aplaymidi -l or aconnect -l to list available devices.
Since 1.0.1a, the Linux version of mt32-pi-ctl also comes with intelligent bash, fish, and zsh completion scripts
that will smartly autocomplete (long) options, romsets, filenames and, if aplaymidi is in your
PATH, even available MIDI ports.
Examples for bash:
$ mt32-pi-ctl -p <TAB><TAB>
14:0 28:0
$ mt32-pi-ctl -p 28:0 --mt<TAB><TAB>
--mt32 --mt32-reset --mt32-rstereo --mt32-txt
$ mt32-pi-ctl -p 28:0 --romset <TAB><TAB>
cm32l new old
For this to work mt32-pi-ctl must be in your PATH, e.g. in /usr/local/bin and the
bash/fish completion scripts must be in a special completion script directory or for bash, sourced
by .bashrc. See below for installation instructions.
Windows-specific options
USAGE: mt32-pi-ctl.exe [OPTIONS]
OPTIONS:
-p PORT : Set MIDI output port number (*MANDATORY*).
-l : List available MIDI output ports and exit.
Common options
-h/--help: Print this info.
-v/--verbose: Be verbose about what is going on.
-r/--reboot: Reboot the Pi. Will block for a few secs to give it time.
-m/--mt32: Switch mt32-pi to MT-32 mode.
-g/--fluidsynth: Switch mt32-pi to FluidSynth mode.
-b/--romset [old, new, cm32l]: Switch MT-32 romset.
-s/--soundfont [NUMBER]: Set FluidSynth SoundFont.
-S/--mt32-rstereo [0, 1]: Enable/disable MT-32 reversed stereo.
--mt32-reset: Send an MT-32 reset SysEx message.
--gm-reset: Send a GM reset SysEx message.
--gs-reset: Send a GS reset SysEx message.
-t/--mt32-txt "Some text": Send an MT-32 text display SysEx.
-T/--sc55-txt "Some text": Send an SC-55 text display SysEx.
-P/--sc55-bmp FILE.BMP: Display a 16x16 1bpp BMP on the screen. (SC-55 SysEx)
-X/--sc55-btxt "SomeText": Display a string on the screen as a Bitmap using the
miniwi 4x8 font. Max. 8 characters (SC-55)
-N/--negative: Reverse image color. Use with '-P/--sc55-bmp'.
-M/--midi "C0 01 C0 DE": Send a list of custom MIDI bytes.
You may specify multiple options, i.e. MT32-PI.EXE -m -t "Hello, World!" will first send the MT-32 mode command and then the screen text.
Building
Note that binaries are available on the releases page for all platforms apart from Linux. Building mt32-pi-ctl on most Linux distros is very starightforward though as you'll see below. For Arch Linux users, there's also a package on the AUR now.
DOS
The MAKEFILE is written for the DOS-version of Open Watcom C 1.9 as it can generate Real Mode executables. The Sourceforge release works perfectly in DosBox.
Make sure you have the environment variables correctly set up. For that, DosBox users will need to run the AUTOEXEC.BAT code supplied by the installer.
Then run wmake in dos_src/ and compilation should run. Optionally, if you also have upx installed in your DOS environment, you can run UPXCOMP.BAT afterwards to pack the EXE and save a couple KB of executable size. wmake dist will also compress and then copy the resulting file to dos_bin/.
Amiga
The Makefile is written for bebbo's amiga-gcc. After you have installed the toolchain, you also need to run make sdk=camd in your amiga-gcc source directory to install the camd library.
After that, you can run make and make dist in the amiga-src/ folder. If you have installed amiga-gcc somewhere else than /opt/amiga, you will need to adjust the PREFIX variable in the Makefile accordingly.
Atari ST
The Makefile is written for Vincent Rivière's m68k-atari-mint cross-tools on Linux or (probably) WSL. For Debian/Ubuntu I recommend using the repositories on the site. After installation of the toolchain, run make and make dist in the atari_src folder.
Linux
You need to have gcc, make, and the ALSA/libasound development headers installed. On Debian/Ubuntu sudo apt install build-essential libasound2-dev does the job. Afterwards, run make in the linux_src folder.
Windows
The Makefile is meant to be used on a Linux host with the i686-w64-mingw32 toolchain. On Debian/Ubuntu sudo apt install mingw-w64* does the job. Afterwards, run make and make dist in the win32_src folder. If you want to compile on Windows, MSYS should work but you might need to adjust the executable names in the Makefile.
Installation
On most platforms installation just means copying the executable file somewhere in your PATH, e.g. /usr/local/bin on Linux, C: on Amiga, C:\DOS\ on DOS, and similar. Alternatively you could add the path to mt32-pi-ctl to your PATH variable if that's more to your liking.
Linux shell completion scripts
For Linux platforms, there's the additional feature of smart command-line completion for the bash, zsh, and fish shells. In order for this to work you need to copy the completion scripts in linux_src/completion_scripts/ to some special folders so your shell can find them automatically. The folders may be distro-specific but the ones below should work for Debian/Ubuntu at the very least. If in doubt, consult your distro's documentation.
Note that you need aplaymidi installed if you want autocompletion to show you available MIDI output ports for the -p option. On most distros—including Debian, Ubuntu, and Arch—the package you need is called alsa-utils.
bash completion script
On modern Debian/Ubuntu systems, install the script using
sudo cp linux_src/completion_scripts/mt32-pi-ctl.bash /usr/share/bash-completion/completions/mt32-pi-ctl
On other or older distros, the bash completion script may need to go to /etc/bash_completion.d/mt32-pi-ctl instead.
Alternatively you can add the line
source /path/to/mt32-pi-ctl.bash
to your .bashrc. After installing, you may need to relogin or reboot.
fish completion script
Install the script using
sudo cp linux_src/completion_scripts/mt32-pi-ctl.fish /usr/share/fish/vendor_completions.d/mt32-pi-ctl.fish
The fish completion script may be located in your home directory under ~/.config/fish/completions instead, if you prefer.
Once copied, completions should be available in fish immediately.
zsh completion script
Install the script using
sudo cp linux_src/completion_scripts/mt32-pi-ctl.zsh /usr/local/share/zsh/site-functions/_mt32-pi-ctl
Alternatively you may use any of the directories reported by echo $fpath but note that the
script has to be renamed to _mt32-pi-ctl or zsh won't associate it with the program.
After installing, you may need to relogin or reboot.
Showcase
The BMP file is in the archive. I made it with GIMP but MS Paint and others should work just fine as long as the file is 16x16px monochrome (1-bit indexed).