port numbers

[eportel6607-creator]

Hey guys,
I realize this work of yours is a bit older and that you don't use it anymore personally, but I thought I would ask.
I managed to get this driver working very well on Ubuntu 24.04 MATE with the Ubuntustudio-installer package on it. So thank you for that because I was about to junk my fairly new MOTU MIDI Express 128 for either another unit that's USB Class Complaint or a rack mounted "midi spliter" and use a single source of midi on another piece of equipment I own.

I noticed that the port numbers is not correct. I've used this unit with Widnows for 3 years and the ports were numbered 1-8 but with this driver on Ubuntu they are numbered 0-7. This really does make things a bit more complex when it comes to recalling these ports are numbered this way because there are many other pieces of equipment I have in the studio that are not using the "0" at the first port. This includes Behringer's XR-18, the X32, the M-Audio MidiSport 8X8 and others. Due to this it makes it a bit more of challenge to have to remember that now, every port on the MOTU is one behind what you think it is. Don't get me wrong, it's not a deal breaker but on Windows this device ports were number 1-8 and also many other devices are numbered this way too. In fact I've had this setup since 1992. So much so that my equipment (keyboards, rack midi modules, etc.) all have small labels on them indicating the port and channel numbers within the system.

Two questions for you.

1. is it possible I could change the port number/name in one of the files before building the application? I looked and haven't found anything in any of the non-binary files that I could see that would change this.
2. What would I have to do to make these source files into a .deb binary executable?
   Thanks you for your efforts on this driver
   Chris

[vampirefrog]

Howdy! I think that's just how linux numbers its ports. Do you have other linux devices that number ports from 1 instead of from 0? I've looked in my code and there's no port naming code, so it's just the default names.

Someone contributed a debian dkms script and you just need to run ./debpkg.sh to build a .deb with the driver.

[eportel6607-creator]

Hey! There he is! Yeah I think you are correct. This is the first time I've use this on Linux prior it was on Windows in Cubase.
I have four other midi equipped devices on this studio ubuntu machine. The other's that only have a single midi port show up as port 1 not zero. Like I have Behringer XR-18 that only has a single MIDI port and it shows as "MIDI 1"..if I look at the Nektar Aruba it doesn't show a port and neither does the X-Touch. I guess because they have a single port.

Ok well thank you for the reply. I really do appreciate it.
Are you guys concerned about "them" coming after you in regards to this reversed engineered driver? I'm asking because I think a lot of us making the transition from Windows to Linux are trying to use as much of our existing equipment as possible. If I had a working Deb file I would host it on my music website but it just got me thinking about "them".

What's your thoughts on this?

I was considering making a deb package but I'll look into that script you mentioned. Thanks again.

[eportel6607-creator]

Hello, Just an update. It turns out that the ports can simply be renamed in Ardour within the MIDI Port Configuration. So that takes care of that. I did find the .deb script that you had mentioned. I don't recall there being any instructions but I've tired just about everything I could like of in regards to where to place the script. I looked at what the name of the folder it was looking, etc. and run the script. It creates the deb. I think the .deb was like 80K when complete. I did install with errors that don't indicate any details. I guess I'll just deal with building it from source. I was trying to make it easier for myself but also other that use this driver or those that don't know it exists.

Thank you anyway.

[vampirefrog]

Try

sudo apt install dkms linux-headers-`uname -r` && sudo ./debpkg.sh && sudo dpkg -i motu*.deb