As you can see, it is composed of XML files. We’ll go through the VLC.xml file and try to learn about it. Then you’ll be able to download it, or change or build your own in a XML editor.
When you’re done changing it, just quit the EUcontrol software and start it over.

Structure of the file :

Let’s go through the two main parts.

AppSetWide

First part define the application, the preset creation informations and a possible target host. Remember that the controler is networked, and could control any host on the network. I’ll have to try this with laptop soon…
Then you have the CustomWheelCommands.
If you read my second article about the MC Transport, you remember that you have to « activate » the wheel jog and the shutter with a soft key. In fact, the soft key only call a pre-defines command.
Here, we can learn that :
- NormalKeys section is used for… normal keys.
- ShiftKeys section is used for… keys when you press the shift key of the MC Transport (the lower right button)
- WheelSoftKey8 is the jog when turned right
- WheelSoftKey9 is the jog when turned left
- OneShot means no repeat of the command
- LWIN=ON is used to activate the command key of the mac keyboard. You also have LALT=ON (ALT or Option on Mac), LCTL=ON (Control), LSHFT=ON (Shift key)
- the keystroke is defines between the field

You can define multiple CustomWheelFunction, just change the NAME and the UID. About the UID, I actually don’t know how it is calculated. Maybe it just have to be unique in the XML file, or worse, in ALL XML files…

You use the exact same settings for the shuttle :

WheelSoftKey17 is the position 0. 18 to 24 is for the + (right) section. 16 to 10 for the – (minus) side. 25 and above is for the transitions. I haven’t tried it yet.

ControlBindings

ControlBindings are made of Sections.
I can actually see 14 Sections. I think some of then are used by the MC Transport, while others are used by MC Control or other Euphonix hardware.
Inside a Section is a Bank. For the moment, every Section seems to only have one Bank, with ID=0.
In Section=2, Bank is empty :

I really don’t want to mess things up. Let’s go to what is defined for standard control : Section 10

This is working exactly the same way as the section before. This section is defined for the so called « soft keys »

- SoftKey1 is the first on the left
- Command is linked to the UID of the CustomWheelFunction defined before

Here you define how the SoftKey2 behave.
- RepeatEntry= »True » is to activate the auto-repeat of the keystroke
- DELAY= »500″ is the time to wait between the first time and the second
- FREQ= »100″ is the repetition delay 10 times per second, so 100ms. Section The interface you can only choose from 30 to 2 times per second. Maybe changing it in the XML file will allow to set it to 1 times per second ?

Section ID=11 is made for the Numpad. Nothing to change here for now…
Section ID=12 is for the Transport Keys, the 7 keys around the shuttle.
Let’s take some examples :

Here, again, you have an auto-repeat. The delay have been set to « as fast as possible ». FREQ=16 means, theoricaly, every 16ms. Set to FREQ=1000 for once per second.
COLOR=ff00b70b set the color of the button. This is a dark green. I don’t really understand how the MC Transport handle color. Also I don’t understant how they code the color on 4 hexa blocs… If you use this, the switch will be light green. Else, it will be light yellow.
Everything else is already known.

Now you should have everything you need to build your own config file. Enjoy and share your own presets. You can get my VLC preset on the download page, or use the direct link here.

First thing to do is register your controler. Go the the Euphonix support’s website.

This is where you’ll find the software download, the email support link and the docs.

When everything is working, as explained in previous post, you should have the green « € » in the top right of the menu, and the controler should display the name of the software you are actualy using (safari ? firefox ?)

I had some controler « freeze » at some point. Then, the controler keeps displaying the same application name, whichever application is in focus. For the moment, the only solution I found is to power-off the controler, go in the EuControl settings (the only way to get acces to the menu) and quit.
Then, restart the EuControl application, wait until the menu icon stop rolling, then power-on the controler.
As I said, I emailed the support about that without any real answer. I openned a new case today… we’ll see…

If you are using a supported application the controler comes pre-configured. This is not the case for most basic applications like Safari, Firefox, iTunes or even the finder.
While the MC Transport is not made for that specificaly, configuring these applications will help us understand how the controler work.

Basic notions :

you have two ways to do that : clic on the green icon in the menu and go to the settings -> « soft keys » tab or, simply, clic on the « eye » key on the controler, at the lower left of the keypad.

Before beeing able to use the jog or shuttle you have to enable it. Most of the time the activation key is the first soft key for the jog and the second for the shuttle. When switching into an application, every key should be off (no light). clic again to activate

You can change the color of the transport keys (the one arount the shuttle). The 2 first and 2 last keys can be yellow or red. The 3 keys in the middle can be yellow or green. For the moment, I haven’t found a way to light a key or change its color depending on the action. I openned a case to the support to have more informations. For example, keeping the key green while pressed, or changing the color at every clic… Another request, which may be linked, is having two actions for the same key. This way, you can have a yellow key. When first clic, send the « play » shortcut of the application and turn to red. When pressed again, send the « stop » or « pause » keystroke and turn back to yellow… I hope the support will give a clue on how to do that, or add support in the next software release

The pdf manual will lead you through the configuration process, which is really easy for the basic stuffs. Let’s write down a walkthrough…
All this is done in the configuration software, not the controler.

- select the button to assign
- give a name in the « soft key label » box AND press enter to validate
- change the font or color if needed
- clic on « command… » or double-clic on the button
- clic on the « add » menu and select what to do. Most of the time it will be « key », and if you want to make the button an activation button for the jog or shuttle, use « wheel »
- enter a keystroke or a list of them. Doing this enable you to do scripts
- you can add more option, again, to script the button

If you’re programming the button to activate the wheel, select wheel and a custom function.
If you’re programming the wheel, you have to :
- clic on the « + » sign and give a name to the « command »
- as you do when programming a key, add a keystroke or another function. This will be used when turning the wheel right (clockwise) by default
- clic on the « turn jog right » menu and change to « turn jog left »
- add the keystroke used when turn anti-clockwise

If you’re programming the shuttle, this is a little bit different. You can add action for each of the 15s step of the wheel (-7 -> 0 -> +7) and for each transition (0 ->1, 1->2 …) and the other way around (2->1, 1->0…)

These are the basics. I’ll try to give examples in the next post

[EDIT]
Now that I have my disk array working, I had another try.
Once again, the MC Transport stayed locked on the « Mail » application. This is not the first time, and for the moment, the only answer from the support was « disable firewall in your mac » and « start the audio mixer of FCP ». These answers were done after 10 days, or more. Seriously, Euphonix, what are you doing here ?

If this happen to you, follow these steps :
- power off the MC Transport
- go in the green « € » icon -> « EU Control Settings »
- go to the menu and quit
- poweron the MC Transport and wait until the « Euphonix » logo appear
- start the EU Control application. The menu icon should turn to green.

For the moment, while the hardware is perfectly built, I can’t say the software is working fine… If you haven’t bought yet, WAIT !
Euphonix team, if you read this, I’m willing to spend some time debugging for you. Just provide me a beta software, or one with extra debug. But please, stop giving stupid answers.

For the moment I havn’t seen any manual firmware upgrade tool to have every drives in the same version. Actualy, this is even better : if you can, always choose drives with different firmware and series for RAID arrays : you will not have all your drives failing in case of a bug related to the production.

Now, let’s see the perfs…
I will not give every results here. Moreover, RAID initialization will probably take one or two days… So I will not wait for the array to be built before using it. I’m sure this will have an impact on the perfs.

Let’s start with the Host : This is a MacPro 2009 with dual CPU Nehalem 2.66GHz and 12Gb of RAM :

RAID card configuration :
The RAID card is a HighPoint 4322 with dual SAS external output. It has 512Mo of cache and an intel processor for the RAID : this not a « software » RAID card !
Main settings, device settings….

Nothing really special here.

What will be tested

When enabled, the data are not directly written to the disk. Instead they are kept in the 512Mo card cache. The good point is that it gives, as you will soon see, a really good write throughoutput. The bad side is, in case of power failure, data are lost… One solution is to get a APC which will handle in case of power failure. You can use a smaller APC to power the disk rack only but you will have to buy the battery pack for the RAID card. I think the battery pack is really (too much) expensive : Highpoint, stop making money on options !!!
The other option is Write Through.

The card can handle RAID 0 (stripe), 1 (mirror), 5, 6, JBOD (Just a Bunch O Disk : no RAID) and any kind of mix, with spare disks. We’ll test RAID 1 and RAID 5.

The card can handle 8 drives. If I have time, I’ll try to bench with 4 drives and 8 drives.

By default the block size is 64k. It can grow up to 1Gb. This is the the RAID card will use to write data. Some people are saying 128k should be fine with big drives and big files… We’ll test that

Test 1 : RAID 5, 8 drives, Write Back, 64k block size

This is a full default when creating an array.
Aja System Test :

BlackMagic Disk Speed Test :

HD Drive Speed Test :

First thing : every speed test software have it’s own way to report. What I can say is that the write speed is MUCH faster than the read speed. This is certainly due to the write cache. I’m sure this value will drop when the write-through option is selected.
Whatever, the RAID array can sustain around 7 streams of 1080p DVCpro. I’m shooting with a Sony EX1, around 35Mbps VBR : I’ll be good

Test 2 : RAID 5, 8 drives, Write Back, 128k block size

Here we see a little improvement. Video files are usualy big, and a bigger block size seem to be helpful.

When taking off Journalizing, we remove one layer on the OS side. This should give some improvements in throughoutput, but it has a price : if the host crash (or the array go offline) while working, we may lose some data. Concidering that 1) I don’t have any battery on the RAID card and 2) I don’t have an APC on the array, the lease we can do is have a journalized FS.
So, this test is only for benchmark resons :

BlackMagic does not show any improvement or loss.
Conclusion : Disabling journalization does not give a real improvement in throughoutput and make the data even more insecure. I’ll stick with a Jounalized FS.
Another conclusion is that using a 1Gb file for testing is not enough. Switch to 4Gb to have a more realistic test, where buffer size can be filled and used for a longer time.

Test 3 : RAID 5, 8 drives, Write Through, 128k block size

We know write through will give less throughoutput on writing. Let’s see how much.
Another thing to enlight : sometimes the Disk Utility seems to have problem creating a 12Tb FS, or mounting it. You have to wait for a timeout and start it over… I actualy have no clue on the why…

Conclusion : reading is REALLY efficient here. On the other hand, writing is now SLOW. I really don’t understand the results. Does « Write Back » means using the cache for writing and « Write Through » using the cache for reading ? Why not both ? I’ll have to ask Highpoint on that. Another solution is that the read cache would be less effitient than with no cache ?
HD Drive speed test, which is only doing a write test, shows us the same result for writing :

Aja test gives no improvement in reading. This test is seriously puzzling me… LEt me know if you have any clue on why the Black Magic test is giving so many reads/sec.
This is co-related with the « iostat » command I’m running alog with the tests :
During the Black Magic test :

Read :

With 128k block size :

Using 64k block size does not change the results.
What we can see here is that the throughoutput is quite stable. Again, results in raw data are almost the same as with the benchmark tools.

Conclusion of static tests

This gives really good results, far more than I need, whatever the mode used. I will have to perform the tests again with a half-full and 80% full array, just to validate the throughoutput is still stable. Of course, it will be less than with an empty array.
Next test will be with FinalCut, and how it can handle big HD files from the EX1 (XDcam-EX 420 1080p @25fps VBR) and Proress 422HQ files.

For the moment :
1) buy a battery for the RAID card (between 100€ and 200€) and enable Write Back
2) use RAID5 for data security
3) user 128k Block Size on disk

The last comment will be about price :
- RAID card : under 600€
- RAID enclosure : 800€ (have to check, I really don’t remember)
- Drives : 157€x8 = 1256€

Total : 2656€ for an array usable for HD (and 4:4:4). Remember this is a 12Tb array with really good perfs.

The problem is that this Seagate drive (ST31500341AS) does not work with hardware RAID, and as reported on Seagate forums, with a lot or S-ATA controlers. See how people are complaining there. Solution : NEVER BUY SEAGATE DRIVES AGAIN !!!!

Today I went to the store and grab two of the new Hitachi 2Tb drives :

This drive have 5 platter of 400Mb each, and 32Mb of RAM. You can find all the specs in this PDF file from Hitachi website.

The interesting thing with this drive is that, even if not reported to be working with either Highpoint RAID cards or Enhance Technology enclosure (maybe it’s too soon), the Highpoint 432x is listed as compatible on Hitachi’s website compatibility list.

And, indeed, it does work !

More screen grab of most of the benchs tools will be availlable soon. For the moment, using only two drives in RAID 1 proved to be faster than the two Seagates (for the few minutes a test can run before the drives get offlined).
Next step : buy the 6 missing drives to fill the array and use the 1.5Tb Seagate drives as internal storage in the PowerMac itself.

One of my best friend always tell me : « buy, don’t wait ». But I chosed to wait a little bit for the new Macpro Nehalem. And it finaly happened : http://www.apple.com/macpro/

Building my config was simple : best possible but not crazily expensive. I finaly settled on a dual CPU, 2.66GHz (8 threads in total), the ATI 4870 video card, wifi, bluetooth and wireless keyboard, which is for sale at 50€ (pickup in Paris). The RAM amount was a real challenge… I wanted 8Gb.
As you may know, new Nehalem processor have a 3 lane memory controler. The Macpro have 4 slots of ram per CPU.
8 Gb = 2x2Go per cpu or 4x1Gb per cpu.
Problem is, to use the whole CPU ram throughoutput, which is the key point on the nehalem, you have to use 3 memory modules.
I decided to use 3x2Gb per cpu, having a final HUGE 12Go of memory
Hopefully, the RAM modules for the macpro are really « cheap » actually. I used the Apple ram extension for 180€. I could have chosed to go with the reseller’s ram for 130€… but I think it’s better to have 6 identical RAM modules instead of 4+2. Remember RAM modules work by 3 at a time.

So, you’re asking, where are the picture… There you go :

The HD card
Things never change alone. Just one month ago, BlackMagic Design released it’s new Decklink card, the Decklink HD Extreme 3.


I just installed it in the mac and installed the driver. I will try it today.
First visible change : you have a new monitor in the monitor preference pane. While this seems to be cool, it is a serious problem when using a Wacom intuos or the special corner feature to get exposé or dashboard.
More on this later

The Raid card
As for the Decklink card, the Raid card is a new one too : Highpoint Rocketraid 4322.
Most of people used the 3522, which is almost the same, with less RAM and a slower CPU (800MHz instead of 1200MHz). While it seems no one sell the 4322 card in France, I had to buy it from Germany. I think I had a real good price, far lower than other cards : 530€.

See both the Decklink and the raid card in the mac :

Here is the back of the computer. See the HD-SDI IN/OUT of the Decklink on top, then the IN/OUT HDMI. Then the two Mini-SAS input of the RAID card, then the video card, with one DVI and one mini-displayport.

The RAID Case
You may ask what can I plug in the mini-SAS raid card… In fact, many things
I chosed to use a 8 disk enclosure with mini-SAS inputs from Enhance Technologies.
I chosed the E8MS as it have mini-SAS input and accept S-ATA drives. Note that you can have the SAME box, in light grey instead of dark grey, from ProAVIo.
The proAvIo box is not sold in France. I had to call the English reseller… which wasn’t OK to sell the box alone, without drives. Of course, their drives were far more expensive (special RAID ones, you can also find it everywhere).
I finaly found a company selling the Enhance Tech model in France, for around 500€, and empty !
I went to the « rue Montgallet » where all the computer parts resellers are, and bought 8×1.5To Seagate drives. This will give me a huge 10.5 To of storage !!
Moreover, it seems the 1.5To disks have a better throughoutput than the 1To ones. And they have the 5 years waranty intead of 3 years for the 1To.

See the pics :

I will try to do a step by step of the RAId configuration and add some RAID tests, but for now, I’m sad to say the RAID card is not working !
The RAID card is managed through a web interface. I can see the drives, create the RAID array and mount it. Then, the initialization fail. Then, the RAID card stop responding and the whole system hang.
I also had strange USB power loss some time. Don’t know if this is related to the RAID card.

Two last notes on what Apple can improve :
- the mini displayport of the video card : WHY ? and why not displayport instead of mini ?
- the RAID card, on slot 2, is just over the video card fan… There should be more space between the two PCI slots so the display card can breath.

Colors are, in fact, PNG images, 128×128 pixels. They are located in « /Library/Desktop Pictures/Solid Colors« 
Just go there, copy an existing image, change its color with any graphical editor (Gimp ?) and there you go.

OK, this is not a tutorial… but, heh, it’s so damn easy…

OK, OK, I do agree too. Apple should let us chose the color in a color wheel instead of stretching or mapping a small image to the whole screen… Maybe we’ll get that on Snow Leopard soon…

Hopefully, as OS X is a UNIX system, you have a solution. The only bad side is that you will have to reboot.

You will find a first solution if you are running Os X < 10.4 at http://www.macosxhints.com

If you are running Leopard (10.5.x), using the first trick will lead you to the Windows Server not running… Pretty anoying. Use SSH and put back the Windowserver in its place. This is what I did, with the help of the blog at http://ruminate.net/pdm :

Sudo -s to get a root shell. Then create the two files like :

cat /etc/launchd.conf

limit maxproc 512 2048
limit maxfiles 512 unlimited

cat /etc/sysctl.conf

# Turn up maxproc
kern.maxproc=2048

# Turn up the maxproc per user
kern.maxprocperuid=1024

# Remove core files
kern.coredump=0

After a reboot, your max user process will be raised to 512 :

ulimit -a
core file size          (blocks, -c) 0
data seg size           (kbytes, -d) 6144
file size               (blocks, -f) unlimited
max locked memory       (kbytes, -l) unlimited
max memory size         (kbytes, -m) unlimited
open files                      (-n) 512
pipe size            (512 bytes, -p) 1
stack size              (kbytes, -s) 8192
cpu time               (seconds, -t) unlimited
max user processes              (-u) 512
virtual memory          (kbytes, -v) unlimited

This website is offering, for cheap, stickers to re-dress your keyboard, for under 10£ !! (13€). They also sell « skins » for your keyboard. This way, you can have a skin for every software you use. This is a little bit more expensive : around 30£ (33€).

You think that’s it ? 

Nooooo ! They also make skins for Macbook, Macbook pro AND new Unibody Macbook Pro (and Air) !!!

Now you have no reason to lose a short-cut.

Yeah… windows stuffs, as usual.

Hopefully you’ll find some tools for Os X :

• daa2iso : download, unzip, go to the src directory from the console and start « make ». You’ll end up with a daa2iso binary. Don’t care for the errors.
  daa2iso in_file.daa out_file
  Result is a out_file.iso, which you can open from the finder.
  I just have no valid daa file for testing

• uif2iso : download, unzip, go to the src directory from the console and start « make ». You’ll end up with a uif2iso binary. Don’t care for the errors.
  uif2iso in_file.uif out_file
  Result is a out_file.iso, which you can open from the finder.

• Daa converter for MacOsX : it’s an app. Download, copy to apps directory and enjoy. Not tested.

iTerm is the most powerfull terminal emulator I know on Mac osX. I first thought the dev of this projec was over when Apple released Leopard. Today a co-worker just get an update warning. Checking it shows there indeed was a new update, version 0820 (20th of August ? ).

The changeLog on the website reference few features and small bug enhancement PLUS a « Fixed nasty crashing bug« . I really hope this is the one I had once and a while (especialy when doing copy/past).

My friend did the update. When starting iTerm he has lost all his (51) bookmarks. Personaly I don’t use bookmarks. But he was really pissed off. After few minutes searching WHY no iTerm.plist was created when changing the config of iTerm, I finaly found that the config file name was changed.

The solution is to rename iTerm.plist to net.sourceforge.iTerm.plist in the Library/Preferences folder of your user (Bibliotheque/Preferences for French users). You can also do it from the Terminal this way (and keep your original file) :

cp ~/Library/Preferences/iTerm.plist ~/Library/Preferences/net.sourceforge.iTerm.plist

-EDIT-
It wasn’t long for iTerm to correct this « bug » :

Version 0.9.5.0821 includes the following changes:
* Fixed a bug in 0.9.5.0821 that causes loss of preferences when upgrade.

Go download the new version at http://iterm.sourceforge.net/download.shtml