The Signal Flow Designer enables you to create and modify signal flows architecture. It includes a variety of components that you can use to design a signal flow. The components in the Signal Flow Designer are represented as blocks and you can connect them using virtual connections to create a signal path. You can also adjust various parameters of each component to customize the signal flow according to your needs.
Signal Flow Designer includes the following components:
The toolbox is a library of audio objects. In SFD, you can create compound audio objects by combining multiple audio objects into a signal audio object. These compound audio objects can be saved and reused in the same and other signal flow designs. Additionally, you can import compound audio objects into SFD using the import option.
Use the search option to locate the audio object in the toolbox. To find the desired audio object, enter the first three or more characters in the toolbox’s search bar.
The audio objects displayed in the toolbox are based on the default device audio library version.
Regardless of the audio Library, two objects are always available in the Toolbox by default. The objects “Frame” and “Textbox” can be found in the Shapes category in the toolbox. These are not audio objects, and they are not considered when tuning or sending the signal flow to the device.
The frame object is used to highlight certain blocks in the signal flow designer. Whereas the Textbox object is used to provide additional information to the user of the Signal Flow.
For more information about various audio objects, refer to the Audio Object Description Guide.
This section contains several operations you can perform in a signal flow design.
Following are operations you can perform in a signal flow design.
- Reset a Processing state(s): In signal flow designer you can reset all audio objects processing state to ‘Normal’ by using the “Reset” button.
- Connect Audio Blocks: When designing a signal flow for processing audio signals, there are different types of audio objects that are used to create the audio signal. To create a meaningful audio signal, you need to connect these blocks in a signal flow. This concept is called routing.
Routing is the process of directing an audio signal from one block to another. In a typical signal flow, various audio objects are connected from input to output using virtual connections to route the audio signal from one block to another.
You can connect all audio objects with a single click using the “Connect Block” option. Later, you can modify the connections as per your requirements. - Saving Signal Flow Designer: When working with a signal flow designer, it’s important to save your work regularly to prevent data loss. This ensures that you can return to your project at a later time. Click on the “Save” option to save the changes in the signal flow design.
- Extracting Audio Object: Extract can be performed only when valid audio objects are selected. Currently, the GTT does not support FIR MIMO, EOC, RNC, Audio IO, Control IN, or Compound Audio Object extraction.
Extract will be enabled only if Signal Flow is saved.
For extracting audio objects, you need to select one or more audio objects from an existing signal flow and extract audio objects into a Compound Audio Object. The application will replace the extracted audio objects with the Compound Audio Object in the signal flow.
For more details about compound audio objects, refer to Compound Audio Objectt.
- Search Audio Object: Using the search option you can locate specific audio objects in the signal flow designer. The located audio object is highlighted in yellow color.
You can use the “<<” and “>>” buttons to move between the highlighted audio objects. When you click the “<<” or “>>” search buttons, the highlighted audio object will be repositioned to the center of the screen. - Redo/Undo: The redo and undo option allow you to redo or undo the changes that you have made to your audio project.
Press Ctrl+Z to perform Undo operatoion and Press Ctrl+Y to perform Redo operation. - Complier Report: The compiler report displays a warning or error message entry item for each invalid audio object.
The following are the few factors responsible for invalid signal flow design:
- If the audio object tuning version differs from the existing audio object type in the Device Associated Audio Library.
- Due to the addition or modification of parameters of an audio object, it might mismatch with the signal flow design state.
To resolve the issue, you need to upgrade the audio object, refer to Upgrade Audio Object for more details.
You can view the properties of an audio object used in the signal flow design through the Properties view. This allows you to configure the properties of the audio object to suit your requirements. The properties can be viewed by selecting a specific audio object.
Audio Object Modes
Some audio blocks support multiple configuration modes. For instance, the AudioIO block can function as both an audio input and an audio output block. Similarly, the Biquads block can operate either as a parameters-based or coefficients-based Biquad.
In previous versions of the Signal Flow Designer, each mode of an audio block was displayed as a separate audio block. However, in the latest version of the tool, it is assumed that every block can support at least one configuration mode.
For those blocks that support multiple modes, an extra drop-down field is now shown on the properties view. By selecting an appropriate value from the drop-down, you can modify the mode.
Control Configuration
In the latest version of GTT, the Signal Flow Designer supports control routing from the control hub (Master Control) to xAF framework instances.
The ControlIn block is used to configure a control flow for each instance. By designating certain control signals to the output pins of a ControlIn block within a given instance, you can decide which control signals that instance will receive. To make the process easier, a new tab is added to the property configuration.
Using that tab, you can choose from a wide list of available control signals and associate them with control outputs of the ControIln block. Re-ordering of the items in the control signals grid is done via the Up and Down buttons.
You can also define your own custom control signals (Control IDs) and assign them to control pins.
When a custom Control ID is defined for a device, it can be accessed in the Control In tab of any ControlIn audio object, along with the predefined Control IDs.
In terms of tuning, the custom control signals are treated as part of the Master Class object, just like the predefined control signals.
Mapping Custom Panel
Open any audio object property view, enable the “Is Custom Panel” option, and select the appropriate custom panel from the drop-down list.
For details about creating a custom panel in GTT, refer to the link Create a Custom Panel in GTT.
You can access these operations by right-clicking on any audio object and selecting them from the context menu. Below are the options available in the context menu.
- Add Audio Pin Label
- Add Control Pin Label
- Dynamic Metadata
- Open Audio Configuration Panel
- Open column name Configuration panel
- Upgrade audio object
- Processing State
