PyPOD

A tool to control the Line6 POD 2.0 via MIDI

USAGE command line:

usage: pypod.py [-h] [-d PROGRAM] [-e] [-x] [-u] [-s TOFILE | -l FROMFILE]
                [-p DEST_PROGRAM] [-i] [-o] [-c MIDICHAN] [-n PROGNAME]
                [-m MIDICC] [-v VALUE] [-r PROGCHANGE]

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -d PROGRAM, --dump-program PROGRAM
                        Dumps given Program (e.g. 2B)
  -e, --dump-editbuffer
                        Dumps the edit buffer
  -x, --hex             display values in hex instead of decimal
  -u, --human-readable  display data in human readable format
  -s TOFILE, --save TOFILE
                        Saves program data to file
  -l FROMFILE, --load FROMFILE
                        Loads program data from file
  -p DEST_PROGRAM, --put DEST_PROGRAM
                        Uploads program data (from file) to pod
  -i, --info            Shows info about the POD 2.0
  -o, --show-midiports  shows available MIDI-ports
  -c MIDICHAN, --channel MIDICHAN
                        Select MIDI-Channel (default: 1)
  -n PROGNAME, --name PROGNAME
                        Renames the Program to NAME
  -m MIDICC, --midicc MIDICC
                        Send MIDI CC (needs value!)
  -v VALUE, --value VALUE
                        the value to be sent with the CC command
  -r PROGCHANGE, --progam-change PROGCHANGE
                        sends program change

We now have support for a config file. The format is json and it can be either stored in the current working or home directory (name is .pypodrc). Here is a sample:

{
    "MIDI_IN": "USB Midi Cable:USB Midi Cable MIDI 1 24:0",
    "MIDI_OUT": "USB Midi Cable:USB Midi Cable MIDI 1 24:0",
    "MIDI_CHAN": "1"
}

GUI:

There is also a GUI (pypod_gui.py) based on Gtk and built with glade that lets you do all the stuff using a graphical interface.

DEMOS:

I made two short videos, one for the commandline and one for the GUI, here are the links (YouTube):

BUGS:

when turning to many knobs on the pod the GUI freezes. This is probably still the same bug as before when it would just quit with a segmentation fault. I still have no idea how to fix this, for now it is not recommended to change too many settings in a short time on the pod.

TODO:

needs some testing, finding and fixing bugs
get rid of time.sleep() and call updateGUI from callback function when new data comes in

REQUIREMENTS:

mido (pip3 install mido)
rtmidi (sudo apt install python3-rtmidi) -> installing via pip3 did not work on ubuntu 20.04 (ModuleNotFoundError)

GUI version:

python3-gi (sudo apt install python3-gi)

This was written and tested on Ubuntu 20.04, it should probably run on other linux distributions as well, no idea if it also works on windows/mac, tell me if it does ;)

CHANGELOG:

2021-05-17: cleaned up some logging messages, added -l / -log-level argument to pypod_gui.py so the loglevel can be changed on startup (is now CRITICAL, so very quiet by default)
2021-05-16: Re-organized Amp&FX Settings-Tab, added "About"-dialog
2021-05-14: Send MIDI CC and Program Change commands via GUI to the pod, also started to include some css
2021-05-03: The first version I consider somewhat fully functional, especially in the GUI-section. Now I will need to do some extensive testing to find and remove bugs. One bug I already stumbled over is a segmentation fault when changing a lot of settings on the pod directly (this gets now live-updated in the GUI!).
2021-05-01: added logging and support for a simple json-configfile. Also added an option to show the available MIDI-ports for easy config-creation.
2021-04-29: added pypod_gui.py, a GUI wrapper for pypod.py. There are still some widgets to add but it is mostly working.
2021-04-28b : moved the whole thing into a class and reorganized the code. Added function to send arbitrary MIDI CC commands to the pod (-m CC -v VALUE, both are needed)
2021-04-28: Renaming programs works, uploading a previously saved program dump also works, next step would be to dump a program from pod to pc, modify it, then put it back on the pod
2021-03-07: We are now able to save and load settings to a file. The only thing missing is the ability to upload the patch back to the pod
2021-03-05: Added the ability to pass commandline arguments. For now we can dump a program in hex, decimal and human readable format and we can also show device info. I still haven't figured out how all the multi-byte values (delay-time, chorus/flanger/rotary speed/depth... work)
2021-02-28: Dumping one Program works, the callback function needs some more functionality, maybe a testing sysex to check if the pod is even connected/responding
2021-02-26: After playing around with MIDI in general, sysex-Commands and some "reverse-engineering" in [jsynthlib] (http://www.jsynthlib.org/) I am finally able to send stuff to the POD and receive the response. Thanks to [medias.audiofanzine.com] (https://medias.audiofanzine.com/files/lin020-477344.pdf) I now have a pretty good understanding how to talk to a POD 2.0 via MIDI and from now on most of the work will be regular programming stuff.

ChrBarth/pypod