Author: stompbox - Page 3 - unrealBook Manual

Linked Apple Music – I do not recommend. Use local files

Apple Music has become increasingly hostile to Apple Music library files. What I mean is audio files you create and want to store in Apple Music. Even the interface to manually manage songs is grayed out and doesn’t show you your files that are stored locally in the Finder. In addition, unrealBook only supports locally stored audio files in the iTunes/iPad/iPod library. It always only supported local files, but at some point Apple did or did not support linked cloud files. On iOS12 it certainly doesn’t. On iOS15 it seems like it actually does supported cloud based songs.

For this reason, (years ago) I implemented direct linking of supported audio files (mp3, mp4, wav, aif etc) in the unrealBook documents folder. It’s easy to use. Simply Airdrop, dropbox, open in…. any audio file to unrealBook and it will be imported. After that, use the CD Menu->Music Controller ->link audio file button or CD->menu->play audio file->then + button or create a transmogrify play button and use the use file button to link the audio file.

This is way more reliable, has none of the problems of linked Apple Music and is not subject to any iOS changes to Apple Music.

In short, don’t use Apple Music for linked audio files in unrealBook if you can.

iOS15 and unrealBook 4.31/4.32

KNOWN PROBLEMS WITH IOS15

Airturn does not turn pages after entering and exiting drawing mode. This is as far as I know a new problem with the Airturn library and iOS15. This only happens with the keyboard airturn devices. For this reason, I highly recommend that people purchase the newer Airturn Direct line of pedals – BT-200. They will have less problems moving forward and will not be subject to breaking every time Apple releases a new operating system.

WORKAROUND – Go to Songs->All Files and load a song or simply close the window.

Photo to PDF seems to hang after taking picture. Investigating. Will be fixed in 4.36 – will require at least iOS13 or above.

Certain PDFs do not render correctly. Fortunately this is a relatively isolated incident. I have reported this to Apple. This is an IOS15 bug and apple needs to fix it.

Small keyboard appears on bottom right sometimes. – uncheck shortcuts: (iOS15 problem)

I have been using iOS15 since the first beta and unrealBook runs on it. In general, I try to use unrealBook on every beta iOS version. A new “feature” is that the documents folder is exposed to the iPad Files app. Unfortunately there’s some kind of restriction with the Open In….. feature that will not allow it to share to unrealBook from iCloud Documents folders. But you can save into the unrealBook documents folder instead of using the share feature and this works fine. (This will be fixed in the next version). In the Files app, press and hold on your file that you want to copy or move. Then choose copy or move and then move it into the unrealBook documents folder that is now exposed in the Files App. No need to use Open in… or share with the Files App.

File Colors

If you swipe up in the middle of the screen in portrait mode, a file color window will appear. You can choose a color that will allow you to visually tag files. This feature is only available in portrait mode.

iOS/iPadOS 15 so far

7-23-21

unrealBook works with iOS15 for the most basic functions.

MIDI has been tested and works as it always did.

Bluetooth master/slave seems to have issues – while I have made changes, this feature could be on the way out. I recommend Airdrop and Wifi for master/slave. A portable Wifi router is good enough.

Cannot see files added manually

There are only 2 ways that a file would not show up in unrealBook after refreshing the list manually, either the file is not there or there is no .pdf or .PDF on the end of the filename. unrealBook does a query on all the files and then only shows .pdf or .PDF extension files along with misc. other files it needs.

More Functions

Settings>Global>Functions>More Functions

Accept multiple files without renaming: If you are airdropping a bunch of files, you can send multiple files to unrealBook. It will accept all the files overwriting any duplicates. Use this with caution. When this is enabled, the rename window will not appear. If this is off, only one file will be accepted at time and the rename dialog will appear.

Insert songs at top of setlist: When inserting songs into a set list, add them at the beginning instead of the end.

Show waveform with linked audio when this is on, a small waveform will appear to the right of the song listing in the all files popup.

Auto hide toolbars when this is on, the toolbars will hide after 5 seconds of non use.

Don’t offset toolbar lower at top when this is on, the top toolbar will be position at the highest point of the screen that it can be.

Use old drawing routines – (Non Apple Pencil drawing) this is the default and is on. If you have a faster iPad, you can turn this off and the drawing will appear smoother when drawing with fingers. Again, this is for when you are not using an Apple Pencil.

Do not use audio in background when this is on, all audio will stop when unrealBook is put in the background and should give you better standby battery life.

Ignore old file format when on, unrealBook will ignore all old file formats from iOS 4,5.

Apostrophe and sorting

The “smart” keyboard for the iPad Pro seems to type in a different apostrophe character than the iPad itself. This can result in weird sorting problems. To fix this, use the on screen keyboard or set the Smart Keyboard “U.S. International – PC”. Set this in the settings app of the iPad under Hardware Keyboard.

Nothing lasts forever – bluetooth pedals

Having worked on unrealBook for over 10 years now, I have been fortunate to use different bluetooth pedals with unrealBook. Unfortunate as it may be, with barely any use my CODA Stomp now refuses to connect to any device, my iRig Blueturn refuses to connect in a similar fashion with the error “pairing took too long” and now my iRig Blueboard is dropping connections sometimes within seconds and other times after a few minutes.

I am at a loss to explain how a bluetooth pedal can decide to no longer connect. They broadcast to the iPad because I can see them, but when I try to connect they donʻt connect. In fact, the CODA Stomp will lock up with the LED turning off and the power button stuck on.

I have to point out that my Airturn pedals all continue to work and pair.

Remapping an entire index (.csv) to a single PDF

Here is a common problem. The index points to a PDF but the PDF name is not the same. One way to fix this is to look inside the index (.csv file) and rename the PDF file to match what is in the index.

Another way is to use the Link to new PDF command. Be aware that this will remap ALL entries in the index to the chosen PDF. So you cannot use this for indexes that point to multiple PDF files. This will basically remap all entires in the index to point to a single PDF.

Here’s how to do this:

1: Open an index and press Edit Index

2: Press the downward v (in this picture to the right of Colorado)

3: Choose Link to new PDF and choose a PDF file to remap all entries in the index to.

Once you choose a new PDF, all of the index entries will point to the new PDF.

Cannot draw on some PDF on older iPads

Please check the following.

Settings->Globals->Functions->Apple Pencil Drawing. Turn it on temporarily and press the i (info button).

Turn on Apple Pencil Drawing temporarily, then press the i button.

If any of these options are on, turn them off: