NAME

       pmidi - A midi file player for ALSA.

SYNOPSIS

       pmidi [ -pclient:port ] [ -l ] [ -ddelay ] file...

DESCRIPTION

       The  pmidi  command  reads  in  the  specified  midi files and plays them through the ALSA
       sequencer.  You can specify on the command line which sequencer port that you wish to use.
       Use the -l option to get a list of possible sequencer ports for your machine.

   OPTIONS
       -pclient:port
              Specify the ALSA port to send the midi file to.

       -l     List the possible output ports that could be used.

       -ddelay
              Delay  after  song  ends.   This  is  used to prevent the last note of a song being
              chopped off early.  The default is two seconds.

   Port numbers
       You can specify client:port numbers in the ALSA_OUTPUT_PORTS  environment  variable.   You
       can  also  supply  a  comma  (or  space if quoted correctly) separated list of client:port
       numbers.  This will allow you to play midi files that use more than 16 channels.

   Examples
              pmidi song.mid song2.mid
              pmidi -p "64:0, 64:1" song.mid

TROUBLE SHOOTING

       Before you start you need to have ALSA installed and configured correctly.  This man  page
       cannot  cover  all  general ALSA topics, but here are a few things to check when things do
       not seem to be working.

   Checking ALSA
       1.  First check that the correct sequencer modules are loaded for your sound card:

           -  For a card with an external Midi connection, you need to load snd-seq-midi.

           -  For the OPL2/3 internal synthesiser you need to load snd-synth-opl3.

           -  For the AWE32/64 internal synthesiser you need to load snd-synth-emu8000.

           -  For the SB Live! internal synthesiser you need to load snd-synth-emu10k1.

           -  (Let me know of any more)

       2a  If you have an AWE32/64 or SB Live! you will need to load the sounds with  sfxload  in
           the same way as for the standard kernel drivers.

       2b  If  you  have  the  OPL3  FM synthesiser you will have to load the FM instruments with
           sbiload.  See note below.

       3.  Make sure that the synth in the mixer is turned up and unmuted if appropriate.

   Before use
       Because you may have more than one sound card and each sound card may  have  several  MIDI
       connections, you have to tell pmidi which one to use.

       First find out what the possibilities are for your system:

       If you run:
              pmidi -l
       it will give you a list of the possible devices that it can play to. On my system I get:

       Port    Client name                      Port name
       64:0    Rawmidi 0 - EMU10K1 MPU-401 (U   EMU10K1 MPU - 401 (UART)
       65:0    Emu10k1 WaveTable                Emu10k1 Port 0
       65:1    Emu10k1 WaveTable                Emu10k1 Port 1
       65:2    Emu10k1 WaveTable                Emu10k1 Port 2
       65:3    Emu10k1 WaveTable                Emu10k1 Port 3
       128:0   FLUID Synth (28152)              Synth input port (28152)
       129:0   Client-129                       TiMidity port 0
       129:1   Client-129                       TiMidity port 1

       Any  of  the port numbers in the first column can be used with pmidi. In the example above
       the first one is the external Midi port,  the  next  four  are  the  internal  wave  table
       synthesiser.    Then   there   are   two   software   synthesisers   running,   FluidSynth
       (http://www.fluidsynth.org) and Timididy.

       If you don't see anything listed then check that the correct ALSA modules are loaded as in
       the section "Checking ALSA".

ENVIRONMENT

       ALSA_OUTPUT_PORTS   Port to use in playing midi file.

SEE ALSO

       playmidi(1)

AUTHOR

       Steve Ratcliffe <sr@parabola.me.uk>

                                           Dec 20 2003                                   PMIDI(1)