Posted
This takes a moment to explain.
First, I recognize that updating of the GUI is being planned and is of high priority. I've expressed my preference for a scheme like in Sony Acid Pro with tabbed, dockable and scalable 'secondary' windows with the basic arrangement window always visible in the upper half of the main window frame ... with it's current structure of the four tabs for Instrument, Progression, Harmony and Mixer on the left and the other current panel on the right. 'Secondary' windows would reflect all other types of windows in Synfire other than the arrangement window.
What I propose for Edit Window would fit in that scheme nicely as a 'secondary' window, but it would also work even in the current design (with some superb coding, of course!).
What I would like to see is something similar to the Cubase 'Track Edit' window with respect to its ability to update itself as different tracks are selected in the main GUI to the selected track and also due to its 'drop down menu' at the upper left where you can select the other tracks by name and immediately update to them. Any of you who use Cubase will know exactly what I mean. I imagine there is similar funciton in other DAWs, but I don't know.
For Synfire this could be a hierarchy of Container Name followed by Instrument Name.
The beauty of this scheme is that you can set up your Edit window, select a parameter to work on and rapidly move back and forth with the 'drop down menu' to work on your other tracks with the same parameter and at the same point on the time line. This is a very quick, efficient and powerful work flow.
The ability to open additional Edit Windows could be retained for those who favored it, but personally I would be happy with this scheme to select other instruments from different containers while maintaining the same edit window and layout.
Prado