Music – Instruments – Electrical musical tone generation
Reexamination Certificate
2000-06-27
2001-05-15
Witkowski, Stanley J. (Department: 2837)
Music
Instruments
Electrical musical tone generation
Reexamination Certificate
active
06232541
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and a method for transmitting data in the MIDI protocol, and more particularly to a data sending apparatus and method and a data receiving apparatus and method in which contents data are converted to the MIDI format at the sending end and from the MIDI format at the receiving end for the data transmission in the MIDI protocol, and in which control commands for managing the data storing operation in the receiving end are further transmitted from the sending end in the MIDI protocol. The present invention also relates to a computer readable medium containing a computer program to configure and operate the above apparatuses and methods.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There have conventionally been known in the art various electronic musical apparatuses in a broad sense such as a keyboard apparatus which outputs musical performance data representing progression of tones according to manipulations of the keys and the controls in the keyboard apparatus, a tone generator apparatus which receives such musical performance data and generates and outputs musical tone signals according to the received performance data, a sequencer which automatically reads out stored musical performance data in a sequence with respect to time progression and generates and outputs tone signals according to the read-out musical performance data or outputs the read-out musical performance data per se, a data filer which receives such musical performance data and records and manages such data, and an electronic musical instrument including a keyboard and a tone generator, among which musical performance data are transmitted according to the MIDI protocol via MIDI interface circuits included in the respective electronic musical apparatuses. There have recently been introduced personal computers which incorporate MIDI interfaces, and generate, edit or record musical performance data therein and transmit such musical performance data to other electronic musical apparatuses using the MIDI format.
However, in the above-mentioned transmission of musical performance data according to the MIDI protocol, various control commands are not transmitted together with the performance contents data representing progression of tones, but only Ack/Nak messages are transmitted at the sending end and the receiving end to indicate that the data have been sent or not and that the data have been received or not, in which such Ack/Nak transmission is made per transmission of a prescribed small size (e.g. 256 bytes) of musical performance data. This causes a considerable amount of overhead and requires much time for transmitting musical performance data, which is disadvantageous for transmitting a large amount of musical performance data, especially in the case of transmitting waveform sample data. Further, in the case of transmitting the waveform sample data, the waveform sample data are transmitted as part of the musical performance data, and therefore the waveform sample data received in the receiving apparatus will be stored in a particular memory area within a tone generator or else which is unique to the receiving apparatus. Thus according to the conventional sending apparatus and receiving apparatus having a MIDI interface circuit, the storage area for the musical performance data cannot be arbitrarily designated in the receiving apparatus from the control of the sending end.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is, therefore, a primary object of the present invention to solve the above-mentioned drawbacks involved in such conventional apparatuses or methods of sending or receiving musical performance data in the MIDI format and to provide an improved data sending apparatus and method and an improved data receiving apparatus and method which enable transmission of the data including musical performance data and control commands which may not follow the MIDI protocol and which data sending apparatus can control the data storing operations in the data receiving apparatus, for example, by detecting available storage devices (HDD, FDD, etc.), requesting directory or file information, and designating the storing area. It is also an object of the present invention to provide a computer readable storage medium containing a program executable by a computer to configure such a data sending apparatus and a data receiving apparatus as mentioned above and to perform such a data sending method and a data receiving method as mentioned above.
In order to accomplish the object of the present invention, the invention provides a data sending apparatus comprising: a first data storage device which stores contents data such as musical performance data in a non-MIDI protocol; a MIDI interface for sending out data according to the MIDI protocol to a data receiving apparatus having a second data storage device; a data read-out device which reads out the contents data from the first data storage device; a to-MIDI data converter which converts the read-out contents data in the non-MIDI protocol to data in the MIDI protocol; a data output device which outputs the converted contents data in the MIDI protocol through the MIDI interface for sending out; a control command generator which generates control commands in the MIDI protocol for controlling data storing operations of the second data storage device in the data receiving apparatus; and a command output device which outputs the control commands in the MIDI protocol through the MIDI interface for sending out.
According to the above mentioned structure of a data sending apparatus, the data transmission can be conducted efficiently without increasing overhead and further the data which are not in the MIDI protocol can be transmitted according to the MIDI protocol. Further, according to the present invention, the sending end can control the storing operations in the receiving end such as by designating the storing areas for the data in the storage device in the receiving apparatus. This increases system versatility in handling data transmission according to the MIDI protocol, and greatly improves the conveniences of the apparatuses incorporating the data transmitting devices according to the present invention.
The present invention further provides a data receiving apparatus comprising: a data storage device for storing contents data such as musical performance data in a non-MIDI protocol; a MIDI interface for receiving data according to the MIDI protocol from a sending apparatus, the received data containing contents data for being stored in the data storage device and control commands for controlling data storing operations of the data storage device; a from-MIDI data converter which converts the contents data in the received data under the MIDI protocol to contents data in the non-MIDI protocol; and a storage control device which controls data storing operations of the storage device to store the converted contents data in the non-MIDI protocol based on the control commands contained in the received data in the MIDI protocol.
According to the above mentioned structure of a data receiving apparatus, the data reception can be conducted efficiently without increasing overhead and further the data which have been converted into the MIDI protocol for the transmission purpose can be reconverted back into the original non-MIDI protocol for the local storage in the receiving apparatus. Further, according to the present invention, the storing operations such as designation of the storing areas in the receiving end can be controlled from the sending end by means of the transmitted control commands in the MIDI protocol. This increases system versatility in handling data transmission according to the MIDI protocol, and greatly improves the conveniences of the apparatuses incorporating the data receiving devices according to the present invention.
As will be apparent from the above description, a combination of the data sending apparatus and the data receiving apparatus will constitute a data communication system accordin
Rossi & Associates
Witkowski Stanley J.
Yamaha Corporation
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