Make a session. Shape the sound.

01 · First session

Build, open, and get oriented

SignalForge is a native Linux desktop application. From the repository root, build it once and launch it:

python3 prototypes/phase01/bootstrap.py
./tools/build.sh
./tools/run-desktop.sh

The bootstrap downloads the pinned build toolchain and is only needed for the first setup. To look around without an audio device, launch with --offline.

On launch, open an existing project or create one from the project chooser. Save the project before importing audio, so SignalForge has a project folder in which to keep its media. Plugin downloads work before the first save; saving copies their model files into the project.

The status readout reports the current audio mode, sample rate, position, xruns, plugin delay compensation and processing load. The Session panel and the four mode tabs stay connected to one session: changing views does not make a copy of your tracks. The ? beside each view's title opens a short description of that view.

02 · Projects

Save work and reuse a starting setup

• Open rig / project opens the project chooser. Pick a recent project, browse to another project, or start with a template.
• Save or the standard Save shortcut writes the current session. Unsaved edits are also autosaved. When there is something to repair, a Repair button with a count appears in the transport row; if SignalForge reports an interrupted session, use Repair → Recover to restore its recovery data.
• Template… in Tracks replaces the current session with a built-in or saved template after asking about unsaved work. To keep the current project separate, start a new project from a template in the project chooser. Save your own setup as a template from the template window.
• When a project reports missing media, choose Repair → Relink media… and point SignalForge to the moved file. Missing… lists the remaining dependencies.

Templates provide tracks, routing and processor placeholders. They do not include third-party plugins, device bindings or licensed models: choose the processors and connect the hardware you have installed.

03 · Workspace

One session, four views

The top row is the transport. The left Session panel selects tracks and other nodes, and has buttons to add hardware inputs, tracks, buses, plugins, tuners and the built-in noise gate, and to delete the selection. The tabs open the four views:

Use Full screen or F11 to give the current mode more room. Press F11 again, or Exit full screen, to return to the full workspace. Tracks and Mixer open compact; Large rows in Tracks and Large strips in Mixer are separate settings for each view, and Tracks also has Super compact.

04 · Record and import

Capture audio or MIDI

Set up an audio input

1. Choose + Hardware input… in the Session panel, or + Input… in Tracks.
2. Name the input, choose mono or stereo, and select the device's audio output port or ports. Choose Connect later in Routing if you want to patch it there.
3. SignalForge creates the input, a monitored track and a recording tap together. Repeat to add another source.
4. In Tracks, arm the track with Rec, set its level, and press the transport's Record button. Stop to finish the take.

Each recording lands on a new layer of the track named Take N, and every layer plays until you mute it; see Layers and takes. A take records only what arrives at the track: the clips already on it are heard while you record but are not recorded again.

A normal audio track can record when it has an input. If Rec is disabled, connect an input to it in Routing or add a hardware input. MIDI tracks carry notes to an instrument plugin and monitor its audio through Master; they do not record hardware audio.

Use the click and count-in

Click arms the metronome for playback and recording. Open its arrow for Audition (hear only the click while stopped), Accent (emphasise the downbeat) and click level. Set tempo and meter in the transport. Turn on Count-in and choose 1 to 8 bars before recording begins. The click is a monitor aid and is not added to the recording.

Loop a range

Select a span with the Range tool and press Loop in the transport; playback repeats that span. Pressing Play with the playhead outside the loop starts at the loop start. Loop recording is for drum tracks set to Loop takes in their Drum setup: each pass lands on a layer of its own, named for its take and pass (Take N · pass 2).

Import an audio file

Save the project, select an audio track, then choose Import audio… in Tracks. WAV, AIFF and FLAC files are supported. Imported audio must use the session's sample rate. The imported media remains separate from the source file.

Import a MIDI file

Save the project, then choose Import MIDI… in Tracks and pick a Standard MIDI File (format 0 or 1). The dialog splits the file into parts, either A clip per file track or Merge each channel across tracks, and gives each part a destination: New drum track, New MIDI track, an existing MIDI track, or Skip. Drums are suggested for a part on channel 10, on a track named for drums, or whose notes read as a kit. Choose Follow the song's tempo, at the playhead's bar, or Use the file's tempo, from the song start, which replaces the song's tempo map and leaves audio clips where they are.

The tracks, clips and tempo are one undo step, and the file is copied into the project. A new drum track gets the kit the song's other drums already play; with no kit to follow, its Drum setup opens so you can choose one.

05 · Tracks

Arrange audio, layers, and ranges

In Tracks, click a clip to select it. Ctrl+click adds or removes clips from the selection. Drag a clip to move it in time, onto another track, or between layers; drop it on a track's controls to put it on a new layer. Hold Alt while placing a clip to ignore the beat snap. Delete removes the selected clip. Double-click an audio clip to open its editing controls, or a drum clip to open it in the drum editor.

Grab

Move and select clips. Drag the empty timeline to pan the view.

Range

Drag inside a clip to select time within that clip only. Hold Shift as you start the drag to select whole tracks, or drag on the ruler to select every track. Use it to split, remove a span, join compatible split clips, set a fade, edit an envelope, loop playback, or export just that range.

Cut

Click an audio or MIDI clip to split it at that point. The two new faces get a short declick fade on audio.

Envelope

Edit audio clip gain points. Use this tool when you want to draw or move the gain line; switch back to Grab to move clips normally.

The timeline ruler is labelled in time. Click it to move the playhead, playing or stopped; Ctrl+mouse wheel zooms the timeline. The − and + buttons zoom out and in, and Fit fits the recorded region into view. Musical placement snaps to the session beat grid unless Alt is held. Plugin rack, at the end of the row, docks the selected track's plugins under the timeline as large cards.

Tempo… opens the tempo map. Each row sets a frame, BPM and time signature; the first row starts at frame zero. Tempo changes guide new musical placements and snapping. Existing audio and notes stay at their frame positions, so changing tempo does not time-stretch them.

Work with a time range

With Range selected, drag inside a clip to bracket time within it. Edits on that bracket change only that clip: they never move later material or touch other layers or automation, and the bracket's caption says clip. Hold Shift as you start the drag to bracket whole tracks, dragging up or down to take in more; start on the ruler to bracket every track.

Split at range (S) cuts clips at the bracket edges. Join rejoins adjacent split clips when they are compatible. Delete removes the bracketed material; when the bracket covers every track, the time is removed and the gap closes. Clear or Escape removes the bracket without editing.

Trim and loop clips

Open Clips / layers… to choose a clip and an action. Properties / move / fades / layer exposes the clip's timeline start, fade lengths and the silence before or after each fade in frames, fade shapes, gain, polarity, mute and layer row. Trim to A..B keeps the selected frame span and leaves the source file untouched. Loop: A additional copies repeats the clip as more instances. Split at A, Crossfade into second clip and Delete clip are in the same list.

Layers and takes

Each row of a track is a layer. A track with more than one row shows a strip for each layer with its name (double-click to rename), M, S, a level from -60 to +12 dB, and ×, which deletes the layer together with its clips in one undo step; media files are kept. All layers play together unless muted. Right-click a track's controls for New layer.

Every recording creates an unmuted layer named Take N. There is no comping state: to build a performance, mute the layers you do not want, or copy and cut clip ranges onto one layer with the usual editing commands. S is audition solo: while any layer of a track is soloed, that track plays only its soloed layers. Solo is not saved, exported or baked; mute and level are. A layer's level and mute act before the track's plugin chain, so every layer feeds the same effects.

Track headers include mute, solo, record arm, input/output, level and track actions. Use the up/down controls to reorder tracks. Delete removes the track; deleting a drum track also removes its DrumGizmo kit and the drum buses only that kit feeds. Detach makes a playback-only copy of a track's clips, layers and processing while leaving the original input available for another take. Bake renders the track's sound to a new playback-only track while leaving the source unchanged.

Row sizes

Tracks opens with compact rows. Turn on Large rows for taller track and layer rows with the same controls. Super compact folds every track but the selected one, layers and all, to a thin row with its name, mute, solo, arm and meter; select a track to open it with its fader, plugin chain and layers. Each setting is remembered.

06 · Clip editing

Fades, gain, and clip-level controls

Clip edits are non-destructive: they change the session's instructions for playing source media, not the original audio file. Stop playback before structural edits, plugin changes, project opening, undo or redo.

Fade and crossfade

Drag the square handles at the top corners of an audio clip to set fade-in and fade-out lengths. The curve drawn on the clip is the curve playback uses, and the length appears while dragging. Right-click a fade to choose Linear, Constant power, Symmetric, Slow or Fast, or turn it off. A switched-off fade plays at full level and keeps its length and shape.

Each fade also has a start handle at the foot of its curve. Drag it inward to begin the fade later: the clip is silent from its edge up to that point, and the fade's full-level end stays where it was. Crossfaded ends have no start handle.

Linear suits related or phase-aligned material; Constant power is a general choice for unrelated material; Symmetric makes a gradual S-shaped transition. Slow brings a fade-in up sooner; Fast keeps it low longer. Fades may overlap; where they meet, the lower curve determines the level.

Overlapping clips do not crossfade automatically. Open Clips / layers…, choose two overlapping clips on one track and apply Crossfade. The paired fades default to constant power; choose linear for related material. Drag either paired handle to shorten the overlap with both fades following. To make it longer, move the clips further over one another and apply Crossfade again.

On a track with its own plugins, clip fades shape the processed output, so an amp or gate still receives the normal source level while the fade brings its sound in or out. A fade-out also silences the effect's tail at the clip's end; switch the fade-out off to let the tail ring.

The Clips / layers… dialog also exposes exact fade lengths in frames, shape choices and on/off controls. The clip menu keeps the same properties reachable without dragging a handle.

New recordings, imports and cut edges receive a short fade to soften abrupt cuts. To set a fade from a bracket, choose Set fade in from range or Set fade out from range from the clip menu. The bracket must touch the corresponding clip edge.

Region gain, polarity, and mute

Right-click a selected clip for clip commands, or open Clips / layers… to edit its values directly. Boost and Cut change region gain by 1 dB; Reset returns it to 0 dB. Invert polarity reverses the signal's sign. Mute silences the clip without removing it. These commands can act on a multi-clip selection.

Normalise… adjusts region gain so a clip's source peak reaches the target (−1 dBFS by default). Choose each clip's own peak or one shared adjustment for the selection. The scan ignores fades and the gain envelope. Normalising changes clip metadata, not the media file.

The waveform preview reflects region gain and marks peaks that would exceed 0 dBFS. A badge shows non-zero gain and inverted polarity. Muted clips are hatched and labelled. Clip mute silences audio and MIDI alike; layer mute silences a whole row.

Draw a gain envelope

Choose the Envelope tool. Click inside an audio clip to add a point; drag a point to change its time or level. Points stay in order. Time snaps to the beat grid and levels near unity snap to 0 dB; hold Alt to bypass snapping. Double-click a point or select it and press Delete to remove it. The line interpolates in gain between points; an empty envelope leaves the level unchanged.

Right-click a clip for Envelope active to keep the line but bypass it, or Reset envelope to clear the points. With a bracket over the clip, choose Envelope from range… to raise or lower that span; it adds short ramps at bracket edges inside the clip. The envelope stays attached to the source audio when trimming, and split, loop and paste carry it with the clip.

Duplicate, copy, cut, paste, nudge, and layers

These commands appear in the clip menu and work as shortcuts while the timeline has focus. Copy and paste operate on clips, so text fields keep their normal text-edit shortcuts.

To paste onto an empty track, select its track in the Session panel, click the ruler to set the playhead and press Ctrl+V with the timeline focused. A paste keeps fades, gain, polarity, mute, notes and envelope, and assigns new clip identities. The clip clipboard is cleared when you open or create a project or apply a template.

Nudge moves the whole selection by a common amount. If any clip would move before the start or beyond the frame limit, the move is refused and SignalForge identifies the clip.

07 · MIDI and automation

Edit notes and control changes

MIDI clips and notes

Create a MIDI track with + Track…, choosing MIDI track, and connect it to an instrument plugin. To bring in a song's parts from a file, use Import MIDI…. MIDI notes… opens a note-list editor, not a piano-roll canvas; drum clips have their own drum editor. Each row lets you edit a note's start within the clip, duration, pitch, velocity and MIDI channel. Start is measured in quarter-note beats from the clip start: for example, 0.25 is a sixteenth note. The timeline shows note onsets in the clip.

Recorded MIDI messages are retained alongside the editable notes. MIDI clips can be split, moved, looped, duplicated and pasted like other clips. Audio clip gain, fades and polarity do not change MIDI note playback; clip mute and layer mute do.

Track automation

Choose Automation… to select a track or other graph node and a control, such as gain, pan or a hosted plugin parameter. Automation points are entered as frame/value rows and use step changes.

Read

Play the saved automation lane.

Write

Record the current control value through playback.

Touch

Write while you move or hold the control, then return to the saved lane when you release it.

Latch

Write while touched and keep the last value until playback stops.

Mixer faders and pan controls can write automation. For hosted plugin parameters, use the host controls or MIDI learn; changes made directly inside a plugin's own editor are not recorded as automation.

Map a MIDI controller

Open MIDI learn…, choose a control, its range and absolute, momentary or toggle behavior, then move a note, controller or program change on the connected MIDI input. Absolute CC assignments can use soft takeover to avoid a sudden jump when the controller and software values differ. Bindings apply to that input and are saved with the session; duplicate assignments are reported. Use the same window to remove a binding. A note release ends a momentary touch; for a continuous controller, use Release touch when you want to end it.

08 · Drums

Program drums and play them through a kit

Make a drum track

1. Choose + Track… and pick Drum track. Its Drum setup opens; reopen it later from Setup… in the track header.
2. Choose the Input your pad kit plays into, its Channel and the Drum map that names its notes. Learn this pad maps a pad you hit to a lane.
3. Pick a Record mode: New take, Loop takes (one layer per pass of the loop) or Overdub (adds hits to the clip under the take). Tidy after recording opens Tighten timing on each new take.
4. Under Sound, choose DrumGizmo kit…, or Add instrument… for another instrument plugin, or Route to MIDI output… to play external gear. Kit coverage lists the lanes the kit has no sound for.

A capture on a plain MIDI track can become a drum track from the drum editor with Make drum track, keeping its clips and input.

Choose a kit

SignalForge plays DrumGizmo kits you have downloaded and unpacked; it bundles no kits, and DrumGizmo must be installed. The kit chooser lists All kits, Favourites and Recently used, with a search, each kit's variations (such as basic and full) and the kit's MIDI map. Listen plays the clip through the selected kit from its start without changing the track. Library settings…, or Kit library… in the drum editor, chooses the folders your kits are in.

Choosing a kit is one undo step. SignalForge adds a DrumGizmo node that the track's MIDI plays, groups the kit's mics into stereo drum buses named after the track (Kick, Snare, Toms, Hi-hat, Overheads, Room and Other, as the kit needs) and sends each bus to Master. The track then carries only MIDI, so the bus faders shape the kit. Kits stay where you keep them; if one moves, Drum setup offers Relink kit….

Edit hits in the drum editor

Open a clip by double-clicking a drum clip, right-clicking any MIDI clip and choosing Open drum editor, or selecting one clip and clicking Drum editor in Tracks. Create beat in Drum setup makes an empty four-bar clip at the playhead's bar and opens it. The editor docks under the arrangement; Enlarge gives it most of the window, and Full screen fills the screen with it under the transport, so the pattern can play while you edit. Escape, F11 or the toggle leave full screen.

Select

Click, Shift+click or drag a box to select hits. Drag them to move by the grid, onto another lane by dragging up or down; Alt+drag copies.

Draw

Click or drag to add a hit in each cell you pass. In the Step view, clicking a hit removes it.

Step

Switches between the step grid and free time. Changing the grid or the view never moves a hit.

Each lane has ▶ to hear it, M to mute it in this clip (saved with the clip) and S to solo it while you listen (not saved). Drag a bar in Hit volume to set a hit's velocity, or Ctrl+drag to ramp several. The inspector on the right edits the selection's position, lane, velocity and gate. Every gesture is one undo step, and Escape during a gesture puts everything back.

Step between the track's drum clips with ‹ and › or [ and ], or pick one from the list between them. Context shows the track's other drum clips dimmed around the one you are editing; double-click one to edit it. All layers or This layer chooses which clips take part.

Build beats and songs

The Build menu has Patterns… (Ctrl+Shift+P) for the pattern library, Save selection as pattern…, fills for a lane, and bar tools such as accenting the beats or duplicating a bar onto the next. Song drums…, also in Drum setup, builds a whole song from one of fourteen styles, from rock and funk to bossa nova and a 6/8 ballad. Arrange its sections (intro, verse, pre-chorus, chorus, bridge, solo, breakdown and outro), each with a length, an energy and an optional fill and crash, adjust swing, humanize and dynamics, then Create it at the playhead's bar or after the track's last clip. Each section becomes a clip you can edit on its own, and the whole song is one undo step.

Tighten timing (Ctrl+Shift+Q) previews grid and swing corrections before you apply them, and Feel… adds offsets, velocity shaping, humanize and groove. The drum editor guide lists every gesture and key, and DrumGizmo kits covers kit coverage and relinking.

09 · Mixer

Balance tracks and shape channels

Each channel strip has a level fader, peak meter, pan control, Mute, Solo and Route…. Click a meter to clear its held peak. A selected strip is also selected in the Session panel and other modes.

Tracks, buses, outputs, hardware inputs and hosted plugins appear as nodes. Add a bus from the Session panel, then connect tracks to it using Route… or the Routing view. Use sends to feed shared effects or buses without replacing the main output route. A DrumGizmo kit has a strip of its own with Editor, and its drum buses sit beside it, so you balance the kit on the bus faders.

The built-in noise gate exposes its threshold, range, attack, hold and release controls on its strip. For other processors, open the hosted plugin editor. Mixer opens with compact strips. Turn on Large strips for wider channels; scroll horizontally to reach the rest.

10 · Plugins

Add plugins to a track

1. Stop the transport. Click Add plugin in a track header, + at the end of its effect row, + Add plugin in the plugin rack, + Plugin on its mixer strip, or Add plugin… in Live Rig.
2. You hear the effect while you play and on playback; the recording stays clean.
3. Choose where to look. The first tab, TONE3000, holds the complete TONE3000 plugin, which has its own amps, cabs and effects. My plugins has the built-in effects, the installed LV2, VST3 and CLAP effects and what you have kept, under Pedal, Amp, Cab and Other effects. TONE3000 tones searches TONE3000's amps, pedals and cabs once you Connect… with your own account. Installed plugins lists the complete plugins on this computer.
4. Click Add to track, or double-click the card. The window stays open for the next one, which goes after it.

Try is optional. It puts a plugin on the track on trial, with the transport still stopped, so you can play your instrument through it. Try this instead swaps it for another in the same place. Keep makes it part of the track; Remove trial, Close or Escape drop only the plugin on trial. If the track has no input, Choose an input… opens Routing on the track. Save to My plugins keeps a TONE3000 download for later without adding it anywhere.

Each track shows its effects in one row, in the order the signal passes through them. Click an icon for that plugin's settings: its own editor, in a window sized to fit it under a header naming the plugin and its track, or a slider per parameter. Plugin rack in Tracks shows the same chain as large cards, each with On and Settings. Drag an icon along the row to change the order. Right-click it for Move earlier, Move later, Bypass and Remove from track. Bypass and settings work during playback; adding, moving and removing need the transport stopped. Each change is one undo step, and removing a plugin leaves it in My plugins.

11 · Routing

Connect ports in the graph

1. Open Routing. If a device or application has just appeared, choose Discover.
2. Drag from an output socket or its label to a compatible input. You can start at either end. Audio sockets are green and MIDI sockets are amber; incompatible ports are dimmed.
3. Click a cable to select it. Ctrl+click or drag a selection box to select more than one, then press Delete or choose Disconnect cables.

Drag a node header to reposition it. The mouse wheel zooms around the pointer, as do Zoom + and Zoom −; drag with the middle mouse button or use the scrollbars to pan. Fit frames the graph. Arrange nodes lays it out again. Node positions and hidden-node choices are remembered for the project.

Select nodes and choose Hide nodes to declutter the view without disconnecting them. Restore individual nodes from Hidden nodes, or choose Unhide all. Hide system nodes hides desktop services that are not part of your music setup.

Default output chooses the playback device that every new project routes its Master to. It is an application setting rather than part of a project; a template that already routes its playback keeps its own wiring, and a device that is not connected is reported.

12 · Live Rig

Build a playing chain

1. Select an instrument track in the Session panel and open Live Rig.
2. Choose Add plugin… to add amps, cabs and effects to the selected track from My plugins or TONE3000, as described in Add plugins to a track.
3. Change the order of the track's effects by dragging their icons in Tracks or Mixer. Live Rig uses the same chain.
4. Use Effect editor for the selected processor, Bypass / enable to toggle it, and Instrument level for the track's output level.

Sign in to TONE3000 with your own account; SignalForge does not include or redistribute TONE3000 models. Model / cab IR… remains available for directly choosing a supported plugin's file property. Tuner opens the hosted x42 tuner. The first use adds a parallel tuner tap while the transport is stopped.

Use Load effect preset… and Save effect preset… for SignalForge-hosted effect state, and Choose saved rig… to switch to a rig you have saved. A third-party processor may keep its own preset format in its own application. For a supported plugin format (CLAP, VST3 or LV2), install the plugin on your system before adding it through + Plugin / tuner.

Adding, removing and reordering plugins require the transport to be stopped; bypass and plugin settings work during playback. If a template shows a missing processor, install the named plugin or replace the placeholder with one you have.

13 · Bake and export

Print a track or render files

Bake one track

In Tracks, click Bake in a track header. SignalForge renders that track through its processing and fader, includes the chain's tail, then creates a new playback-only track routed to Master. The source track is left unchanged. Use this to print a sound or keep a rendered copy alongside the editable source. The bake runs in the background under the same progress window as an export; Cancel stops it and adds nothing, and the new track appears when it finishes.

Render a mix or stems

Choose Export… in Tracks, or press Ctrl+E. Select the whole session or, if a bracket is set, that range. Choose a mix or stems, select a format and name, and set a tail length if needed. A tail value of zero lets the chains report their own tails. Files are written to the project's renders folder.

The export runs in the background while a progress window shows how far it has got, how fast it is rendering and roughly how long is left. Cancel stops it and writes nothing. When it finishes, the window lists the files it wrote, and Open folder shows them in your file manager. A real-time export uses the same window, with Stop in place of Cancel.

The formats are WAV (16-bit, 24-bit or 32-bit float), FLAC (16-bit or 24-bit), AIFF (24-bit), MP3 (320 kbps), Ogg Vorbis (quality 7) and Opus. SignalForge does not change the sample rate on export. MP3 is therefore only offered for sessions up to 48 kHz, and Opus only for 48 kHz sessions. At other rates, export WAV or FLAC.

• Mix renders the session as heard through its tracks, inserts, faders, pans, sends and buses. Mute and solo affect the result.
• Stems renders one file per track after its inserts and fader, before sends and buses. Stems line up with the session; track mute and solo do not remove them.
• Record in real time captures the live mix through the audio graph. Use this when the signal path needs external hardware, another application or a plugin that cannot render offline. It takes as long as playback and writes one mix file.

Rendering does not change the session. For a real-time render, playback must run to the end of the chosen range, so turn Loop off first; Stop ends the capture.

14 · Quick reference

Keyboard shortcuts

The clip shortcuts also appear in the clip context menu. Ctrl+C, Ctrl+X and Ctrl+V are scoped to the timeline, so they do not replace the clipboard behavior of text fields. While its grid has focus, the drum editor takes the editing keys for hits; its Edit menu lists them.

15 · Help

Common problems

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