As of TouchDAW 2.5 the XY-Pads view is fully editable und user-customizable. Its default appearance replicates most of the previously hardcoded functionality, but is provided in XML presets and you can change every aspect of it. If you do not need this interface at all, you can also load any other preset into the screen.

For details on editing see Custom Controllers.

If you had previously customized parts of the XY-Pads view, TouchDAW will try to transfer it to the new format. Backups of your previous layout will additionally be created at presets/bup

The screen's default preset(s) provide simple interfaces for finger-drumming, sample-triggering, sound manipulation, surround panning etc.

Layouts are divided into two halves and by default show a drumpad interface and an XY controller. There are two more presets that fill both halves with drumpads or xy-pads (as previously set by the layout preference in the app's settings).

The right / lower part contains two additional tabs holding some standard synth controls plus DAW transport and navigation controls. The latter are wired to the app's first MIDI port and replicate functionality of the app's DAW controller without the need to switch screens.

The third tab also contains a global MIDI channel selector for drumpads, XY-pads and all the synth controls.

As the screen is fully built from XML definitions, none of its contents is set in stone and you can swap out each component against something that better suites your needs.


Finger-drumming demo using the (customized) pad controllers. Courtesy of The Neon Syndicate ( YouTube link )


MIDI Assignments

To change MIDI assignments, set pad titles and colors, bring up the menu and switch the screen into edit mode. Then select single controls to edit their properties.

The drumpads' enclosing group ('Grid') has some options to manipulate settings on all its children in one go:

Select a drumpad for editing and touch it again to switch to the grid's properties (See: 'Editing Groups').

On the editor dialog's 'Control' tab you will then find options to change the number of pads, assign some notelayouts across all the pads, select scales etc.

After using those global options, single pads can still be set to individual settings.

XY - Sensor, mutes and inversions

The XY-pads have an in-control menu that brings up an overlay where you can mute single streams (needed for mapping) and invert their output.

The overlay also contains options to link a device sensor (accelerometer etc.) to the pad.

Controller definitions for the screen are stored in "controller" nodes inside the "xy-pads" node of the currently selected XML setup file: