Docs/Getting started
The window
How Shadow Rack's window is laid out: the top bar, the MIXER and CHANNEL views, the in-ear layer, Setup and the menus.
Shadow Rack has one window. There's a bar along the top, and under it the rack (or the in-ears) in one of a few views. Setup and – with a WING – the routing open over the whole window, and you close them with BACK TO RACK.
The top bar#
- 1SESSION – the session's name and its menu
- 2FX / IEM – the layer
- 3MIXER / CHANNEL – the view
- 4CPU and DROPS – CPU load and dropouts
- 5LATENCY – what the Mac adds, and the measured loop
- 6AUDIO – the interface, its rate and buffer
- 7SETUP
- 8BYPASS ALL – the panic button
From left to right:
| Element | What it shows | Click |
|---|---|---|
| Logo | SHADOW RACK FX, or IEM in the IEM layer. | -- |
| SESSION | The session's name ("Untitled" until it's saved). A red dot means unsaved changes. | The session menu: New session, Open..., Open recent, Save, Save as..., Show sessions folder. |
| Undo / redo | The two arrows; grey when there's nothing to undo or redo. | Same as ⌘Z / ⌘⇧Z. |
| FX / IEM | Which layer you're in. A green dot next to IEM means the in-ear engine is connected. Only there when you have both Rack FX and Rack IEM. | Switches layer. |
| MIXER / CHANNEL | Which view. In the IEM layer: MUSICIANS / MIX / SOURCES. | Switches view; also closes Setup or the routing page. |
| CPU | How much of each buffer's time the audio processing takes, with a bar: green, yellow above 55 %, red above 80 %. | -- |
| DROPS | Dropouts (clicks) since the start or since you last reset it. Red when it's not zero. | Resets the count. |
| LATENCY | MAC: exactly what the Mac adds between the interface's input and output – one input and one output buffer. LOOP: the whole trip desk -> Mac -> desk, if you've measured it. On top of that, every plugin adds its own delay on its channel. | Opens Setup > Audio. |
| AUDIO | A green or red lamp, the interface's name, then rate and buffer ("48 kHz · 64 smp"). Red with "Waiting for..." when the interface is unplugged, or "No audio device" when none is picked. | Opens Setup > Audio. |
| SETUP | Lit while Setup is open. | Opens or closes Setup (⌘,). |
| BYPASS ALL | Red when everything is bypassed; the bar's bottom edge turns red too. Only with Rack FX. | Every channel plays without its plugins (⌘⇧B). Click again to bring the plugins back. |
On a small screen, like a 14" MacBook, the bar gets narrower, but the read-outs stay readable.
Two layers: FX and IEM#
With both Rack FX and Rack IEM, the window holds two layers:
- FX – the rack: your channels and their plugins. You get there with ⌘1 (mixer) or ⌘2 (channel).
- IEM – the musicians' in-ear mixes. You get there with ⌘3.
In the IEM layer the bar shows the in-ear engine instead of the rack: CPU IEM, its DROPS, LATENCY as OUT and IN, and IEM OUT – where the mixes come out. Clicking LATENCY or IEM OUT there opens the SOURCES page. More in Rack IEM.
If you have only one of the two parts, there's no layer switch – the whole window is that part. Shadow Rack remembers the layer and view it was in when you quit.
Two views: MIXER and CHANNEL#
MIXER shows every channel side by side, with its plugins:
- 1The toolbar: acts on the selected channels
- 2One channel strip
- 3A plugin tile – click it to open the plugin
- 4+ ADD PLUGIN
- 5The send to a New York bus
- 6IN / OUT meters and the channel's delay
- 7BYPASS and OPEN
You click a strip to select it; ⌘-click adds more, ⇧-click selects a range. The toolbar then works on all the selected ones at once. Details in the mixer.
CHANNEL shows one channel: its chain on the left, the plugin you picked big on the right, and every channel along the bottom.
- 1The channel: previous / next, colour, name, BYPASS, the channel menu
- 2Where it comes from and goes to
- 3The chain: one row per plugin, top to bottom in signal order
- 4The channel's New York send
- 5The plugin's name, SIDECHAIN, BYPASS, PIN
- 6The plugin's window, as big as fits
- 7All channels – click one to open it
- 8+ MONO / + STEREO: add a channel
To go from MIXER to a channel, double-click an empty spot on its strip, click its OPEN or press ⌘2. Details in the channel view.
Setup#
Setup (⌘, or SETUP on the top bar) covers the whole window. Its tabs run down the left:
| Tab | What's there |
|---|---|
| AUDIO | The interface, sample rate and buffer, live CPU load and latency, measuring the loop. Setup > Audio |
| PLUGINS | Which of your installed plugins you can pick when you add one. Setup > Plugins |
| MIDI | MIDI controllers mapped to Shadow Rack. Setup > MIDI |
| TABLET | Shadow Rack on a tablet's browser. The tablet |
| ABOUT | Version, this Mac, keyboard shortcuts, credits. Setup > About |
| LICENCE | Your licence, its parts, deactivating. Setup > Licence |
BACK TO RACK at the bottom of the column – or ⌘, again – closes it. The sound keeps playing the whole time.
Menus#
Shadow Rack has five menus in the macOS menu bar. Every item shows its shortcut, and whatever doesn't work right now is greyed out.
| Menu | What's in it |
|---|---|
| Session | New, open, save, save as. |
| Edit | Undo and redo (the item names the step, e.g. "Undo Remove Pro-C 2"), copy, paste, duplicate and remove a plugin. |
| Channel | Add, rename, duplicate, bypass and delete channels; previous / next channel. |
| Plugin | Add a plugin, bypass it, open it in its own window, previous / next plugin, My plugins.... |
| View | Bypass everything, tap tempo, the views and layers, full screen, Tablet..., Setup. |
The Plugin menu works in the CHANNEL view; the Channel menu works when the rack is showing (not in Setup or the IEM layer). Right-clicking a strip, a plugin row or a send opens a small menu with whatever has no button of its own there. All shortcuts are in shortcuts.
The window itself#
- It's an ordinary macOS window, at least 1280 × 720. Full screen is the green button or ⌘⌃F. If you quit Shadow Rack in full screen, it opens in full screen.
- The title shows the session's name, with "(edited)" when it has unsaved changes.
- Short messages appear at the bottom centre for 5 seconds, above plugin windows too. Some carry an Undo button that undoes exactly what the message is about.
- Quitting always asks Quit Shadow Rack? first. The rack is saved automatically either way.
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