EDIT several times will back you out of a series of menus and bring you back to the
top-level LIVE-mode screen.
The Ztar Operating System has a LIVE mode and an EDIT mode. Pressing the
EDIT key from the LIVE-MENU enters the top-level SONG-EDIT screen to alter the
various setup parameters of the fingerboard, pads, triggers, joystick and pedals.
The ZTAR will continue to play while in the EDIT mode. Make sure to exit back to
the LIVE mode after completing an edit, however, as you may accidentally change
one of your setups by hitting the joystick or another programming key. Also, the
instrument will play a bit faster in the LIVE mode, as there it isn’t the necessity to
update any Edit screens
Programming, Mode Selection and Data Entry:
Many of the programming features on the ZTAR have been implemented in the
screen/menu system and also in shorthand fashion on the front-panel “hot-keys”. In
the screen/menu system the eight “soft” keys surrounding the display will be
physically near their selections on the screen. Use of the hot-keys will save a
number of keystrokes. Also, the joystick is used both as a performance tool and a
data entry device in conjunction with the data Up/Down buttons when programming
the system.
“Chase” features:
In several of the menus a String, or a Key, or other Sensor may be selected by
simply touching it, in addition to using the Display keys
A little more Terminology
In an effort to make the ZTAR as fully user-programmable as possible some
existing MIDI concepts have been expanded and are slightly re-defined:
Patches for the ZTAR are called SONGS. A Song stores the complete configuration
for the instrument. This includes all of the fingerboard splits/zones, transpositions,
patches, tunings, and all of the MIDI control assignments for the SENSORS,
including any recorded Notes, Chords or Drums, Continuous Control EFX, and a
list of other parameters. SONGS may be thought of as ‘Kits’ in the sense used in an
electronic percussion device, a set of assignments of hardware Triggers to MIDI
output functions and the player’s response setups for all of the hardware. There is
no analogous term in guitar playing so we chose ‘SONGS’ as you might use a
different configuration for each song in a set, different voices, etc.
HOTKEYS/ FUNCTION KEYS
Most of the function keys are intended to serve the Ztar Fingerboard which is not
installed in this instrument. However, due to the low-volume nature of the
FloorPads we re-used our existing hardware in the Y-10 controller rather than
